This mild, summer evening, Ned Dunkle and his family are on their way home from a filling dinner at their favorite restaurant; Chili's.
“Mom, my tummy hurts,” complained Bobby, Ned’s son.
“You shouldn’t have eaten so many jalapeño poppers, pumpkin” Ned Told him.
The 2001 Chrysler minivan pulled into the short driveway that leads to the small, two story house. The Dunkle family lives on a private drive with only 4 other houses on the road. The house is surrounded by woods on one side, and a corn field on the other. The house seems to be very old fashioned. Ned had to get out of the car and lift up the garage door by hand.
“The Smiths down the street have a fancy garage that opens by itself! You should see it dad, it seems like magic,” said Ned’s daughter, Olivia. Olivia has hair down to her shoulders, that is usually put up into pigtails.
“We don’t need that, Olivia. We’re perfectly happy with what we have.” Ned’s Wife is a very strict, monotone woman, that always wears a tan sweater with khaki pants. She always has her hair in a tight braid that never seems to come out.
When the family walks into their small house, Bobby immediately goes to his room to lay down. The other three sit in the family room and begin their favorite Saturday night game of Family Scrabble. 

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After a couple hours of competitive word making, the Dunkles were getting tired. They decided to wrap up family scrabble night with one last game before bed. Bobby was still up in bed trying to get rid of his stomach pain, and probably was asleep by now.
“Wow, it got dark out early tonight. It’s only 8:30,” commented Olivia while looking out the window in the living room.
“Fall is just hop, skip and a jump away! It’ll be getting dark before you even change into your jammies,” Ned said to Olivia.
As the Dunkles were picking up their letters to Scrabble, they heard a something outside. It sounded like metal banging together.
“Must be the critters. They’re always getting into trouble,” Ned explained. “I’ll go see what happened.” Ned walked out the sliding door and went around to the front of the house. Sure enough it was the trash can, but he couldn't see any raccoons or possums. He couldn’t figure out how it was knocked over. He set the can back up and went back inside to help clean up. Moments after he returned to the living room, it started to rain. I was coming down hard.
“It wasn’t supposed to rain tonight,” complained Ned’s Wife.
Olivia began to get up and go upstairs to get into bed when there was a loud “CLUNK” and all the lights went out.
“I’ll get the flashlights! The wind must have knocked a tree on the power lines. Should be back up soon.”
“Daddy, what should we do until the power comes back on,” Olivia asked tearing up. ”I’m too scared to go to bed.”
“We could play more scrabble if you want! That’ll get your mind off of it. I can just shine the flashlight on the board.”
The Dunkles sat back down and got Scrabble back out and continued to play. A yawn would come from one of them every so often. They were all tired, but couldn’t get to bed until the power was back on.
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Nearly an hour passed and there was still no power. Ned was getting impatient, so he looked out the window in the dining room window towards the road.
“I can’t see any trees down. And the neighbours have lights on so they must have power. What the golly is going on,” Ned said in a frustrated tone. “I’m going to go out and-”
“Daddy! Why is there a man standing at the side door?” Ned Turned around to see a large figure at sliding door. His heart dropped. Ned could only make out his face. Only, it wasn’t his face. He was wearing a white plastic mask with a great big mouth painted on it and eye holes cut out. Ned’s eyes moved up and down the figure to see a knife in his hand.
“Sweety, go make sure the front door is locked, and go upstairs to the master bedroom. I’ll be up in a second.... GO!!” Olivia and her mom ran out of the living room and upstairs. Ned moved slowly towards the mudroom, watching the man. The man wasn’t moving. His eyes followed Ned out of the room. Ned made it to the mudroom, but could no longer see into the family room. Ned opened up a cabinet and grabbed a flashlight and a pink can of pepper spray. They didn’t have any guns in the house because Ned didn’t know how to use one.
He walked back past the family room and looked for the man, but he was no longer at the door. Ned turned to go upstairs with his family when there was an enormous crash followed by glass hitting the floor. Ned spun around to see a brick had been thrown at the window to break it. Ned waited for the alarm system to go off, but there was nothing. He went to the phone in the kitchen; nothing. He had forgotten the power is out. There was no way to contact the police. Ned ran upstairs to the master bedroom.
“He broke the window. He might be coming in,” Ned said out of breath. “Let’s stay here and keep quiet.” The Dunkles sat and listened. It was quiet for a few minutes. Then they could hear footsteps on the back deck, and into the house, making crunching sounds as broken glass was being stepped on. The listened the sound of the steps up the stairs. They stopped moving.
“Bobby. We forgot about Bobby. He’s still in his room,” Olivia said in sort of a shouting whisper. At that moment they hear a bedroom door creak open.
“Daddy? Is that you?” Bobby’s voice was coming from the hallway.
Ned swung the door open, “Bobby! Get over here!” At that moment a hand reached out and grabbed Bobby’s arm. Ned reached into his pocket for his flashlight and pepper spray. He charged toward the man and sprayed him in the eyes with the spray while shining the flashlight at him. Ned noticed something was different about the man though. He didn’t have the mask on. In fact, it wasn’t the person who was at the door. It was their next door neighbour.
“Chad? Is that you?” Ned asked the man he sprayed.
“Yes, Ned, It’s me! Why did you spray me?”
“I assumed you were the scary guy that broke our window. I’m sorry about that.”
“That s*** really stings, j****, Ned. I came to make sure you guys were okay. Baxter ran out the door and I was out here looking for him and I saw that guy break the window and I yelled at him. I think I scared him off.”
“Boy, if you weren’t here we would be in trouble now wouldn’t we, hehe.”
“Why didn’t you call the cops? Your power out? We should get out there and turn that back on.”
The two guys went outside and saw that the powerline to Ned’s house had been cut; most likely by the mad who was standing at the door.
“Ned, you can head over to my house and call the cops on our phone.” And that’s what they did. Ned was relieved when the police came. He was thankful his family is okay. Hopefully the Dunkles never have another run in with the masked man.