The hole was in the closet in Tommy's room. Tommy and Momma and Daddy lived in a not very big, not very new frame house on the edge of the city and Aunt Martha lived with them. Tommy didn't—at least not yet, although there were promises—have any brothers or sisters. But he did have his own room and a family of his own, too. It was the extra bedroom and it had a closet that was cramped and with no light. Tommy liked his room. It was small, with a small bed, and it belonged to him, along with his family of Mr. Bear and Old Rabbit and Kokey Koala. It was also in easy crying range of Momma and Daddy's room and Aunt Martha's room, so if Mr. Bear, who was the timid one, got frightened in the night, Tommy could cry—purely in Mr. Bear's behalf—to bring help. Or at least company.
Tommy and his family all liked the closet well enough too, except for the shelf that was out of reach even from the "don't climb" stool. The closet was good to hide in or play bear cave or rabbit hole and fine for finding missing toys after Momma had a spell of playing cleaning house.
The day Tommy found the hole in the closet was the week after his third birthday. Daddy was at work. Momma was out shopping. It was a rainy afternoon. Aunt Martha was sitting with Tommy and the afternoon television.
He was in his room with his family and they all agreed as soon as they heard the television coming on strong that it would be a very poor afternoon to waste on a nap. Besides, Mr. Bear's feelings had been hurt by having been somewhat left out of things recently in favor of new birthday presents, now largely broken or tiresome. To make it up to him, Tommy and Old Rabbit and Kokey all agreed to play bear cave in the closet. It was a nice game and going well enough, except for some grumbling from Kokey Koala, who always wanted to argue and claimed that bears lived in trees, not caves.
But then—and it was Mr. Bear's fault for wanting it darker, so he could hibernate—the closet door shut tight. That didn't seem so serious at first. It would only mean a scolding for being out of bed when Aunt Martha would come to open it after Tommy hollered loud enough. And then there was the hole in the closet, back in the corner next to the broken drum. They all saw it and they heard the Ugly Thing talking or thinking at them. It stretched out a part of itself at Mr. Bear, who was the closest.
It didn't grab Mr. Bear, but he was terrified just the same. And none of them liked it. They didn't like it at all. The Ugly Thing couldn't come out of the hole because the hole wasn't big enough yet, but it tried and it was making the hole bigger. And it kept thinking at them, red thoughts, and hungry, as it tore at the edges of the hole. The family all looked to Tommy, so Tommy cried and yelled.
Finally Aunt Martha heard him and came to open the door. Then the afternoon sunlight streamed across the floor into the closet and the ugly red thoughts from the Thing pulled back, far back, so you could barely notice them, and you couldn't see the hole any more, even though you knew it was still there. At least Tommy and Mr. Bear and Old Rabbit and Kokey Koala knew.
After she opened the closet door and carried Tommy from the closet to the living room, Aunt Martha scolded. She wasn't really mad because she had waited until a commercial interrupted her television program before answering the cries from the closet. But she scolded because she was Aunt Martha and scolding was what Aunt Martha did. A really good cry, even one worked up strictly as a service for a companion, takes a little time to turn off. Then, after a few settling gulps, Tommy tried to explain.
"Auntie. Aunt Martha, there's a hole in the cave—in the closet—and there's a Thing inside of it."