"You'll burn in hell just like your no-good father!" was a favourite insult of my mother's, whenever she wanted to scold little five-year-old me for anything. Or ten, fifteen, twenty-five. Whatever. Every time I pressed her on what she even meant, which wasn't often, she never let slip what exactly he did that was so bad.

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Another inane rule she had was that in any circumstances, I could never, ever go down to the basement. Like, it was worse than forbidden. And if I heard anything down there? I didn't. Nope, there most certainly weren't any faint beeps coming from down there. And I suppose it was the muffled, tortured sounds of Elmo that kept me awake some nights.

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Well, I sure wish I didn't hear or see anything. I was told I couldn't do something, and guess I what I did? I did that thing. Fantastic.

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When I was seven, my mum stepped out to mow the lawn in the morning. Without realising that I had awoken. Of course, I was planning to go tell her I woke up and all that, but I walked past the door to the basement. And stopped, for the door was unlocked. The forbidden fruit was sitting right there, ready for me to access it.

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Forbidden for a reason, of course.

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Dumbass me opened the door, only to find a long stairway leading all the way down. And in the room?

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As I walked in, the smell of roasted flesh and coppery blood hit me, undeterred by the large exhaust fans at the corners of the basement. A middle-aged man was pressed between two large black plates extending from his neck all the way to his ankles, with a bit in his mouth and multiple tubes running in and out of him. Shocked, I walked around the machine containing him, I realised that he had no feet, but rather mere bloody stumps hastily cauterised. The site disgusted me, but I still had my doubts.

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Like, why was the burning smell there?

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Curiously, I peeked under one of the plates, and realised what was happening.

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The plates were burning him. Every second that he was there, his skin was continously being singed, burnt to a crisp. If he had any skin there, as all I could see was some white layer on his body almost welded to the plates on both sides.

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"Oh my god," I whispered, trying my very best not to throw up all over him.

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I was horrified — revulsed even — but I had to know more. I circled around the other side of the machine, and noticed that there was a lever there. Once again, I had to pull that lever. Curiosity got the better of me.

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Well damn, that was a mistake. Immediately, the bit inside his mouth was pulled out. And in a move that just made everything worse, a minute later, he woke up.

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He turned his head to me, and started screaming. His intense screams of agony ricocheting off the grey walls of the basement brought chills to my spine. Oh god, remembering those still terrify me. This memory's worse than a nightmare!

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He screamed hoarsely for a solid minute, though it felt like much longer to me, not stopping even as he spewed blood all over himself. By the end, I understood what he was trying to tell me all the time.

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"I CANNOT STAND IT! KILL ME! KILL ME! PRESS THE BUTTON AND LET ME DIE! THIS IS AGONY!" he roared, before making a sickening gurgling sound in his throat.

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"Who are you? What do I do?" I yelled back in terror.

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More coppery blood spewed out from his nose and mouth as my mum ran down into the basement.

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"You, get out!" she said as she pushed me up the stairs. "And never breathe a word about your fath- about this!"

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As I ran up, not wanting to bear witness to any more of that gory scene, the noise got softer before eventually going away entirely. After half an hour, my mum came up, and that was the end of it. We didn't discuss that event ever again, not that either of us was willing to.

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In my thirty-five years of life, this is still the worst experience I've ever had. Period. I have no doubt that it was my father suffering down there for years and years in the hell of my mum's making, but not knowing what happened afterwards will always gnaw at me. My damned curiosity got me into that situation so many years ago, but I still wanted to know more!

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And she passed away last week. Now, maybe, its time to revisit the basement.

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