Beyond the Doors

by David Neilsen

  She was extremely glad Zack had volunteered.

  Inside the portal room, Zack and Sydney quickly hooked the door into the frame, while Alexa scurried about, giving orders they pretended to follow. Dimitri sat down in front of the bank of computers and began to make some adjustments—twiddling knobs, checking dials.

  Janice became very aware that she was not helping. She chided herself on her laziness, but continued to remain aloof all the same. There was something about this door, something disturbing, something evil, that repulsed her. More than once, she considered quietly leaving the room before stopping herself.

  No running away this time, Janice, she told herself. You’re really doing this.

  Sooner than she would have liked, the machine burst to life, Alexa fished another knob out of the drawer, and Zack donned a pair of rubber gloves and opened the door wide.

  “I’m doing this,” he said. “I’m not risking anyone else.”

  “Forget it, dunderhead,” snapped Sydney. “You’re not doing this alone.”

  “It’s too dangerous,” insisted Zack.

  “Which is why you can’t go in alone.” Sydney crossed her arms defiantly.

  “You’re nine years old!” said Zack.

  “And you’re eleven. Get over it. I’m coming.”

  Janice knew they were both right. Zack couldn’t go in there alone, but Sydney, tough as she was, would be better off outside, in reality. The answer was so obvious that Janice’s mouth was open and her lips were moving before her brain even caught on.

  “I’ll go,” she said.

  Eyebrows were raised; surprised looks were shared. She didn’t care. “I’m the oldest. If anyone should go with Zack—and no, you can’t go in alone—it should be me.” She tried to sound convincing but wasn’t sure if it was working. “Alexa and Sydney will wait out here with Dimitri.”

  “No way. I’m going,” insisted Sydney. “End of story. You guys need me. You’d be lost without me.”

  Janice managed to avoid rolling her eyes at her sister’s bravado. Ridicule would not work with Sydney. In fact, it would backfire. So she tried a different tactic. “Look,” she said. “Alexa can’t go in there, right?”

  “I wanna come!” piped up the little girl, only to be ignored by everyone.

  “Yeah, okay,” agreed Sydney somewhat reluctantly, as she pretty much knew where this was going.

  “One of us needs to stay out here with her,” continued Janice. “She can’t be left alone.”

  “I not go in,” reminded Dimitri, who was also swiftly ignored.

  “I can too be left alone!” complained Alexa with a frown and a stamp of the foot. “I found the upstairs door all on my own! I’m handy!”

  “You stay with her, then,” suggested Sydney, once again blissfully ignoring everything Alexa was saying.

  “I have to go with Zack. I’m sorry, Sydney. It really is for the best.”

  Janice waited for Sydney to verbally strike back but was relieved as her sister appeared to be giving in. Of course, the irony of the whole situation was that Janice absolutely, positively did not want to go back into the MemorySphere. But sometimes big sisters had to act like big sisters.

  Unfortunately, her brave and selfless moment was interrupted by the voice of Aunt Gladys lilting in from the hallway.

  “Well, look at that! That’s a big door! We should look in there!”

  “That’s the room we started from,” griped one of the very large, very burly, and very grim-faced men.

  “Is it?” asked Aunt Gladys in wonder. “You’re right, Mr. Gonzo! Maybe they doubled back!”

  “They’re coming in!” warned Sydney.

  “Hide!” hissed Zack.

  Janice looked around the room, empty save for piles of wooden doors. There was nowhere to hide. She groaned as the obvious dawned on her. Bad idea, she thought. Only idea, she thought right back.

  “Into the memory! Everyone!” she cried.

  Nobody had to be told twice. With a mad scramble, all four ran up onto the platform and vanished into what Janice just knew would be the ultimate nightmare.

  It was worse than a nightmare.

  Janice could tell it had once been a bedroom, but if ever a memory had spoiled, this was it. The floorboards of the room were mushy and pulpy, and bursts of something really nasty-smelling shot up into the air from time to time like pus being squeezed out of a zit. The ceiling disappeared far above them. The windows, as near as she could tell, were bleeding. And a lot of the furniture seemed to be alive, which Janice found very upsetting. One chair in particular looked to be growing hair.

  I was right, thought Janice. Very bad idea.

  “I don’t like this memory,” said Alexa.

  “Don’t worry,” said Zack, trying to sound calm. “It’s only a memory. It can’t hurt you.”

  “That circus was a memory, too,” reminded Sydney. Zack shot her a glare but didn’t respond.

  Janice peered into the dark shadows at the far end of the room. She didn’t see anything, but it was difficult to pierce the gloom. She knew they weren’t alone, however. Their grandmother had to be in here somewhere.

  A sudden, weak-sounding cry startled all four of them. Janice’s heart skipped a beat as she imagined the most horrendous, evil terror jumping out at them from the dark, teeth bared, fire pouring out of its eyes. Then she caught sight of the source of the cry and actually grew even more afraid, if that was possible.

  It was a cat.

  Specifically, a small kitten. White with brown spots. Fluffy. Beyond cute. It was not covered in blood. It was not sprouting a mass of tentacles. It did not have a third eye. It looked perfectly normal.

  Which really and truly terrified Janice.

  “Kitty!” squealed Alexa, bending down to pet the creature.

  “Alexa! No!” yelled Zack and Janice and Sydney at the same time. “Get away! It’s evil!”

  “It’s not evil,” said the little girl, reaching out and scratching the kitten behind its ears. “It’s fluffy.”

  Janice was pretty sure fluffy could still be evil, but didn’t know how to explain this to Alexa.

  “Aunt Gladys said Grammy had cats,” cautioned Zack. “It is a part of this memory.”

  “You said the memory couldn’t hurt us,” reminded Alexa, scooping up the suddenly happy kitten into her arms. It purred like a fine-tuned race car and quickly settled down in her embrace.

  “Way to go,” needled Sydney.

  “Do I smell…faaaaaaamilyyyyyy?” creaked the most terrifying voice Janice had ever heard.

  All four children were instantly paralyzed with fear. The unearthly, inhuman voice dug into their hearts with an icy grip, stealing the very breath from their lungs. Janice felt her mind go blank in response, her brain willfully shutting down rather than dealing with whatever horror lurked in the shadows.

  As they stood and stared, transfixed, the owner of that wretched voice slowly crept into the light. The first thing the children could see were ten gigantic fingernails poking out from the darkness, each one finely whittled to a razor-sharp point. The fingernails seemed to hover, disembodied, for a moment, before the fingers themselves came into view. Gnarled and grotesque, each individual finger was the size of a grown man’s arm. Somewhere deep inside herself, Janice thanked her brain for shutting down, otherwise she was pretty sure she’d be screaming bloody murder right about now.

  “Soooomeone come to viiiiisit meeeeee?” called the disturbing voice behind the enormous fingers.

  And then Grandma’s face invaded the light.

  It was massive, even larger than they’d been led to believe from the size of her fingers. Dozens of bulbous warts sprouted and bubbled, much like the floor itself, across her face. Her hair streaked down in wet strands, and her lips were parted in a perpetual sneer. But for Janice the most horrific thing about her were the eyes.

  All five of them.

  Two in their normal places, a third halfway up her left cheek, a fourth just ab
ove her chin, and a fifth at the end of her nose.

  I’m going to scream now, Janice informed herself. To which she responded, Go right ahead.

  She inhaled a massive amount of air into her lungs in preparation for launching the scream to end all screams, but was interrupted by a blast of bright white light as the door through which they’d entered was suddenly flung wide open once again.

  “Mom!” cried a much younger, far more lucid version of Charlotte Tulving bursting into the room. “I’m back! Like I promised! I’m going to help you. I’m going to save you!”

  Even though Janice had intellectually known that they were going to meet up with their mother from years ago inside this memory, actually seeing her was a shock. Luckily, Zack was on the ball enough to quickly grab his sisters and pull them into the shadows of the far wall.

  “Saaaaave meeeeee?” asked the Grandma-Thing. One of her normal eyes rotated to glare at her daughter, as did the eye on her chin. The others rolled around in their sockets independently of one another.

  “You’re sick,” explained Young Charlotte. “Suffering. But I can make it better.” Totally unfazed by the abomination gyrating before her, she stepped forward, hands out like she was approaching a nervous puppy.

  “Siiiiiiick,” creaked Grandma. “Yessss. Soooo siiiiiick.”

  Even as the creature wailed and moaned, Janice noticed her oversized fingers flexing absently, grasping and clutching at the air.

  “We need to get you out of this memory,” continued Charlotte, speaking as naturally as if she were discussing the weather over a cup of tea. “It’s gone bad. You’re not yourself in here.”

  “Siiiiick,” repeated Grandma. “Not myseeeeeeelf.”

  Janice watched one of those enormous hands quietly lower itself to the floor beside the bed—out of Charlotte’s line of sight. What was going on?

  “No. This isn’t you,” agreed Charlotte. “No matter what Dad says, this isn’t you. This is not my mother.”

  “I smell faaaaamilyyyyyy,” said Grandma, the eye on the end of her nose turning to face Janice and her siblings.

  “That’s right. I’m your daughter,” said Charlotte, understandably misinterpreting her mother’s meaning. “And you’re my mother. We’re family. Family does not give up on family.” Having reached the bed, she smiled up at the horrific creature towering above her.

  “Faaaaamilyyyy goooooood,” muttered Grandma, her voice low and menacing. The five fingers on the floor silently jerked forward, detaching themselves from the hand and crawling around the edges of the bed. With a start, Janice realized they were hunting her mother, who was oblivious to their existence.

  “Zack, the fingers!” whispered Janice as loudly as she dared. “They’re going for Mom!”

  Her brother put a hand on her arm, holding her back. “Don’t interfere,” he hissed.

  “She’s gonna be torn apart!”

  “This is a memory,” he reminded her. “Just watch.”

  “Watch?”

  “We’re waiting for Dimitri,” said Sydney, butting in on the conversation.

  Janice couldn’t understand why they were so calm. Didn’t they see those…those things? Clawing their way forward? Preparing to seize Charlotte and rip her to shreds?

  “Here’s what we’re going to do,” continued Charlotte, unaware of the doom stalking her. She dug into her pocket and held up a doorknob. “You’re coming with me. Into the real world.”

  “Reeeeeeeal worrrrrrrld.”

  “You’ll revert to your old self, leaving this horrible place behind. Then we can insert you into a nice, new memory.”

  “New meeeeemoryyyyyy.” The five fingers approached Charlotte from either side of the bed even as she kept her gaze lifted up toward her mother’s face.

  “Where you can exist in peace,” finished Charlotte, beaming with joy.

  She believes it, realized Janice. She’s convinced herself it can work.

  “In peeeeeeeeace,” repeated Grandma, the eye on her cheek widening with expectation. In that moment, Janice saw the creature was toying with Charlotte. Playing with her like a cat plays with a mouse. It wasn’t sick. It was evil.

  And Charlotte had no idea.

  “I love you, Mom,” said the blissfully ignorant younger version of their mother, swelling with pride and closing her eyes to soak in the maternal love she imagined she was receiving.

  The five finger creatures raised up to skewer Charlotte on their razor-sharp tips.

  “No!” screamed Janice.

  Her cry was drowned out by the sudden opening of the door yet again and the frantic calls of “Charlotte! No!” issuing forth from Marcus Tulving as he raced into the memory. He was quickly followed by Aunt Gladys and…

  Dimitri!

  Zack squeezed her arm. He saw him, too.

  Grandma paused, annoyed by the interruption, and her fingers quickly dropped down and away before Charlotte opened her eyes. “I smell faaaaaamilyyyyyyyy,” she spat out nastily.

  “Get back, Charlotte,” ordered their grandfather. “Come away from her.”

  Charlotte whirled toward her father, her face reddening the same way Sydney’s did when she set off on a RAGE. “Leave us alone!” she screamed.

  “That’s not your mother!” he insisted.

  “You know nothing!” she replied.

  “I love this part,” whispered a calm voice from behind the children. “I honestly can’t get enough of it.”

  Janice whipped her head around to find Dimitri leaning against the wall, smiling. Or rather, a memory of Dimitri.

  The memory of Dimitri.

  The children gawked in astonishment, mesmerized by his sudden appearance even as the drama of fourteen years prior unfolded behind them.

  “Dimitri?” asked Alexa.

  “Oh, I’m sorry if my words confuse you,” he said, smirking. “Is this better?” He dramatically cleared his throat before continuing. “This favorite part. Love very much.”

  Hearing him mock his own style of broken English infuriated Janice. Zack was right, this wasn’t Dimitri. Not anymore.

  “Why are you doing this?” asked Zack. “What do you want?”

  Instead of answering, Memory Dimitri slipped himself between Zack and Janice and pointed at the gruesome face of Grandma. “Look at that,” he said. “Terrifying, isn’t it? Can you imagine spending years alone with her? The only escape into memories equally horrific? No respite from her appetite? Nothing but an eternity of misery and darkness with your grandfather’s and grandmother’s twisted memories? Can you imagine? No? Well, I can. Because I lived it!”

  Janice and the others shrank back as if struck as he spun around and sneered at them.

  “And it’s about to happen all over again. Watch!”

  He threw an arm back toward the action just as Marcus grabbed Charlotte and began pulling her away from Grandma.

  “Let go! No, Dad! We can save Mom!”

  “Someday, I hope you will understand,” said Marcus sadly. “Gladys! The door!”

  Aunt Gladys obediently pulled a doorknob out of her pocket and attached it to the bedroom door.

  “Nooooooo!” wailed Grandma. “Doooooon’t gooooooo!”

  “Mom! Help!” Charlotte continued to struggle, threatening to break out of her father’s grasp, until Dimitri stepped in to help.

  “Must go now!” he chirped. “Is bad memory!”

  “I was such a good soldier, wasn’t I?” murmured Memory Dimitri.

  Aunt Gladys yanked the door open and, at her father’s commanding nod, stepped through to the other side.

  “Mom!” yelled Charlotte in a last-ditch effort to break away from her father. “Mom, he’s abandoning you!”

  Janice felt Memory Dimitri lean in until his lips were inches from her and Zack’s ears. “Wait for it,” he whispered.

  Grandma exploded.

  Not physically, but psychically. A howl of primordial fury erupted from the darkness, sending out a shock wave of energy that kno
cked everyone off their feet. The blast of chaos released by the abomination tore through the fabric of the memory, stretching it beyond the boundary of understanding. An instant later, the memory snapped back into place like a spent rubber band, but the damage was done. Everything and everyone in the room in that moment was duplicated, almost as if reality had just hiccuped. Janice felt as if she had been pulled out of her own skin, while at the same time she felt something deep inside her yank itself free.

  From the boiling, bubbling floor, both Janices watched as two versions of her grandfather wrestled two versions of his struggling daughter into the doorway—one pair half a second behind the other. Finally, he shoved her through the door.

  And then he did it again.

  “Dimitri!” both grandfathers yelled after having inexplicably sent Charlotte home twice in succession. “Run!”

  “Zack!” cried Sydney twice. “It’s happening!”

  The Zacks took a step forward, but two Memory Dimitris blocked their path. “Just where do you think you’re going?” they asked, one speaking a fraction of a second after the other.

  Janice’s mind, having more or less returned from its vacation, raced. They would get one shot at this, and the timing needed to be perfect. She looked out and saw the first Marcus Tulving step through the door. It was now or never. As each Zack tried to dodge around a Memory Dimitri, she launched herself forward and then followed herself a split second later.

  “Go, Janice!” shouted both Alexas.

  The Memory Dimitris twisted back around and spied both Janices making for the open doorway as the second Marcus left the memory. “Oh, no you don’t,” they said. But before they could stop her, the Zacks and the Sydneys all leaped upon the Memory Dimitris, bringing them to the ground.

  “Now, Janice!” called both Zacks from the floor.

  Janice reached the doorway just as the first Dimitri left the room. She reached the doorway again a moment later. With a cry of triumph, she shoved her arm against the door as it was trying to close, forcing it to stay open. She moved to shove her arm against the door a second time, but found it difficult to concentrate. The second Janice grew hazy, less distinct, as if reality within the memory was healing itself from the psychic explosion.