The Red Door
CW: Implied SA, no explicit descriptions. Implied substance abuse, mentions of “glass bottles” and “small plastic bags” but no explicit use or language. Also this is my first story and any feedback will be very helpful as I hope to write more in the future.
THE RED DOOR
Did you ever play that game during a car journey? The one where you watch the raindrops slowly drip down the window and see which ones made it to the bottom of the glass the fastest? That was the game I chose for this journey, sun setting, watching them drip, that one will win, no wait I meant that one. “Grab your bag then.” mums voice broke the silent battle of the raindrops, I stared at the brick house in front of me, crumbling, brick lacing the grass, door big and red, almost red, stripping away and revealing the tattered wood underneath. I sighed, grabbing my belongings for the weekend, kissed my mums cheek and whispered a small “love you” before creaking the car door open, climbing out and walking towards the front door of the building, the door seemingly getting larger the closer I got, until it towered over me, making me feel much smaller than I was, I knocked, glancing behind me just in time to see my mum drive away, not looking behind her as she went.
I snapped forward to the abrupt noise of the door opening, the first thing I noticed was the slickly gelled black hair of the man before me, rough stubble lining his face, a grim smile creeping to his half toothless mouth. I looked at the ground, hoping to not fall through the gaps in his teeth.
“Hi dad” i whispered, perhaps more so to the ground than him. His long arms wrapped around my shoulders and suddenly i was claustrophobic and praying my mum would pull back into the driveway and i could race the raindrops and see the red door get smaller again. But I was never that lucky on dad’s weekends.
His slender fingers tapped my bag, I passed it over and he carried it over the threshold, I paced slowly behind him. I heard the opening of a door and the thump of my bag. “why are you being so shy? come, sit down” he said from in his room. I breifly shut my eyes, letting out a shaky breath, glancing to the dark staircase beside me, a staircase i was to never ascend at any time. That was a good rule, the darkness above scared me anyway. I realised i had not done as he had asked and scuttered away from the stairs quickly and went to the right, where my father’s room was.
The way dad’s weekends worked was one week i would sleep on the sofa he had in his bedroom, the next i would sleep in the bed. He claimed this would make it “fair” despite him sleeping in the bed everyday and i was only there every other weekend. This weekend i was sleeping on the sofa, a pang of pain already creeping into my back at the thought of the old leather cushions, too thin to comfort a singular episode of the sitcoms he would watch, nevermind a whole nights sleep.
“How’s school?”
“fine”
“How’s your mum?”
“busy but she’s okay”
“she still seeing that guy?”
“yeah”
He hit his knee so loud with his flat palm that I flinched into the rock solid back of the sofa, hitting my head, and softly rubbing it. “I am your father and i want to talk to you. i expect adiquate responses” he said, voice slightly raised.
“I’m sorry, i’m just tired”
We sat in silence for what felt like hours, the way an 8 year old can’t sit still, can’t be quiet, it enveloped me, it felt much longer than it probably was. He broke the silence “you hungry?” I nodded, head heavy, pain still itching in the back of my skull, ashamed to ever admit I was hungry. His slender legs pushed him off the edge of the bed, and he came back with a tin of beans, I stared blankly at him for a moment, confused on what i was meant to do with this stone cold can. He passed me a spoon and did a quick nod of his head. I ate them, cold, out the can, wincing at the taste. I forced each gulp, getting almost halfway through before the only warmth I felt was the feeling creeping into my throat, I pushed the feeling down and weakly smiled in his direction “I’m full” i said with as much volume as i could muster without throwing the cold back up. “No you’re not, finish them” a stern, sharp statement. I knew i had no choice, i ate and i ate and i ate. I ate the cold can of food, and i ate all the bile that threatened to spill from my throat.
I curled into the blanket that covered me on the sofa, staring at the small bags lined with a fine powder and empty bottles on the cracked table, its only one sleep, i thought to myself. One sleep, and then I can go home. I shut my eyes, attempting to allow my head to have any form of support on the sofa cushion, but no relief came, I tossed and I turned, nothing, the pain of the sofa and the lump growing in the back of my skull making it impossible to position myself in a way that meant i could fall asleep peacefully.
I felt bone collide with my back through my Pyjama shirt and i was lifted slightly, placed gently onto the feeling of clouds and encapsulated comfort, the bed, the pillows being the only relief my head had felt all day, I was almost relieved.
When i peered through one eye to perhaps see my father in the only form of kindness he will ever show me, i did not see my father. I saw the gaps in his mouth, the copious amounts of gel in his hair, but not him. This person had no shirt, the same way my father didn’t when he slept, but his ribs popped from his chest, almost as though there was no skin to cover them, his eyes were wide and unblinking, mouth agape, wider than a mouth should ever open, showing the gaps and the black teeth hanging from singular nerves, swaying against his breath. Tongue hanging low, drool dripping down onto his bare chest, pooling into the crevices of his protruding ribs. His face was pale and peeling dead skin from around every feature, specks of blood shedding from the scabs. I tried to keep my gaze low and unnoticeable, but the fear that i could be engulfed by his open mouth encased me, I closed my eye, “do not panic” i repeated in my head.
SPLAT, SPLAT, SPLAT. Every drop of thick water from his tongue landing on my face, I resisted the urge to reach up and wipe it dry, my breathing shallow, the opposite of the hot, open mouthed breath of the man before me.
My face was wet, sweat and drool. I dared to open my eyes, both of them, wanting to fully face the thing infront of me that stole my dad’s features. I was eye to eye with the brown eyes of my father, but they still held their wide and unblinking gaze they had possessed earlier, his tongue almost grazing my face with how close he was. I wouldn’t let this change that I love my dad, i do, this thing had his face but it was not him, and i wouldn’t let it ever be. I closed my eyes to the sound of a faint “zip.” My body was frozen, and I watched the figure of my father from the ceiling, as though I no longer possessed my own body. It was as if time was simultaneously the fastest and slowest i had ever experienced it, i experienced the following 20 minutes for hours, if not days, if not weeks, if not months, if not years, watching from eyes that were not mine.
I faintly heard a second “zip”, my consciousness finally returned to my limp body. The view of my father’s features was blurry, drool, tears and sweat coating my face, in this state he almost looked how he always had, at the zoo, at my birthday parties, at my school plays. With a wet, long lick on my forehead, it tried to speak, tongue swinging up and down frantically, as if panting and fighting to get a sound out of its dead mouth, spitting it’s saliva through the air, small droplets landing in the bedsheets, teeth ripping from nerve and landing in whichever direction its tongue was swinging in that moment. It’s speech was slurred and inhuman - hard to understand, but my fathers voice was behind the words, drivelling in my direction, not clear, but just understandable“i do it because i love you”
My stomach turned, almost causing the meal i had eaten earlier to return to the back of my throat , the tears rolled down my face, mixing with the copious amounts of drool that i still refused to wipe away. I stood. My small feet swinging over the side of the bed and hitting the floor, the cold making my whole body shiver. It was gone, not on the sofa, not in the bed, not on the floor. Just as quickly as it had stolen the vague resemblance to my father, it had left. I creaked the door open, looking left and right frantically, just how my mum had taught me to do when crossing the road, spit flying off my face as i did so. CLANK. Noises emerged from the kitchen to the right, I ran for the stairs. I hesitated on the first step, my eyes adjusted to the darkness. Step step step step step step step. I went up what felt like 50 stairs, barely visible the more I ascended, I shook like a lost dog on a winter night, at least the darkness made me harder to find, and far far away from the monster below me. I let out a large breath when i reached the top floor, finally daring to wipe the mix of liquids from my face, leaving behind a slight stickiness to my skin.
The distance caused a relieved sob to leave my mouth, quickly covering my mouth with my hand and clenching my eyes closed, I took a deep, shaking breath and wondered down the hallway, towards a faint light at the end. A window, rain running down, but now was not the time for racing raindrops. I opened a door to the left of the window, peeking my head in, it was him, not the monster, my father, my real father. I ran in to hug him, babbling through sobs how happy I was to see him, the actual him
“you have to go” he whispered and pointed behind him. A big, red door, standing tall and wide, much like the front door
“go” he said again
I let go of him and stood infront of the door, gripping the handle and walking through. I stood by the entrance, furrowed my brows as I saw my father again. One lone glass bottle in his hands, he lightly nodded towards another red door, but this one had one clean crack down the centre. I entered again.
Two bottles and my father.
Two cracks, another door.
In I went.
Three bottles.
Open the door.
Four bottles and a small plastic bag. The all familiar glisten in the back of my father’s eyes. Every door i entered more bottles and more bags. All I could do was cry but run frantically through the doors. His eyes are wide. Another door, his mouth is agape. Another door, dribbles of the contents of the glass bottles down his stubbled chin. The next door I didn’t even dare look towards the figure in the room. I just ran through the next.
No more doors. The thing that remained of my father lay on the floor, I wouldn’t forget the drool, the eyes, the bones. I stood and stared, the floor no longer visible as glass and bags covered every inch, surrounding the thief. I walked towards the figure, floor cracking and crinkling under every step, but it did not move. I lent down, over the face I thought I knew so well, it stared back. I knew that look, behind the wide eyes, I knew what it meant, it was wanting, it wanted more and more and more and suddenly the surrounding mess made sense, he needed more, and when that wasn’t enough, it would swallow me whole. It would swallow me and i’d slide through the gaps where his teeth used to be, I’d slide down his throat like the contents of the bottle he found solace in the bottom of. I’d sit in his stomach, until he found it right I emerge, viscerally, up where I came from, into the toilet and all I’d be is regret of the night before, flushed and forgotten, and no one would save me. Why would no one save me? A tear fell from my face, it’s bony fingers cracked and popped as it reached up towards me, I didn’t move, it wiped my face as the corners of its open mouth bent up, perhaps a smile. I wanted it to eat me, I wanted it’s jaw to detach and swallow me, I would let it feed on my flesh until it felt content, because he was my father and I loved him. I rose to my feet, and it let me, the red door, if i could call it red anymore, was ajar and i walked through, no one was here, I ran through every door until i was back in the dark corridor of the upstairs, I ran down the hall, down the stairs, into my fathers room, slid onto the sofa and slept.
By the time I woke, it was the afternoon, my fathers sat in bed on his phone, when he saw I was awake he put it down and said “your mum is here, remember this is a secret”
I walked out the red door one last time, he kissed the top of my head and I walked to my mums car, throwing my bag into the back seat, climbing into the front, and it was silent, I didn’t race the raindrops, I don’t think I ever did again. The red door had swallowed me whole, I had nothing to say, because it was our secret, I love him, and I was just last nights regret, I had let it feed and now no one would save me.