“My mother always forbade me to open the upstairs door, I remember it was a big white door with a pristine, golden doorknob, gleaming even though I never saw anyone clean it. My childhood home was a rickety but cozy townhouse that lay in the middle of a mysterious forest.
Back then I was very nervous (I still am, though gracefully a little less so) and stressed out with unhealthy ease, something that was accentuated by living there, among those giant oak trees that whistled gracefully with their broad leaves, hiding the secrets of hundreds of years, I know.
The little I remember is the bad things, I had such an awful time that I have mental gaps regarding that stage of my life, the damned forest… always watching us, strange and amorphous creatures accompanied us there, I’m sure! Those bellowings I heard at dusk meant he was out hunting, I swear there was a skeletal old man who wandered and stalked, watching us when my parents were asleep and I was looking out the window, he was disgustingly rickety, his eyes produced their own light, as powerful as car headlights, he always knew when I was seeing him, as if he had met me before, and then he would turn his head, like a rotten owl, and I would have to look away because I couldn’t stand the intensity of the brightness, I would always cry when he peeked at me, and I would fall asleep on the floor because I didn’t dare look out the window again, or climb into bed because his light would reach me.
He was one of the things lurking in that stupid forest, the branches conspired against us, my parents knew it, but did nothing. I, trying to evade the monsters of the night, used to play in the living room, entertaining myself with a rusty yo-yo whose color had faded. When, once, it slipped out of my hand from using too much force, it landed in a corner of the wall, and as I went to pick it up, I noticed it. I realized that, up in the wall, there was a white door in the middle of the wall, about two meters from the floor, it didn’t make sense, ha ha! What a face my poor mother made when I made her aware of the existence of the door, she was seriously surprised and went to look for my father, who was smoking a cigar in the shed. When they returned, both began to examine it and sent me to my room upstairs, but I ignored them and hid sibylline behind the sofa, how they underestimated me! I heard them talking worriedly.
- “How the fuck is that possible Darren?” I was quite shocked, it was the first time I had ever heard my mother swear.
- “I don’t know honey, I don’t know…. Maybe…” My father tried to search for an answer in a sorrowful way.
- “I told you this was abandoned for something, come on, tell me, why is this the only house on the whole ranch? I’m sick of this kind of thing, how come we haven’t seen that fucking door!?” She kept raising his voice until it almost became a shriek, especially at the end of the sentence.
My father was unable or unwilling to respond and left the house. My mother stood sobbing into her own arms, until I approached her quietly, pretending I was coming from the stairs and hadn’t heard anything, she didn’t notice my presence until I was beside her and called out loudly, she was startled, wiped the tears quickly with her sleeves and pushed the hair away from her face. Her eyes were reddish and her makeup had smeared so much that she looked like a clown’s. I asked, acting as if not suspecting, what was wrong, so she tried to comfort me, telling me that everything was alright, the typical response given to a child who questions too much.
But I couldn’t sit still, my stomach hurt, and it was because I NEEDED to know what was going on with that door, I asked my mother again, which seemed to make her a bit cranky, so she resolved not to letting me go near the living room again while alone, and just ignore a door set in the middle of the wall, it would be impossible to reach it without a prop. Two days after we discovered the door, my parents took over the living room, ordered me to lock myself in my room (literally, by bolting the door) and not come out until they knocked.
I became alert, the pit in my stomach hurt again and I went upstairs, but I leant my head a little at the entrance to discover what was happening, after a while, my father came in with some yellow stairs in both hands, the entrance being opened by my mother, who helped to pass them because of how big they were. They muttered something between them, but I could not understand, and then they went to the living room, so I also crawled on the floor until I could peek my eyes in.
They placed the metal ladder in front of the door up the wall, making them match so they could enter, Darren, my father, snorted looking at the floor, he adjusted his glasses as he used to do when he was undecided and started to climb, my mother asked him to be careful, and he tried to calm her down. He got to the top and was able to open the door, he put his trembling hand on the handle, my mother stared at him as he held the ladder, he turned the knob very slowly until it gave way and it could open, it opened inward, into what would be the bowels of the house.
I was in such a perspective that I could barely see what would be inside, Darren plucked up the courage and kneed the door open fully and it did, and then he was totally paralyzed for a few moments, until his legs began to tremble greatly, making the ladder vibrate as well, my mother tried to hold it steady, demanding my father to calm down, but he would not, he threw his hands to his mouth, he retched a great retch.
He went so far as to mumble “Isabel, no… I can’t… don’t look, for God’s sake…”, my mother yelled at him to describe whatever it was he saw, as she did not wish to do so, or to come down at once.
I was totally intrigued, I couldn’t control myself, so I ran in until I stood at the side of the stairs, “What do you see, dad? “ I shouted excitedly. My mother, noticing I was there, let go of the ladder and put her forearms around my face so I couldn’t see anything, I heard the ladder wobble and fall, I shoved my mother off me with a hard push, the only thing I could see was Darren, trying to hold his balance on the threshold of the door, it was clear that he had had to jump to avoid falling on the ladder and breaking his back, he gasped and moaned totally terrified of what he witnessed, before he could do anything, something came out of the door, it was like… a raspy, thin but very long tongue, red and swollen, as well as sharp and snaky, wrapped around Darren’s neck, he tried to pull it off him, but it didn’t take long for it to snap his head back 180 degrees, I listened in terror as his spine snapped, and his body was dragged inside, the door closed with devastating force, which caused a deafening slum, the lights flickered briefly and then the electricity went out in the whole house.
Isabel, my mother, began to cry and scream, hitting the floor with her fists, so hard that her knuckles went bloody, she did not understand what was happening, no one did.
The following days were strange, my mother acted very weirdly too, she hardly spoke or ate, she stayed in the fetal position in the living room, next to the folding ladder, which we did not remove from there at any time, until another day she left for the forest with a lost look, I accompanied her for a while, I asked her and insisted what she was doing, but she paid no attention to me, I left her alone when she reached the oak trees, because I knew that the old owl man was gliding around there, illuminating his prey with his powerful ocular headlights, I tried to warn her about him, but it didn’t work either.
That same night, while I was looking out the window as usual, he came again, he came out of the trees and came a little closer to the house, something he had never done before, his fiery light penetrated my whole room, but I endured the brightness a little because I saw that he was carrying something in his right claw, it was Isabel’s severed head, he grabbed it by the long black hair, he wielded it proudly like a trophy in the air, I did not feel sorry, I tried to warn her, but she did not take me into account, they never take me into account.
I could see how that horrifying Perseus waved with joy the remains of Medusa until I was overwhelmed by the brightness and I had to close my eyes, that was like looking directly into the sun. After being orphaned, I began to worry about food, water, electricity, but it was easy, there was food in the pantry, the brown water from the taps tasted like iron, but I could hydrate myself and I had become accustomed to living off the grid. When supplies started to run low was when my concern increased, I was surrounded by the oak trees, I couldn’t even remember the last time I left the forest, where was the nearest town? I didn’t know, just the thought of having to go through the groves made my stomach clench and twist painfully.
I was starving, I had hardly any cereal left in my drawers or the knick-knacks I used to hide in my toy chest, with nothing to lose, I gave my soul what I wanted most, to know what was behind the door, it didn’t matter, even though I knew that what I witnessed would surely ruin my life. At dawn, I clumsily placed the ladder, I made sure it stood upright and I stood in front of the hated door, I thought I would end up like my father, but curiosity gripped my stomach and I had to do it, unlike him, I tried to slide the door slowly, in vain, because something made it open at the speed of light, throwing on me what was inside that house …. Ha ha ha ha, it’s normal for Darren to vomit!
I didn’t understand the fleshy forms that were created and died there, the venous genesis! The Flesh Monad that waited dormant at the epicenter of evil! An inexplicable orgy of the primordial form of matter, whipping, drooling and thrusting into itself, birthing and expiring, a fearsome Ouroboros of skin and muscle tissue! In that formless mass I saw Darren’s face, rejoicing as he was constantly disemboweled and reborn!
My consciousness, being human, naturally rejected the vision and I was forced to run, I almost killed myself falling down the stairs, I hurt my shin, but my survival instinct took over my body and adrenaline drove me to run without looking back, there waited the oak trees, I knew the old owl man was hunting, but no matter, I ran, cried, cried as I ran until I reached a city, and on its asphalt I collapsed, a car almost ran over me, but it realized it in time and the woman who was driving took me to an aid house, they could easily heal my leg, I told them what happened, but given my age, everyone thought I was an abandoned child who had lived in the forest, but it was not so, I know, I remember Darren and Isabel, when they tucked me in, they lied to me when they said that everything was fine, but at least they tried.
I told them the truth, the abode of the Monad rests apathetically protected by the robust vegetation of the unfathomable terrain. So many years later, I had to go back there, I had to prevent anyone else from finding it. Now, back in my home, the forest, I see a nice family settling in the house, a mother, a father adjusting his glasses and a poor child. My eyes itch. Tonight I will try to warn the boy to get them to leave.”
This text was found on the Griffe Ranch, owned by David Fisher Cornwell, located near Ashley National Forest, Utah. The pages, lying on the ground next to some brown owl feathers, were in a lousy and barely legible condition, the find was the work of the farmer himself, who was deeply disturbed, as he swears there has never been any house on his land. David hopes, with all his heart, that this is just an elaborate prank to scare him.