Their ghostly bodies and anger ridden faces consumed me entirely as I took my first step through that decrepit door. Back in the dusty and untouched room in my church, there has always been this slender and odd looking door. I had always been obsessed with the idea of opening it because I longed for an answer. What is behind that door? One day when I was sent off to the kid’s group to praise Jesus away from the adults, I slipped through the line and went into the back room where the door remained. I had been working up my courage to open this mystery for days, and I was finally ready. I stood in the musty room and looked up at the door that loomed over me, calling my name and putting my hand on the doorknob. “Now or never Violet, now or never.” Is what I told myself as I slowly opened the forbidden door. 

The door swung wide open and a gush of wind smacked me in the face as I was dragged into this portal-like entryway. I opened my eyes to what looked exactly like the stage at my church. The only difference in this “new” world was that instead of seeing the people I always see, I saw spirits floating around the building. The rooms were cold and empty, yet filled with a feeling of agony and pain. It was hard to walk through each room of the church; not because I was still really confused and in shock that I just went through a portal, but because I could physically feel the pain of the spirits around me. They terrified me as they passed by me, showing their mournful faces and threatening me with a small whisper in my ear. The spirits obviously want me to leave them be, but I feel a certain attachment to their damaged souls and dangerous aura. 

Eventually, I made my way back to the church and the service was over. My parents were looking for me, and I could tell they were relieved when they found me even though I had only been gone for around 20 minutes. I knew I needed to stay away from the door and the spirits, but I could not stop thinking about turning that doorknob again, it was like I was drawn to it. 

As the days go by my mind races, filling with the empathetic need to understand these broken souls. Sunday comes around again and this time I can’t hold back from going into that back room and ripping that door wide open, so that’s exactly what I did. The usual slip away from the church service and sneaking to the back door commenced. I took a deep breath and opened the door, not knowing that my little sister, Ivy, had followed me back here. I so fearlessly stepped into the portal that appeared from the door, and my sister did the exact same.

I wandered through the halls of the church, stopping and asking each spirit about their unfortunate lives, knowing each answer would not differ much from the answer before; it was all the same, the revenge, the spite, the anger, and the hurt. Every answer was almost the same except for one. The most beautiful of the spirits grabbed me by the wrists as I asked the routine questions of who they were and how they ended up here, but this spirit felt more than cold, it felt evil. The spirit was a freakishly tall woman with sunken eyes and a certain chilling tone to her voice. She leaned into my face and spoke the most horrifying reality into my ear, “I have her Violet. I have what you love. I own her now.” My heart sunk into an abyss as I looked over to see my sister floating in a cloudy haze down the hall in the children’s room at the church. Her face was beginning to sink in and mirror the beautifully evil spirit’s face. 

How did she get her? I asked myself over and over as I tried to loosen  from her death grip around my wrists. I felt so guilty for coming into this hell on earth and somehow bringing my baby sister into the world as well. I should have closed the door quicker or tighter or made sure she wasn’t anywhere in sight. These thoughts circled my brain over and over again like a broken record as I miraculously slipped through her grip and took off down the hall to rescue Ivy. I made it down the hall with Ivy almost within my reach as her body suddenly vanished. I stopped dead in my tracks. confused and heartbroken. I frantically searched for her in every room throughout the church, and when I almost began to break down, a voice came from behind me, “Go left, down the hall, and into the lobby of the church. She is there hidden behind your reflection.” Before I got a good look at the spirit who whispered these directions to me they disappeared into thin air as if they were breaking some sort of rule for giving me hints. 

The lobby came into view, but Ivy was nowhere to be found. I racked my brain for any idea as to where she would be until I saw not only myself in the tiny mirror hanging on the wall, but Ivy’s sunken face staring directly back at me. I smashed the mirror into pieces to get her out, and when I did she fell into my arms as if she was too exhausted to stand anymore. I gripped my arm around her waist and made a run for it back to the door that would lead me to safety. 

The adrenaline surged through my body as I threw my little sister over my shoulder and sprinted to the door leading to the otherside. I made it down the hallway and made the first left in the direction to the door as I saw her, the beautifully evil spirit, soaring towards me with their arms stretched out screaming for me to stop and turn around. She got closer and closer, but so did the door. Racing down the halls, passing strange spirits too caught up in their own hurt to even notice me, I finally see the door. As I went to turn the doorknob the spirit grabbed my arm and held me back. The spirit’s chilling voice screeching for Ivy and ravengening for the taste of revenge that she hey craved was enough for me to use every ounce of strength in my body to separate us from her. The doorknob turned and my sister and I flew out of it, slamming the door behind us. I sat my sister down as her face came back to life. I took her into my arms and refused to let go, that was until I saw the missing poster plastered in front of my face with my sister and I’s face on the cover. I had been in the other world for maybe an hour, yet to our world, Ivy and I were as good as gone. Three weeks had passed in my world, and I could only remember one hour, one horrific hour of the other.