Urbana Des Moines drove up the winding road to her new rented living arrangement. On either side of the road were craggily old trees who's leaves littered the forest floor, a little odd, considering it was only August. The winding old road was well kept despite it being a gravel road. Eventually, Urbana made it to the front fence of the property, beyond the fancy, gothic fence stood a large, black, Victorian style mansion. Urbana still couldn't believe how cheep the rent was and was starting to second guess coming here for fear of becoming a "true story" that a horror movie would base on her. Urbana started to get out of her run down blue mini-van when the gothic black gates opened on their own. Yep, totally not creepy.

Not seeing anywhere else to park, Urbana parked near the front door. As she got out, she felt like the two gargoyle statues that sit at the bottom of the stairs to the front door were watching her.

"You two are the most handsomest looking boy's I've ever seen," Urbana cooed to them as convincingly as she could to the ugly statues. She felt ridiculous but she didn't feel scared of them anymore.

Urbana walked up the stairs to the black double doors, then picked up a silver knocker that was in the shape of a human skull and knocked three times as loudly as she could. She really hoped she wasn't going to have to deal with any body snatchers or murderers or anything that'll want to physically hurt her.

The door creaked open and an eye could be seen through the crack a foot or so above her.

"Uh, Hi. I'm Urbana Des Moines. I'm here about the rented room you guys posted in the paper," she said.

The eye blinked then as the door opened farther, Urbana could clearly see the six-foot-tall man in a butler suit who looked like a zombie in every way except for the rotting flesh and smell. The giant zombie man motioned for her to come in.

Urbana gave him a nervous smile, "Thank you," and she walked into the mansion.

The inside was huge, like the outside gave you the impression that it would be huge on the inside, but you're never really prepared for it despite that. The entryway looked to be two stories tall with three chandeliers lighting the area, giving what could be a gloomy room a soft white glow. There were several items in the immediate area that added to the spooky mansion; furniture engraved with human skeleton parts on them, animal skulls that weren't just deer heads sat on some of the shelves, there was a painting of a man bleeding out from being repeatedly stabbed in the back hanging on a wall right across the door way, and right next to it was a hanging human skeletal structure. The skeleton seemed to be smiling at her, but Urbana couldn't tell if it was smiling welcomingly or menacingly. On either side of the entryway are two open hallways, one looking like it leads to a living room and other one leading to stairs.

Urbana turned to say something to the butler zombie guy, but the door was already closed, and he was nowhere to be seen.

"How the fuck he do that," she said.

"Hello!" Shouted a bombastic male voice.

Urbana screamed unintentionally and spun around to be met with a well dress man in a black suit coming from the stairs with the zombie butler close behind.

"Ah, yes, you have a wonderful scream," the man said, seemingly genuinely.

"Thank you?" Urbana said.

Urbana thought the man looked quite handsome, not as tall as his butler, but still taller than herself. He had a tinny black mustache on his face and his black hair was slicked back with gel.

The man shook her hand vigorously and said, "We're so glad someone finally decided to take up rent here. We've had that ad out for two years now and you're the first person to come. How soon can you move in?"

Still being shaken, Urbana said, "Rig-right now."

"Darling, you're going to shake her hand off," a calm and collected female voice stated behind the man.

The man turned around and warmly greeted the tall woman by kissing her hand, all the way up her arm, and finally landing one last kiss on her cheek. Then he said, "You look beautiful as always, my love."

She smiled a hauntingly beautiful smile at the man. Urbana was trying to focus only on the woman's smile, since the long black dress that she was wearing was lowcut enough to almost reach her bellybutton and it was wide enough to show a lot of inner side boob.

The woman turned to her and said, "Pardon my sweet husband, we rarely get visitors that aren't family. I am Morticia Addams. This lovely man here is my husband, Gomez, and the man holding your luggage is Lurch.

Confused, Urbana turned around to see that Lurch was indeed holding her two purple suitcases.

Turning back around she said, "Well, I'm Urbana Des Moines—"

"Des Moines," Morticia questioned.

"Oh, honey," Gomez said seductively, "That's French."

"Oui," Morticia said then the two kissed passionately.

Urbana averted her eyes and chuckle uncomfortably.

Noticing this Gomez said, "Oh, where are our manners. Let us show you to your room. I'm sure you've had a long drive."

As Urbana followed the couple up the stairs with Lurch following behind, she asked, "So, is it just the three of you here?"

"Oh, no, there's our children," Morticia said.

"Pugsley and Wednesday," Gomez said, naming them off.

"Then there's my mother," Morticia continued.

"You're allowed to call her Grandmama, if you want," Gomez stated.

"She just loves to cook, so you'll find her mostly in the kitchen," Morticia added.

"Then there's my brother, Fester," Gomez added.

"He's quite the charmer, so be careful he doesn't steal your heart," Morticia stated.

"Heh, literally or figuratively?" Urbana asked.

"Who knows," Gomez said then laughed uproariously.

"Oh, and we can't forget about Thing," Morticia said.

"Of course, we can't," Gomez said, "Little guy's always going around lending a hand. They love to help."

Urbana followed them onto the fifth floor and then they lead her down a hallway with eight oil paintings of men and women's death. They all had silver plaques beneath them stating their name, date of birth and date of death. The eight oil paintings were between four different doors and they lead her down to the farthest one on the right.

"Here's your new home, hope you like spiders," Morticia said as she opened the door.

Urbana instantly hid behind Lurch.

"I most certainly do not like spiders," Urbana shrieked.

A couple of wolf spiders walked out of room.

"Oh, get it away. Get it away. Get it away," Urbana said as she took a couple of steps back.

Morticia calmly picked up the wolf spiders as Gomez said, "Look's like we'll need to ask Pugsley to move his pets when he gets back from school."

"How about we just move me to a new room," Urbana said.

"We can if you want," Morticia said, "But we chose this room specifically for you because it's our finest one."

Urbana danced in place. She didn't want to be rude. These people are weird but they're not malicious, so far at least.

"Okay, how about I wait until Pugsley gets home to move his spiders and then when I check out the room and I can imagine it not being recently infested with spiders, then I'll live in that one room. If not, please put me somewhere else," Urbana said.

"Sounds like we've got our selves a plan," Gomez said, "Lurch, my friend, place her luggage beside the door."

# # #

Urbana sat at the kitchen table while drinking green tea with Grandmama making dinner for the night. The air smelled of spices and herbs she wasn't familiar with, but it smelled great. Grandmama looked like a fairytale witch; hunched back with gray hair and a big fat mole on the side of her chin.

"Uh, do you want any help, Ma'am," Urbana said.

"No," Grandmama said, "I don't have the time to teach you how to cook the way I like. Do you need more tea?"

"Yes, please. It's delicious," Urbana said.

Grandmama walked away from the stove with a black kettle in hand and as she poured, she said, "Thank you dearie, I grow and hunt most of the food myself."

"That's very impressive, Ma'am," Urbana said.

Grandmama cooed and pinched Urbana's cheek, "You're quite a charmer with words, aren't you?"

From a distance the two of them could hear something slam.

"Oh, that must be the children," Grandmama said, "Pugsley has the worst habit of slamming doors."

There was the sound of running that closed in on them as Grandmama went back to work at the stove. Urbana turned towards the sound and a rotund, blond boy wearing a black and white striped shirt with black shorts, barged in. He looked about 11 years old.

"A-ha! You finally made it!" Pugsley said.

"And how many spiders do you own, by the way," Urbana asked.

Pugsley looked sheepish, "I guess you didn't like them, huh? Man, why can't I find anyone that likes spiders as much as I do."

Urbana took a sip of her tea then said, "You've got to understand kid, arachnophobia is a genetically ingrained fear, kind of. You're going to have to look hard for your kin. Now, please take them out of my could-be room."

Pugsley sighed, laid his backpack next to the kitchen entrance then ran off to the fifth floor.

A little girl, who looked to be about 13 years old, walked in watching after her brother. Her long, black hair was braided into two pigtails and she was wearing a frilly black dress with white trimmings on the long sleeves, the skirt and collar. She then turned her attention forward and froze at the entrance, her face unreadable.

"Hello, young lady. I'm Urbana. You must be Wednesday," she said, "Your Grandmama made tea, would you like some?"

Wednesday slightly shook her head no, then walked away without a word.

Urbana shrugged as she turned back around to keep drinking her tea. Then a bald man in a dark green trench coat came into the kitchen from the outside door across from her, holding three dead rabbits by the hind legs. Urbana tried to ignore the blood she saw on the fur of the rabbits.

"Grandmama, your traps managed to catch three rabbits today," Fester said proudly.

"Thank you, Fester dearie," Grandmama said as she took the dead rabbits and placed them in the sink, "And you reset the traps?"

"Yes, Grandmama," Fester said.

Grandmama gave Fester a quick kiss on the forehead and said, "Thank you for your help."

Fester smiled wide, showing off his yellow crooked teeth, then he said, "Awe, your always welcome Grandmama."

Fester then looked Urbana's way and she tried to fight the urge to look away.

"Oh, pardon me," he said, "I'm Fester. Sorry I couldn't greet you at the door when you first got here."

"It's fine," Urbana said as she took a sip of her tea, "All I have left to meet is Thing."

"Oh, you're going to love Thing," Fester said, "If you ever need an extra hand, never be afraid to ask for Thing's help."

Urbana noticed that Grandmama was skinning the rabbits and she immediately got up.

"I'm going to go see if Pugsley has removed his spiders by now," she said, leaving the kitchen in a hurry.

Pugsley was nowhere to be seen on the fifth floor, so Urbana took a quick look inside her could-be room. The room really was beautiful. The wallpaper had images of crows and ravens in different positions like flying or sitting on branches. The furniture was very raw looking in the way that it was carved, with curving lines that make you think of a watercolor painting. The bed was in the center of the room and across from the bed was a fireplace that looked like an old tree. The floor was made of black oak and partially covered in a rug that depicted a giant raven eating some grapes. The only human appendage looked item in the room was the hand sitting on top of the fireplace mantle.

"You know this isn't such a bad room," Urbana said aloud to herself, "And there's a lot of room for my stuff."

Urbana then saw that the giant window had a bumped-out window seat. She was delighted and went to check it out. After some time admiring and looking for any stray spiders, Urbana decided that this room would be great to live in for her college days. She then turned to the fireplace to remove the creepy hand, but it was gone. Weird. She went to grab her luggage but then she saw the hand on one of the tops of her suitcases. She picked it up and it waved at her.

"Oh my god!" she said as she dropped the hand.

The disembodied hand landed neatly on its fingertips and crawled to her suitcases. It looked like it was trying to move her suitcase for her.

"Thing, what are you doing," Pugsley said as he walked towards them.

"This is Thing," Urbana gasped.

"Yah, Dad and Uncle Fester like to make jokes about Thing," Pugsley said as he picked up the hand, "I moved all the spiders back to my room and since Thing is out of your room that means we found them all."

"Oh, well, good," Urbana said, breathlessly.

"Also, Grandmama says dinner will be ready in thirty minutes," Pugsley said.

# # #

Urbana sat between Grandmama and Morticia at the kitchen table. Gomez and Morticia were flirting with each other over their food. Fester was asking about Pugsley and Wednesday's day at school. Grandmama was making sure everyone's drinks were full and Lurch was eating slowly and dutifully with Thing on his shoulder. Urbana felt like she's entered a different dimension and left her old body behind, she was still processing the fact that there's a hand without a body just "walking" around.

"What about you," Morticia asked.

Blinking rapidly and turning to the lady of the house, she said, "What?"

"When do you go to school? Or are you out now?" Morticia asked.

"Oh, uh, I go to college next week," Urbana said, "but you won't be seeing much of me around the house 'cause I go to my first day of work tomorrow."

Everyone congratulated her.

"Will you be a demolitionist and destroy buildings," Pugsley asked.

"No," Urbana said, "I'll be working at the Olive Garden that's close by."

"Oh, we know that place," Fester said, "We love going there when Grandmama doesn't feel like cooking."

"Their food is still subpar in comparison to my food," Grandmama stated, "But they're passable."

Urbana had to agree that the vegetables here were the best thing she's eaten, she didn't bother with the rabbit, considering she's a vegetarian.

"What are you going to college for," Gomez asked.

"English major with a minor in art," Urbana said, "I like to draw comic stories."

"I love comics," Pugsley said, "Will you let me read your stuff."

Urbana smiled at him, "Sure kid."

# # #

Urbana had finished unpacking her clothes, toiletries, school supplies, her watercolor sets, her drawing pencils, her for-fun-to-read books, her camera, her laptop, and her five sketch books. When she was satisfied with where she put her stuff, she was about to get ready for bed when Wednesday suddenly appeared in her room. Urbana jumped in surprise.

"Dear Lord, girl, you scared me," Urbana said, placing a hand over her heart.

"Mom wanted me to tell you that you're allowed to decorate this room however you want it," Wednesday stated in a monotoned voice.

"Oh, okay," she said.

Wednesday didn't leave.

"Is there something else you want," Urbana asked.

"Have you found the secret bathroom yet," Wednesday asked.

"A secret bathroom? In this room?" Urbana asked.

Wednesday nodded her head,
Urbana smiled wide, "No I have not. Do you know where it is? Can you show me?"

Wednesday walked over to an empty space between the window and the bed. She then pressed a part of the wall with an image of a crow sitting on a raven, then a door slid open revealing an old-fashioned looking bathroom with a claw toed bathtub and themed with crows and ravens like the rest of the room.

"Your house is so cool, are there other secret rooms?" Urbana asked.

Wednesday nodded her head.

"Do you think you can show them to me when I don't have school or work?" Urbana asked.

Wednesday nodded her head.

"Awesome," she said.