What Hides Within.

Before me stands a three story home. The home is a traditional country home. White in color, stone stairs leading to a wrap around porch, that spans the entire home. Ahead of me are two well dressed individuals, a man tall, black hair, black suit. In his right hand is the hand of another, a woman.The woman is much shorter than the man, she has dirty blonde hair with hints of golden streaks. She has her left hand in his right. In her right hand she hold a white handkerchief. Their body language suggests that they are somber, almost grieving. Their backs are always turned to me, I am never able to see their faces. We move together up the stone stairs to the front porch and in a blink of an eye, the two ahead of me had vanished. They disappeared...

The front door, is donned in crimson red.To the left of the door sits a rocking chair. Hanging on the arm rails of the chair is a set of three skeleton keys.I feel compelled to get the keys and as I turn my back, I hear a hollow "caw". It frightens me and I quickly turn around to find a half dead raven.The raven sits boldly on the back of the chair. It has no face, a it's skull. However, the raven still breaths, still cawing at me, both dead and undead, a bird with a claw in both sides of life. An omen? I am not sure...

I place the key in the front door and it opens. Inside, I see the two from before in the home. They are awaiting my arrival, but still I only see their backs.The inside of this home is not traditional in any fashion. There are no rooms, there are melted memories of childhood. Some grim, very few happy.I am ushering the two through each memory, explaining them. Justifying my actions, explaining my feelings. There is a staircase in the back of the open space. The closer we approach the staircase, a sound can be heard. The sound is subtle, faint, almost mimicking white noise, too faint to really comprehend. I look back for my fellow travelers and again they are gone.

I decide to move upward to the second floor, with my remaining two keys and place the second key into the second floor door.When I attempted to open the door, ear piercing screams can be heard. It frightened me and I slammed the door without going in.After a minute or two, I gather my courage and attempt to open the door again. This time there is only silence. Again my fellow travelers are ahead of me, in one place in the room, looking intently at something, I am not sure what. This floor is much like the one before it. No partitions, no bedrooms.A space of memories from my adult hood. Each space again a specific memory. As I approach the first of many, my travelers are staring into it, just as I am. I continued to explain these memories as before however, these memories are much harder to explain. I often am unable to find correct words to go with the visuals. Again very few happy times on this floor. There is tragedy, torment, torture. Pain and anguish is the main theme. I become emotional with each attempt. As I usher the other through this section of horror, the once subtle white noise, gains intensity.

Now, the sound is angry, like a building during demolition.Twisting metal, crunching concrete... I turn quickly to look for the others, because at this point, "being scared" is an under statement.They are back at the happy memory, the memory of when my children were born. The only truly happy memory on this entire floor. Obviously, these two are no longer coming with me, for the rest of my journey. I bright white light can be seen at the third floor stair case, and I have one key left. As I approach the stair case to the third floor, the stairs are decayed. The bright white light can be seen behind the cracked, worn door. When I attempt to climb the stair, I become unstable.The stair shake violently, for every step I take the door seems to further and further away. The demolition sound is deafening.I am gripping the walls to ground myself and continue to attempt to climb these impossible stairs.

After what appears to be an eternity, I finally find myself at the top of the stairs.The sounds stop, the ground stabilizes, I am no longer fearful and entire journey to get to the top does not seem to matter. I take a moment to rest, looking through the cracks in the door.The light is just to bright to see anything. I place the key into the door and....

That is when I wake up. I have never seen what was behind to third floor door. It must be wonderful...