Secret Place

She had never noticed the door before.

It would have been hard to notice anyway, given how much junk was piled up in that corner: a table with boxes stored under it and on top of it — and more things piled up on top of the boxes.

But she dropped something, a bead that fell when a necklace broke. The necklace was of sentimental value and would not have been the same without the large amber bead. It had bounced hard as it fell and not broken, thankfully. But then it had rolled away into that cluttered corner of the room. It surely could not have been able to go far, but it had disappeared from view and it was necessary to move some of the boxes under the table in order to gain access. The boxes were surprisingly light, being filled mainly with old hats and boots, although there was a box of books that took more effort to slide out.

Her flashlight caught the glint of the bead and she was overjoyed. She had to get down on hands and knees to crawl under the table, and it was rather dirty and dusty, but she was so relieved at having found the bead that she could not care.

But once she was on the floor under the table, she realized she could glimpse daylight coming through what she presumed to be a crack in the wall. On closer examination, she found the crack to extend vertically up above the height of the table; and it also came down to the ground where another crack ran along the floor. She pushed the wall gently and felt it give, just a bit. Where the vertical crack met the horizontal crack at the floor, there was a corner she was able to engage with the tip of a finger — and she found she could rock it back and forth a little way. With great excitement, she put the treasured bead safely in a zippered pocket of her waistcoat and backed out from under the table, almost hitting her head in her haste. She had to make some space on the floor before she could remove items from the table. Above the boxes were piled old curtains, cushions and lampshades. The boxes contained smaller furnishings, such as anti-macassers, small mats and rugs, and lots of needlepoint samples.

There was now revealed the complete outline of a door, and she was able to pivot the table sufficiently away in order to perhaps open the door inwards. A long bolt secured the door. It was stiff at first and did not wish to move, but a few minutes of persistent jiggling persuaded it to slide open.

The door opened onto a tiny closed-in porch. On either side, a window-less brick wall extended a few meters beyond the front of the porch, which was enclosed by a rough wood-framed wall which opened half-way-up into a window covered with a screen, but no glass. She had never seen the back of the building and had had no idea this little porch existed.

From the hilltop location of her dreary rented room, with only a small skylight for light, there was now a marvelous view of the downtown skyscrapers. The sun was going down behind here and the soaring towers reflected the golden colors of the sunset.

There were more boxes and discarded items out here. And it looked like rain came in quite often, because everything was mildewy. But she enjoyed the view for a while, breathless with excitement. She fancied that the little porch afforded privacy — perhaps because it was so little.

She would not bother to turn everything out and redecorate. That might draw attention to the little treasure she had just discovered, and she might never get to enjoy it. Over the next few days, she rearranged things, just enough so that she might easily gain access to this space without making it obvious. And she made enough space in the porch for an upturned packing crate where she sat with an old cushion for comfort and a crocheted blanket for warmth. A taller packing crate, which was too heavy to move, provided a parking spot for her wine glass, once she had pushed the stack of magazines on top of it a few inches from the edge.

It was her special little place to withdraw to at the end of the day. And there she would sit, night after night, enjoying her cheap supermarket wine surrounded by piles of moldy magazines — but with that magical view as the sun went down and the city began to sparkle.

She had never had a home with a porch.