I woke up. The piercing shriek of my sisters voice ecoing about the room.

"Staley! Wake the fuck up! We've got company coming over and Mom wants you to vacuum the basement.

I got out of bed, briskyl getting dressed before heading to the kitchen to prepare my breakfast. I had time. I had plenty of time. The Pinkmen' weren't coming over for hours yet.

As I made my way to the fridge I grabbed one of the many marbles lying about before rolling it down the hallway where it clatterred against the others lying there. We had way too many of the things lying about; one of the hazards of living with a family of marbletons.

Ah, well, a marbleton is really just a word I made up for our family. I kind of hate our last name. Strangler is, well its not the greatest last name to have when your family tends to lead an agoraphobic lifestyle. In that, I guess I was an oddity. I didn't mind going to school or to the supermarket, or at least it didn't drive me to have a panic attack.

But I digress. We are the marbletons because we have a shit ton of marbles all around. Pretty simple right?

Oh, you wanted the more complicated answer?

Screw you. That's really the reason! There are literally a shit ton of marbles around us and there is nothing we can do about it. You see, well actually i can't explain it.

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We do sell them though. Some of them are worth a pretty penny. We've got marbles made of nearly every material you can think of, glass (obviously) precious and semi precious stones, metals. Some of them are what I call compond marbles as they seem to have an outer layer and a separate inner layer made of some other material.

But even when we work really hard and sell or get rid of every marble. The next morning the house will be full of them once more. If I had friends I think they'd call it strange. What? You're surprised that a boy who literally loses his marbles all over teh place, has a family full of agoraphobes and a last name like Strangler doesn't have friends? Or did you think it strange I knew what they'd think?

.... Television may not be the most realistic representation of a normal family life but I'm pretty sure cable tv isn't as far from normal as my family.

My favorites are the Family Jewels. Yes, that's a joke. It's a small bag of the most amazing marbles our family has found over the years.