The door that shouldn't! (a halloween story)
The Door That Shouldn’t By: Randon Kesse
“Ahhh! Stop! DON’T! I’ll NEVER come back just let me go! Please I’m young don’t do this! Please!!!!”. Hello, my name is Matthew Herbert, but you can call me Matt, my friends do. I am 14 years old and I am in a heap of trouble. Let me cut in here to tell you that this is the starting point of all my troubles. This all started two days before Halloween. I was stupid enough to take a bet that could potentially kill me, but then again, me and my friend Kevin are daredevils but I will get to him later. Well here is the story for now where I left off. “Oh no, not this time, what did you expect when you came into my room against my permission while I wasn’t here?” “Oh come on sis, Kevin bet I couldn’t take your hair brush without you finding me.” “Oh, so it’s ok for you to sneak onto other people’s property and take their things because a friend dared you to?” “Sheri please, just stop giving me a noogie so we can talk about this rationally.” “Rational? I’ll give you rational!” “Ow ow ow ow ow ow stop! I’ll tell mom and dad!” “Mom and dad aren’t here right now are they?” “Okay, Okay! I learned my lesson! I will never sneak onto other people’s property without their permission!” Of course, I had my fingers crossed. “Ok,” she said and let me go. “But promise me you won’t ok? And show me your hands and feet this time.” She knows I can cross toes so she didn’t want me to pull any tricks, to bad I already did cross my fingers, so that whatever I said about the subject is null and void. “I promise to not sneak, snoop, or lie about the two until Halloween.” “Acceptable. I will not be here on Halloween and mom and dad are on their 2nd honeymoon cruise, so I want you to take care of your self because it’ll just be you and your friends.” “No worries sis, I am all about safety and responsibility.” “Right, you better be.” And with that she gave me a swift kick to the ribs so that I can remember what she will do to me if I’m not, and I left her room. In pain but with a hairbrush, I got it when she kicked me. Mission accomplished, I decided to call it a night and go to bed. However, as I was sleeping, something weird happened to me that night. I had a dream that I should stay away from something that I knew but I had forgotten to remember what it was, and I was told this by someone I knew but didn’t know it was to confusing to understand at the time I tried to ask him his name but I couldn’t hear what his name was and at that moment I woke up to the next day confused and in a daze. But now I know I should have listened to him.
The next day which was Monday the 29, a school day, I decided to meet up with my other friends do discuss out annual Halloween tricks and or treats. On our break that we get before last period, I decided to go look for them. “Hey Kevin, how you doing?” “Ok I guess, but I wish I could think of more tricks for Halloween. I have stink bombs, fake rats, 20 fake spiders, a howling monster machine, a fog machine, a frog machine, and the classical yet still affective fart sound effect along with whoopee cushion Oh, by the way did you do it?” “Nope, she caught me but I still managed to get the hair brush. She came home from work to early. Hey where’s every one else? Lars, and Mori I mean?” “Them? Well, Lars is baby sitting his cool and fun nephews Herro and Miyumi you remember them right, from last Christmas?” “Oh yeah, they were the life of the party! I’ve never seen a 3rd grader drink that much root beer.” “Yeah, and Mori is spending it with her parents on a trip to Transylvania.” “That’s so cool, how come we can’t ever go on a trip to somewhere fun for Halloween?” “Because we are the ones to play the tricks on everyone in our neighborhood and take there candy. Plus we’re cheap.” “Ha ha ha I suppose you are right.” The bell rang and we were off to our last period of the day and then the bus ride home. Then, it happened again, that night while I was sleeping, I had the same dream as the one from the night before, but this time I could only remember a part of it he said “stay away from my basement door” what ever that meant I still had no idea what he was talking about but that part was clear I needed to stay away from his door what ever it was.
The next day we meet after school to go costume shopping and planning for the next night. See we always dress up to a code of sorts. For example, two years ago we were super heroes then, next year we were ghoulish pirate zombies so this year we will not be scary, get it? Well anyway, we decide on being samurai and ninja just because I like swords and he likes throwing things. If I didn’t choose the samurai costume we might not have lived to see the light of day after Halloween but I will get to that later. “You know Matt, you really do look like a samurai.” “And you look like a real ninja. I can’t wait for the tricks we are going to pull.” “Neither can I.” “I know the best places where they give out candy.” “What do you think Lars and his nephews will be?” Kevin asked. “Probably what they are every year Santa Claus and elves they aren’t as creative as us. The only one we don’t know about is Mori she’s more random than us every year when it comes to costumes.” We left the store, said our goodbyes, and waited for the next day. Then, as if on cue, I had the dream I asked him who he was again and this time I heard the first part of his name before I woke up he said it was “Coll…” and his name sounded so familiar like a distant memory. I know I knew him but I didn’t know from where or when, it was a mystery but not for long all I knew from that moment was that it was my fault for his disappearance and I couldn’t shake my feeling of guilt.
Well, Since our school is such good sports when it comes to celebrating Halloween, Christmas, Easter and Thanksgiving they release us early one hour. Kevin and I met up around the park to discuss any last minute additions to the plans and I decided to ask him about what he thought of my dream. “Hey Kev do you know or remember anyone with the first letters of their name C-O-L-L?” “No why would I?” “No reason, but I keep on having a dream about someone telling me to stay away from something and his first letters of his name are C-O-L-L.” “Well it’s probably just the stress of Halloween you’ll get over it soon.” It was clear that he didn’t have any idea what I was talking about, but I know it was not stress that was producing these dreams, it couldn’t be, and it wasn’t but I had to learn that the hard way. And just then the worse possible thing that could happen to us happened, we were dared.
Along with almost every school there is a school bully/jerk that does nothing but aggravate you until you do something stupid, you probably know what I mean. But around here we have a kid named Roy. He is a big jerk and is the one to always dare me into something stupid and dangerous, like running across train tracks 3 seconds before it goes speeding pass you. Anyway, he has a proposition for us, one I we have just walked away from but didn’t. “Hello losers, are you going to be fairies for Halloween because those outfits are very believable?” He said this with a stupid and evil smirk on his face like we didn’t know any come backs to his “brilliant” wit but we did and I replied with “No we are going to surprise you but you should really take that mask off because it’s to scary and I think I will go home and cry because of it.” “Hey I’m not wearing a mask stupid. This is my face.” I turned to Kevin and whispered, “Wait for it, let it register, oh wait there it was he figured it out.” Kevin and I snicker as I match all of his reactions perfectly. Roy then turns around, now understanding that he just made an idiot of himself turned red in the face. “Hey how dare make fun of my beautiful face?!” “Well I couldn’t have done it without your help.” This then caused Kevin to laugh so hard he couldn’t breathe and, as to not risk further embarrassment he got right to the point of what he wanted to say to us. “Whatever anyways I just wanted you to do a dare.” I, not being able to resist a dare, tuned in immediately. “What kind of dare?” “A good one, one worthy of your skills. But you have to agree to it before I tell you what it is.” I turned to Kevin and we huddled together to discuss this. “Should we do this? I mean this could be dangerous.” Kevin then replied, “This is Roy we are talking about Matt it’ll probably just be something mild, like dingdong ditch. I mean he’s stupid but he is not stupid enough to put our lives at risk.” Clearly not remembering the train incident. “Come on let’s do it.” I had a bad feeling that I should have listened to but didn’t. We turned back around and Kevin and I both said it in perfect unison “Deal.”
Around 8:00 p.m. we were ready to go do the dare we had already gone tricking and treating and now it was time to do his dare. He told us that we had to stay in a house for one hour thanks to some haggling on my part, I’m really good at that kind of stuff. Well anyway, we were on our way over to the house when it became apparent which house we would have to go into and I must say it’s a good thing I haggled. “Well I guess that’s the house.” Kevin said of course not knowing the stories about the house so I had to explain it to him. “Kevin do you know the story to that house?” “No, why would I? Should I know it?” “Yes you should. It’s the story of the house that shouldn’t.” “Ok, what’s that?” “The house was never occupied, and on record it was never built. It isn’t even on the map. No one knows how it got there or why it is there. No one has ever been in there. And at night you can hear howling and wailing from the house like a true call from beyond the grave. But most of all you can hear this horrible laughter that haunts you to the bone.” “Wow! That is some story. Well I guess we’ll be making history tonight.” “Are you sure we should be doing this Kev? Our parents don’t know about this.” “Sure! what could go wrong, it’ll only be for one hour, besides no one’s gonna know plus we’re young so if the cops catch us we’ll get a slap on the wrist don’t worry.” “Ok” I should have worried.
“So you losers decided to show up, well you are stupid so this is something I would expect. Are you ready?” Kevin and I looked at the old decrepit building, and against all instinct said again in perfect unison. “Yeah.” As we entered the building I felt as if we were here before. I opened the door and found to my surprise, a clean well kept house. Kevin leaned over to tell me to start or watches and start exploring the house for 50 minutes then return to the door. I was smart enough to bring three walky-talkies, one for me, one for Kevin, and one for Roy in case we ran into trouble like a stray dog. “That’s how dares should be done planned and organized and not on impulse.” I said to Kevin and Roy but nothing could prepare me for what was about to happen. And with that we split up and I went upstairs to the bedrooms and Kevin went into the living room. The place was too familiar. I knew where every thing was, the bathrooms, the rooms, the safe and it’s combination and no there was no money. About 40 minutes in looking around I reached the far bedroom. I began to feel a chill down my spine as if I had been standing in front of the freezer section in a Wal-mart. I was drawn to the room and when I entered it looked like it belonged to a kid my age. But what really got me was when I saw a picture on a dresser and opened my eyes to the pictures around me.
It was the picture of Mori, Lars, Kevin, me, and someone else. It wasn’t photo copied because he and I were in a lot of pictures that I remember taking but not with this person and not doing the same pose I was so freaked out I was shaking I knew with all my heart that I had to get out of there but it was to late. I heard the creaking of the floorboards, heavy breathing, and the feeling that something was behind me but I couldn’t turn around because I was so scared, but that didn’t stop my knees from shaking. I thought if I pretended I was a mannequin whatever it was would go away. That may have been a stupid idea but let’s see what you come up with when your caught off guard in a thought to be abandoned house upstairs with a walky-talky, a eighth grade education, and an unnatural fear of psychos, pyros, and chop-shops. Oh, and by the way it didn’t work. I was attacked so fast I couldn’t scream it had me pined to the ground in less that a second but it seemed like an hour. I was about to cry when I noticed it was a dog and not some wolf man hybrid what do you call them? Werewolves and it was quite intent on licking my face. “Bud stop it. Ha ha quit it! It tickles! Bud let me get up.” For some reason I knew this dogs name out of nowhere and he listened to me. Since my hand was on the walky-talky, Kevin came running up the stairs in a panic. “MATT!! Are you ok?” “I’m in here!” I shouted back. “Matt are you…..” Silence, he saw the dog. “Matt move very slowly away from the dog and show no fear it can smell stuff like that.” Now his legs were shaking. “Relax, Bud’s not going to hurt you just help me up.” Kevin reached over, picked me up, and then asked me an important question. “How do you know that dog’s name if it’s a stray?” “Well I probably isn’t a stray.” I looked at it and saw it’s collar and it had my address on it. “What? That’s my address!!?” I shouted. In shock Kevin replied “No way man, I don’t remember you having a………” Silence, I could tell he was thinking. “You don’t have a dog do you because I think I remember him and some one else but I can’t.” “That’s how my dream felt! Something really weird is happening here and I want to find out.” At that moment our watches rang to tell us how much time we had left. “Come on we have five minutes before we have to head back lets explore some more and then as if a dark and evil figure were watching us it leaned in and whispered in all of our ears. It said to go to the basement. Though we were freaked out we decided go to the basement to finish up our little tour. And Kevin, Bud, and I proceeded to the basement.
As we neared the basement where the boiler was, just as Kevin reached for the handle, we had an insight of the past and unraveled the mystery of why I couldn’t remember but did. And it started like this, we were here before except it was with our other friend Collin. This was like a T.V. repeat but when they cut stuff out. The three of us usually spent all of our time at his house, this house. He told us about a weird thing happening with him in his house the night of this Halloween when I brought Bud along with me. He was like a daredevil but had every ones best interest at heart, like standing up to bullies three times his size. He was our best friend since second grade and that’s how long we were together Kevin, Lars, Mori, me, and Collin. His parents went with mine for a vacation so it was just us at his house We went to the basement to see where the weirdness was coming from. But when he opened the door our costumes became real. I was a master samurai, Kevin was a ninja, and Collin was a psychic/wizard. There were things trying to pull us down into a dark abyss but with our power, we fought it off except for Collin who was dragged down but not before hitting us with a remembrance spell and as he did that an arm was right about to grab me but Bud jumped in the way and was pulled down. But it was my fault I was to scared to open the door myself so I asked Collin to do it and that’s why he went down first, because he was closest to it. He was an easy target when it came to pulling us down because he was so close. That’s why I felt so guilty it was my fault. I don’t know why we forgot but I knew we couldn’t open that door again no matter what. But it was already to late.
I could tell from the look on his face he opened the door on accident while he was remembering what had happened and with that we were pulled into the room where we saw Collin and all of his family members held captive. We fought again but this time we made a dash for the door after it was clear we wouldn’t win at this rate. I was in the lead and everyone else was behind me and we ran out of the house or so I thought. I came bursting through the door and met Roy standing there surprised. “What do you think your doing? you’re suppose to stay in there for one hour not one second!” “We ran into some difficulties on the inside.” Then he looked at me like I was stupid and said words that chilled me to the bone. “You idiot you went in there by yourself, what’s wrong you hit your head or something?” “What do you mean me and Kevin….” This time it was my turn to be quiet. Kevin and Bud were nowhere to be found, and I was alone except for Roy. “What happened to Kevin, Collin, and Bud?!!?!” “Who?” “Don’t play dumb, I said what happened to Kevin, Collin, and Bud!?!” “Hey listen!! You went in there by yourself and came out by your self! I don’t know anyone by those names so get off my back!!” I was really scared now, Kevin was gone like Collin was before. Collin told me that his family built his house from the ground up but they never put in a basement. And that’s why we were checking it out to figure out what was behind that door with the weird symbol. When we heard a voice explain that it was a portal to purgatory. Well it wasn’t purgatory like you hear about I Catholic schools but an artificial purgatory made by a powerful evil who’s name was forgotten in history except for those who remember it. It had created a place where lost and angry souls try to pull down all those unlucky enough to come across it. And the only way to cut off the portal is by saving the youngest and most current owner/part owner of the house from the void itself so in this case it would be Collin and defeating it. Then it added that as a defense mechanism, all those who are trapped inside lives are forgotten and erased from history and that we would forget this conversation as well, but I guess due to my traumatic experience I remembered it. Which explained why no one remembered Collin, Bud, and now Kevin. “Are you going back in the house or do I have to go back home?” “Oh I’ll go back in, I’ll go in right now.” Now that I knew what it was I was ready to fight it and I entered the house. It had changed, everything creaked and waned it was gloomy and dark it was like a painting by a disturbed artist. I unsheathed my sword and charged to the door striking down all the menacing souls in my way until I came to the door. I said a quick prayer and entered the room.
I was surprised to see all of them there in the back but when I went to go get them I realized why they where in the back. I looked at them and then turned around and I saw him. He was about my size and had a sword and he challenged me to a fight to the death and we commenced in the battle for our very souls. He matched me blow for blow. I’d do a deep cut to the left and he mirrors me perfectly and does the same. Then after fifteen minutes of nonstop, samurai action I realized something, when I took a brake it took a brake when I shifted from side to side it shifted from side to side, when I grunted from my efforts it grunted. I realized that I was in purgatory and needed to think of the rules to this place and remembered that it causes you to fight against the anger and sadness in your heart until you find something but what was it. I knew it could be suicide but I embedded my sword in the ground/wood floor and he did the same. I then knew it for sure I was fighting myself or my inner demon so to speak. We walked to one another and stood there just staring at each other. Then I put my hand on his shoulder and he put his on mine and I smiled and then I remembered what it was, peace. Then it was like an earthquake and an eruption put together. I saw the world crumble and it revealed to me the real room where my friends where and I could see the abyss again, not only that but I saw the creature that tried to get me to fight against myself for eternity, the big evil that was freed on this day every year, and it was huge.
It had a purple mask that showed only seven eyes with an upside down triangle going threw each eye and it was wearing a full and puffy white suit so I couldn’t tell if it was a man or woman but make no mistake it was huge. I demanded that it let every soul it captured go or else I would cut it with my blade of righteousness. I had no idea why I said that but I did know that I had sounded more mature than I ever had in my hole life, even now I am still amazed. It wasn’t so pleased and didn’t say anything but just stared at me with a blank expression. When I went over to my friends and released them and all of their family members only Collin, Kevin, and I remained excluding the void. “Go on you guys I’ll finish this.” I said with stunning confidence. “Are you sure you won’t need any help?” Kevin ask me but before I could speak Collin had already answered for me. “If he needed our help he would ask lets just get out of here and wait for him to finish that thing.” “Okay, but scream if you need help.” “I will” I replied back. “Oh, and Matt?” “Yeah?” “Thanks for remembering” “You’re the one who reminded me.” And with that they ran out of the door as fast as they could. I then turned to the beast and prepared to end this night with a big finish.
“Prepare to die!” I shouted and charged at the monster but no matter how many times I tried to cut it I couldn’t penetrate it’s force field. I fell to the ground weak and tired and realized that I might not make it out again to see my friends and family and in that moment I was filled with strength and I stood up and struck it two more times but this time I cut it. My blade went through the field and barley cut it but I cut it enough on slash from the head down and another from shoulder to shoulder. At first it seemed that it had no affect but then the cut marks began to glow and it burned into the creature leaving a forever mark on it’s body but most importantly it cut the mask in half and I could see it’s face or should I say her face. She screamed in pain, shrunk down to my size, and began to approach me. And she was the most beautiful girl in the world. More beautiful than any girl you have ever seen or imagined or not it could just be my shock of seeing a pretty girl come out of a monster I don’t really know which. “Please don’t hurt me that monster took control of my body and forced me to be his shell but now that you have freed me I will follow you to the ends of the earth and serve you till the end of time and then some. Oh thank you!” She was walking towards me and then I heard the voice again and realized that the power, wisdom, and skill that I had came from the sword. As she came closer it shouted, “Do not be deceived for she is the original deceiver say her name and watch her fall into the vat to be consumed by her own evil for her name is Lilith.” At first I didn’t believe it but I saw her reflection in the sword and it was pure evil. So I listened to the sword and pointed it at her. “What are you doing!?!” She screeched. And I said in a true ancient wise voice “Sending you where you belong. Lilith abi!” which means lilith be gone and she let out a devilish screech/scream and was cased away into to abyss of her own creation only to be judged and sent to… well you know the place I mean so I don’t have to tell you. And with that the room was fading and I ran with all my might to the door and I made it out of the basement just as it collapsed into it’s self and I knew my task was done.
I walked out of the house and met up with everyone else. “You did it!” Screamed Collin and Kevin in perfect unison. Roy, stunned that all of those people came out of the house the second I went in just turned around and walked home. Then the house started to make a loud noise, like a crowd applauding, then all of the souls were freed and all of the people forgotten were remembered and the souls of the dead were freed and passed on to the next life and we did this all before bed time folks. As Collin, Kevin, Bud, and I walked away we decided to celebrate and with that we went to my house and partied with my older brother. Oh yeah I forgot to tell you my older brother went into the basement to prove there was nothing wrong and gave me his samurai sword to remember him by if he didn’t come back. He thought I wouldn’t need it but I guess that was one lucky move on his part. We partied until Collin and Kevin had to go home and me and my big bro Kyle went to sleep for the next day, but this time I didn’t have a weird dream. The next morning Sheri came back with mom, dad, and Uncle Humphrey and Auntie Mary from the cruise and said that they all had the weirdest dream about Halloween but I pretended not to know what they meant. Life went on from their. “Matthew it’s time to eat!” “I’m coming mom” I said as I was ran down the stairs. “Hey honey kids come here real quick!” “What do you need dad?” “Matthew have you ever seen this door before?” I looked at the door in horror, as it was the same door as the one in Collin’s house except it had a different mark on it. “I don’t remember there being a door here do you son?” He asked me as he reached for the doorknob. “No no,no,no,no! not again!” "What are you talking about?" He opened the door and I heard a deep menacing voice’s laughter. Here we go again! Happy Halloween!
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