Behind the door

There are moments when the soul disconnects so thoroughly from the physical world that all matter begins to swirl and blur. When the walls of the universe and the windows of the soul glaze over, leaving only a door to darkness and the echoes of life a million miles away. It is in this moment that I live.

I do not know how I came here (does anyone really?), but I know I've been here too long. I don't think anyone belongs here. This room, a twisted reflection of the libraries and studies of my youth. It gorges around itself, like it's a bubble under the skin of creation.

The shelves and literature all melt and merge within each other. Little faces of bookends scream out the ends of bookmarks, and the titles of great classics litter the cushions of chairs. I sit inside one of them, gazing at the closest thing to an open book in the whole place, a large medieval looking print of one solid piece glued into the misshapen desk, half consumed by the floor. Aside from the dizzying and unknowing matter within the room, this book has been the only thing I’ve studied. There are no pages to turn (as I’ve noted, the whole thing is one conglomerated mass), instead, words scroll along like driftwood along the shores of a calm lagoon at night, slowly and passively. These words are all merely shadows, both in appearance and in essence. They are quotes from books. Books I know. Books I’ve loved, but they are shallow imitations as opposed to proper reproductions. They tell of stories as a summary, a recollection of something you once read, but not the source.

Why remain in such a place? Why suffer inside such a prison of cosmic proportions? Have I suffered the wrath of some cruel deity? No, for this place is surely a dungeon of my own making. In truth, nothing keeps me here. There are no chains upon my wrists, no shackles holding me down, nor have I begun to sink and merge within this molten room. Not only am I fully free to move, but my path away, my path to leave, is the only thing in this spiral of chaos that is discernible. There is one singular path, just as wide as I am, leading straight for the door.

The door is the most real tangible thing in here. I’ve spent far more of my time studying its oaken outline than I have glossing over the sprawling gibberish of the books. It's about 7 feet tall, with a singular brass door knob, about five planks of oak make its supports (unpainted but with a coat of finish), a thinner wooden piece adorns the bottom lower half, and the most studied part of all; a window pane, all black.

Well, it’s not always all black either. It changes. Sometimes you can see the shimmering of stars within it. Other times, you can see almost a tiny dim light emanating from behind it. When I don't look at it straight on, sometimes I swear I can see a faint glow of blue and green, like a sunny day on the earth all those years ago. In those moments I can hear the echoes again. I don't remember much of anything of what I used to be, but these might be the closest things to memories I could describe. The sound of a violin or guitar reminds me of a moment I can't visualize, but that none the less I feel. The whispers of a joke that curve my face into a smile despite me not knowing a word of what it’s saying. And the soft sounds of a laugh that almost bring me to tears, for a reason I can’t explain.

But in other moments, I stare it straight on and see nothing. I do not even see black or dark, nor do I see white or light. I simply see nothing. A never ending, eternal void, looking to swallow and consume. When I do, I swear I can feel it creeping through the window like a fog. It inches its way towards me, it engulfs me, chokes me, steals away my only being and hollows me out until I am almost just a shell the void inhabits.

At this point, the last spark of myself will awaken, and I vomit it out and heave it back onto the unholy floor. It then spills back into the window, delayed but not destroyed. And it’s for this reason that I hold myself within this room. Whatever is out there, the blue and the green or the nothing and the desolate, I’ve never been able to face it.

But the echoes have been calling me closer far too much lately. What used to be glimpses at a world I once knew have become cries begging me to join them. And I feel restless. I don't believe I can continue like this. For what seems like an eternity, I have hidden from where I should be, hidden in my own bubble of unnatural cowardice.

For the first time in eons, I stand up. Setting my feet upon the ground seems to rattle the whole universe like a gasp, yet I carry on. I trudge past the plastique furniture and step on to the solid tiles. It feels like a vertigo of focus, narrowing me onto the door and blotting out all outside distractions. It feels like just me, the dark, and the door.

Until the echoes begin again, and I realize the battle before me. I hear them, the laughter and violins and jokes in one ear, and the empty ringing of the void in my other ear. I feel the forces swirl around me, attempting to take my mind as I inch closer to the door. I try to cover my ear to the void as I march on, but it just begins to mute the sounds in my other ear, and I uncover my ear in fear it will take over both. These two beings, this being of light and darkness and the other being of eternity, fight for my attention as I walk into their domain.

I decided instead to allow them to fight as I get closer, leaving it up to them who shall win, what shall consume me. I get closer, and the echoes get louder and quieter. Moments of ear shattering wonder and bone chilling silence swirl and over take each other all around me, as little green and yellow streaks form around the blots in my eyesight. I’m almost there. I reach my hand out to the doorknob, shivering and weak, wincing from all of the sensations over taking me.

I grasp the handle.

In a moment, everything stops. The room stops melting, and it’s a single discernable place again. Shelves hold themselves firmly, as a breeze blows the pages on the open book on the desk behind me. All things have reorganized themselves, and all things are silent. Though, not the same kind of silence as that creeping void. It's a silence like a baited breath, like a presence waiting to reveal itself. All at once I feel as if everything in existence is watching me, waiting to see what I do. Even the window, which once held all I knew of the world outside, no longer shows its face. Instead, I look into a mirror. A reflection more foreign to me than anything I’ve seen in eons. I take a moment, remember who I was, who I once again am. Am I an angel? A demon? Whichever it is…

I open the door.