Books

Short story by me written for an exam

(had to start with the line "'Was this the right way?'")

'Was this the right way?' I couldn't help but ask myself. The darkness enveloping me was so disorienting, it was hard to tell which way was right and which way was left. I only needed to reach the stairs. That was it. It was supposed to be easy. But I was lost. It's hard to know how far your final destination (the stairs, in my case) is, especially when it should've only been 30 seconds away from the door. My hand shook as it held my torch, which barely illuminated my feet in front of me. I didn't know where I was anymore.

After about 25 minutes of walking, I saw a door. I almost gasped aloud, the shock of seeing something that wasnt a complete void in front of me was exhilirating. I practically ran up to the door, desperately trying the handle. When that didn't work, I dropped my torch (it was useless anyway) and began pounding on the door with my fists. The door was clearly old, it looked older than the house had from the outside, bits and pieces of wood sticking out from it, but I kept banging. Pieces of the wood lodged into my knuckles, which eventually made me stop trying to knock the door down. It hadn't budged, but I wasn't ready to just move on and wander back out into the darkness yet. So instead I stood there, plucking the splinters from my hands. The wounds pooled with blood as I yanked each splinter out, appearing much bigger now that there was no wood. Just as I was tugging on the last splinter, wondering how the door could appear so much older and ruined than the house's exterior, I heard a noise. It sounded like creaking. Like a door creaking open. As if the door next to me, that hadn't budged a second ago, were creaking open. I stood in shock as I slowly turned my head towards the door, afraid of what I might see in through the doorframe, even though I had been fiercely trying to get in not two minutes earlier. The room inside was barely lit, I stepped in cautiously.

The smell hit me first, I don't know how I didn't smell it as soon as the door had inched open. I stood in shock once I entered the room. Blood covered the walls. Some patches were brown, clearly old, and others were a dark red, newer than the other patches. As I stepped in slightly further blood splashed onto my shoe. That's when I noticed there was even more blood on the floor than just on the walls. And I realised it had just splashed around my foot. It wasn't dry. This blood was much, much more recent than the blood on the walls. It was barely coagulated yet. Either this room had been airtight, or someone had just been here. When I was banging on the door? How did the door even open? Did someone let me in? I started to panic, unanswered questions flooding my mind. I put my head in my hands, trying to decide what to do next, but just as I moved my hands back down, deciding it would be best to leave this room, I saw something laying in the back of the room.

In one of the puddles of blood, half covered by the sticky fluid, was a photograph. I slowly walked over to it and picked it up, attempting to ignore the blood that now coated my hands and trying to wipe away the stains on the image. It showed a young girl, teenager or young adult. Her brown hair fell into her face as she smiled nervously at the camera. The smile seemed fake, like she was trying to please someone, maybe the someone behind the camera? And then I noticed her arm.

It was hard to see, the remaining blood stains on the photograph and the overall bad quality of the image making it grainy. But I could see it. Her arm was plastered with wounds, raging from bruises to cuts (some seemed to still be bleeding) to burns. I imagined her other arm must be in a similar scenario, but she posed with it behind her, her legs also out of frame. Was the blood in this room hers? What happened? Who was this girl? I pocketed the picture and decided to turn and leave the room before the overwhelming, chemical smell of blood made me sick.

I closed the door hard behind me. The darkness felt colder than before once I left the room, making me tug at my sleeves in an attempt to warm my hands. And then the door was gone, along with the room. Literally. I had blinked and now there was no destroyed door, no red room. I frantically felt for the photograph, still in my pocket. I couldn't have been hallucinating if I still had the picture. But how did I know I hadn't hallucinated the room and was now hallucinating the feeling of the photograph between my fingers. I had no choice but to keep walking. But then, after about another 25 minutes of walking, my thoughts were cut off abruptly when I heard the screaming.

It was so loud, it felt as if it came from all directions, all around me. I panicked as I started to have doubts about this place. The house looked so normal from the outside. Not very big, but a nice home for a small family. The empty void inside betrayed that image, so did the red room, and the screaming. There was too much wrong, it was all so confusing. My legs and my knuckles began to ache, I had no choice but to stop walking. I sat down against the barely visible wall, hoping for some rest. I fell asleep to the sound of the screaming, my bloody hand still gripping the photograph.