Brent had been a mortician for almost forty years. In fact, he had been involved in the business longer than that. His father had been a mortician, and Brent had worked with him long before he bought the business.

It could be the nature of the work he did, or it could have just been who he was. But it was hard for someone to scare him, and it always was. His friends gave up on taking him to “haunted” places on Halloween because the things that were supposed to frighten him didn’t.

He could remember the night they went to the “Haunted Forest” as a group of teenagers. At one point, a man jumped out of the brush with a mask on, revving a chainsaw. All the others scattered. But Brent immediately saw that there wasn’t even a chain on the saw. How scary is a chainsaw with no blade?

Instead of running, he said, “Did you know your saw has no blade on it? It will be hard to cut wood or anything with that.”

At first, the poor actor was confused when Brent didn’t run. He just stood there, staring at Brent like he was the ghost. Then he slunk away to wait for the next group.

After Brent had worked for years in his mortician business, he got a call from his nephew, Mike. “Uncle Brent, I’m taking classes in pre-med, and I wondered if there was some work I could do with you to give me insights into human anatomy.”

Brent told Mike he was welcome to come work with him and would even pay him for the hours he worked. Mike was excited and said he would start coming on weekends and other days when he wasn’t in school.

Mike was like so many of Brent’s friends from his youth. They all wanted to show that they weren’t scared of anything. When Mike came to the mortuary, he would walk through the chapel into the embalming room and not turn on a light just to show how cool he was. Sometimes, when Brent had to move caskets into the chapel to have room to work, Mike would bump into them in the dark then act like it was no big deal.

One day, when Brent went on a short vacation, he stopped at a little tourist-trap gift shop. He walked through one section, and his movement triggered a mounted fish to start singing. “Take me to the river. Drop me in the water. . .” Brent smiled. He then saw a little box with a sign saying, “Pick me up.” When he did, there was a loud knocking sound from inside the box. Then, a slightly muffled voice said, “Help! Help! Let me out!” Brent grinned. He suddenly had an idea of how to get Mike.

Brent paid a hefty sum for the little box and took it home. On the night that Mike was supposed to come help, Brent shoved some caskets into the chapel to set the stage. He made sure that one of the caskets was angled in such a way that Mike would bump into it, and when he did, it would jar the pew next to it. Then Brent placed the little box on the end of that pew.

It worked perfectly. When Mike arrived, Brent turned the light off in the embalming room and watched through the open door. There was just enough light from the hallway for Brent to see Mike coming down the chapel aisle. As planned, Mike bumped into the casket, and the casket hit the pew. Mike took one more step when the knocking from the little box came.

Mike slowly turned around and looked at the casket, and that was when the voice, sounding like it was coming from inside, said, “Help! Help! Let me out!” Mike stood there, frozen in place. The knock came again, followed by the plea for help.

Mike turned and made a mad dash toward the doorway where Brent was. Brent stepped out of the way and flipped on the lights just as Mike flew through the door. But Mike was going so fast he couldn’t stop and crashed into the cupboards on the opposite side of the room.

Brent laughed so hard his sides ached. When Mike found out about the little box, he was embarrassed, but he did turn the light on to cross through the chapel after that.