The Rainbow Cloud At Her Door.

The first knock was softer than my heartbeat. The kind of sound wood makes when it sighs under the weight of weather. I froze, my knuckles still pressed against the door.

The porch smelt of rain though the night was dry. A halo of moonlight slicked the steps where I stood, clutching the flowers like a fool who had never learned his part. Lilies this time. White, open-mouthed, fragile. They trembled like small birds in my hands.

No giant at the door tonight. No wall of fire. Only the rainbow cloud. It drifted down from the eaves like a strange mist, iridescent, as if the air itself had been dreaming. It curled around my ankles and whispered in a language I almost understood.

“Alice,” I said to no one. “It is me.”

The piano inside had stopped hours ago. Silence pressed back at me through the door like another heartbeat. I knocked again, harder.

When we first met, I had been all jagged edges and broken sleep. She had written me a song anyway. Played it on this same piano, fingers trembling but sure. No one had ever written me anything. It was like she had cracked open a window in a locked room I did not know I had built.

But the birds, she had not understood the birds. They were not meant to frighten her. They were sentries, little warnings against the things that follow me. I never meant for them to look like omens.

My hand shook against the door. I pressed my forehead to the wood. “Alice, forgive me. I am not what you think.”

The knob turned.

I jerked back.

It did not open. It just turned, slow as a clock hand. The rainbow cloud thickened, curling up past my knees, dampening the lilies. The flowers sagged and their scent turned sharp, like iron and honey.

I whispered again. “It is Hank.”

The door opened on its own, just enough to let out a breath of warm air. The hallway inside glowed pale blue as though moonlight had wandered indoors. At the far end, the piano waited. The lid was up. One key was pressed by no hand. It hummed a single note, low and trembling.

“Alice?”

I stepped inside. The rainbow mist followed me, leaving no footprints.

Her house had always been small, neat, scented faintly of oranges and cedar. Now it smelt of rain on stone. The walls were still lined with her books. The photographs still faced outward. But everything had a softness, as though dipped in milk.

I moved down the hallway. “I did not mean to frighten you last time. Or any time. The flowers were supposed to...”

“Hank.”

Her voice. From the piano room.

It stopped me cold. She sounded awake but far away.

I hurried to the doorway. She sat at the piano, her back to me. She was playing nothing, just resting her hands on the keys. The rainbow mist poured in from the open window beside her, rising like steam.

She did not turn.

“I did not know if you would come,” she said.

“I almost did not.”

“You always almost do not.”

I tightened my grip on the lilies until their stems snapped. “I was frightened. There was a, there was something at your door last time. A giant.”

Her shoulders rose and fell in a small sigh. “That was not a giant. That was my brother.”

I blinked. “Your...”

“He was making sure you did not come in.”

I felt the words like a blow. “Because of what I did.”

She finally turned. Her eyes caught the strange light and turned silver. “Because of what follows you,” she said gently.

The rainbow cloud hissed at the sound, curling tighter around my feet.

“I have been trying to protect you,” I said. “The birds, the warnings..."

“I know.”

That stopped me. “You… know?”

“I wrote the song because I knew.” She stood, smoothing her dress. “You cannot keep me safe from your darkness. It is not yours. It is a road you walked down once. It wants you back, but it cannot have me.”

I felt my throat close. “But I am still on that road.”

She came closer. The mist parted around her, making a small clear path. She reached out and touched my hand. Her skin was warm.

“You are at the door,” she said. “That is already a different road.”

The rainbow cloud lifted, swirling up toward the ceiling. It began to glow, shifting from blue to gold to white. The single piano key released its note with a soft click. Silence fell again.

“I do not know how to be who you need,” I whispered.

She smiled faintly. “You do not have to be who I need. You have to be who you are when the door opens.”

The mist thinned until the room was just a room again. She still held my hand.

I looked down at the ruined lilies. “I am sorry. I broke them.”

“They were never the point.” She took them from me anyway, placed them on the piano. “You knocked for real this time.”

The front door behind me swung shut on its own, a soft wooden click. For the first time in years, the sound did not feel like a lock. It felt like a beginning.

........

Author's Note:

This story is for the writing challenge"The Knock At The Door"