Behind Closed Doors

“It’s shut up all tight for a reason,” his father told him.

“But…what’s the reason?” Danny Sanderson asked.

“I can’t tell you that.”

“Why?”

“Because your Aunt Martha walked through that door and never came back.”

“Uh-oh,” Danny intoned.

“You see,” his father explained, “this is a door you don’t want to see behind. It’s been sealed, caulked, nailed, and glued shut for everyone’s good."

“Why do we have something like this in our house?”

“Danny, my son, I think every home has a door like this. And it doesn’t matter if you move to another house. It isn’t for the house; it’s for the home. It follows the people, not the brick and mortar.”

Danny was only five, so he didn’t understand.

“All I’m saying, Danny, is leave it alone. You don’t have to concern yourself with it. You don’t hurt it and it can’t hurt you. Understood?”

“Understood,” he answered his father. Then, after a moment, asked, “Is what’s behind the door scary? A monster? Did something horrible kill Aunt Martha and eat her?”

“You don’t have to concern yourself with it,” his father repeated. “Understood?”

“Understood,” Danny answered.

One day, his father didn’t come home. His mother knew why, but couldn’t bear to share the news with little Danny. She was a weak woman and couldn’t find the courage to tell him he left and would never come back.

When he’s older, she promised herself. For now, patronize him—let him down easy. Maybe one day I won’t even have to tell him the truth.

“Your father had to go on a long trip,” she explained. “He’s going to be gone a long time.”

“Will he be coming back?” little Danny asked.

“Of course, honey. He’ll be back soon. And with presents for you. You’ll see.”

And life in the Sanderson home went on, for the single mother and her son.

For both of them, doors opened and closed. Opportunities both arose and and fell.

They continued to live in that house with its mysterious door, Danny always wondering about it. Wondering about what horrible thing was behind it. Wondering about Aunt Martha and what that horrible thing had done to her. And, worst of all, could it get out? Were his Mom and he in danger?

Danny Sanderson never married. He had finished his education and found a profession in contracting. He always wondered about that door, and now he had access to the tools that could open it. After all, he was all grown up now. There were no monsters, he knew full well. That was kid stuff.

He made plans to visit his mother and brought his tools with him. She was happy to see her son again, but wondered.

“Why are you bringing your tools into the house, Danny?”

“Because once and for all, I’m gonna open that door and see what the big stupid mystery is.”

“No!” she objected. “Please! Don’t!”

“Mom,” Danny said, “it’s not like there’s really something terrible behind it. I mean, Aunt Martha isn’t there. That’d be ridiculous.”

“If your father knew you’d do this, he’d lose his mind!” she blurted.

“My father? Mr. Disappeared-and-Never-Came-Back?”

His mother began to weep.

“Oh, Mom, I’m so sorry. I didn’t meant that.”

“Just promise me,” she pleaded, fighting her tears, “you’ll never open that door. Understood?”

“Understood,” Danny promised.

One day, Danny got a call from the hospital. His mother had died of a stroke and he was asked to come right away. She was elderly, so it really wasn’t a surprise. Truth be told, he was elderly himself, and realized he had better watch his own health, now that the idea of mortality had clobbered him so hard on his head.

I should quit smoking. I should lose weight. I should go get a check-up. He promised himself all the things that arise when a sense of impermanence and temporality becomes real to a person.

He dutifully made the arrangements for her service, but it was only sparsely attended, since they had no other real family. Danny said a few words, but they were cursory, trite, and nothing special.

Instead, he grieved to himself.

Nothing is more unsettling or surreal than realizing you’re now living in a world in which the one you love is no longer part of it. He hadn’t suffered such a thing with his father, because his mother had promised he’d be back one day, although he knew that had been a lie; still, Dad was probably out there somewhere with some new family and the world still spun with him on it, as best Danny knew.

He had to go to the house to get his mother’s things so that he could liquidate the estate. There wouldn’t be much for him to inherit, yet there was the house.

And that door.

The deceased hold no right to enforce promises. He vowed the first thing he would do was crack open that door. On his very first postmortem visit to his old home, he brought his tools.

He used solvent on the caulking and seals. He chipped out the nailheads with a screwdriver until his two-pronged hammer claw could find purchase to yank them out.

Finally, still closed, the gaps of the doorframe were ajar enough to reveal a light behind it.

Danny fell back in awe. What’s this? he asked himself.

Then the door creaked open. He hesitated, then reprimanded himself. Kid stuff! he scoffed. Get a grip, Danny-boy! He summoned his intestinal fortitude and rose to the challenge, putting his hand on the now-unfrozen doorknob. He opened the door against its hinges slowly. It creaked exactly like he had expected.

Kid stuff, he reminded himself.

He stepped through its threshold. The light was so bright that he couldn’t really see what was in whatever room he had entered. He squinted to see, and when he couldn’t make out anything, he braced himself for whatever might be there that meant the kid stuff was real. For what had gotten Aunt Martha.

“Come in,” said a woman. It was a familiar voice. A kind voice.

“Who are you?” he asked.

“Your Aunt Martha,” she answered. He strained to remember what she had looked like, but seeing her brought her back to him.

“Oh!” he exclaimed. “What happened to you?”

“The same thing that happened to you, Danny.”

“The door,” he said. “Am I now trapped behind the door with you? With the monsters.” He feared he would become part of the spooky lore of this haunted house and its possessed door.

“Trapped?” she laughed. “Come,” she requested, holding out her hand. “Come with me.”

He took her hand and they walked together until they could see another figure approach.

“I’ve been waiting for you for years, now, Danny,” his mother told him.

“Mom? Is that you?”

“Yes, son.”

“But you died. You didn’t go behind this door like poor Aunt Martha did.”

“We’ve all crossed this door,” she said, as his father joined them. “Everyone does. People get old.”

“They die,” his father added.

“I died, then?” Danny asked.

“No, son,” his father answered as his mother smiled. “You’ve just begun to live.”

“And love,” she added. “Really love. So, close the door behind you, my darling.”