In the depths of Garfield High School, just beyond the view of the average student, there lie places only known to most through legend. Here are but a few of these places that have remained shrouded in mystery at Garfield, from the band loft containing relics of Garfield’s past to the enigmatic basement. Note, the following places are inaccessible to students without explicit staff permission. 

THE BAND LOFT 

Through a winding staircase in a storage room adjacent to the band room, there lies a dimly lit loft which stores memorabilia from throughout the band’s history. The room primarily houses several inundated instruments along with lines of uniforms that have been left unused for decades. On small alcoves along the stairs, there are carefully curated piles of smashed Yerba Mate cans alongside a smattering of multicolored paper cranes, and once reaching the top one is met by a large face scrawled in sharpie. Alongside the face is the scribbled message “BEWARE CRUNCHY”, with numerous different scrawls, from gospel proclaiming this figure as a deity to a small figure on the stairs labeled “crunch cat”, being found around the room. Next to Crunchy’s unblinking eyes is a warning to all that erasing the image will result in a curse, followed by messages in several languages warning those who come across the visage to be afraid of what they see.

THE CATWALK

Behind a door labeled DO NOT ENTER on Garfield’s main stage in the Quincy Jones, is a spiral staircase illuminated by soft glowing blue lights. Once one has ascended the staircase, they are met with a forking path—forwards is the main pathway, and to the left is a room where all that can be made out is the faint outline of several prop skeletons glaring out from makeshift tombstones. One floor above lies the fly loft, the tallest point in the theatre, where all the lights and sounds of the main stage seem to fade into the loft’s remoteness; with only the sensation of height to remind one of their surroundings.

THE BASEMENT

Through a nondescript door on the second floor lie a cascade of stairs that lead down to Garfield’s concrete basement. The central area is well lit, with the left hallway illuminating several heaps of crumbling boxes and the right leading to a concrete corridor that grows darker the further into it one is. A single wooden step ladder leading to an area above is the last thing observable in the right hallway, with the sole route to it accessible only through crawling towards it for several feet. The left hallway is littered with clots of red insulation and empty mouse traps, and finally leads to a large boiler room adorned with flecking mint green paint. Through the boiler room is a dark descending staircase with howling pipes above, and once descended one ends up at a single door. The door leads out into the left first floor hallway opposite of the computer lab, and the basement’s dark mystique ends just as swiftly as it began

THE HOBBIT HOLE

In a men’s restroom at Garfield’s, there lies a locked metal door. Once opened, this door leads through to a long, dark, and narrow corridor called The Hobbit Hole. The corridor’s last use was used to store extra equipment for the school’s theatre department, but the origins of its construction and location in a men’s restroom remain a mystery.