Doors Ajar

 May 26th

In this dream, I was with my brother, a young woman, and a young man as we explored a place called "The Unlocked Manor." It was an abandoned mansion in the middle of a wooded area that sat empty and inviting. We stayed the evening with several others; this includes students and teachers who used several rooms as a substitute for classrooms and offices. All the while, a storm raged outside, giving little reason to think of leaving.

The woman from before sat with me as I tried to show her some of what I had written. She leaned back into my chest, and with one hand I massaged her belly, and I scrolled through some writing projects with the other. At times it felt like an oddly romantic moment, despite my writing having less than romantic themes. This woman stuck around throughout the dream as a central character while my brother and a few others hung around in the background exploring the room.

Regardless of the appearance of such a scene, everybody in this room was fulfilling a function. Our duty here was to ensure that the building was kept secure as criminals were known to try and breach the building from this back room from time to time. As fate would have it, two men came to the back door and tried to break in, but with only a stick and our fists, we managed to push the two back to the edge of the clearing that the school sat in.

Despite the ferocity of our fight only moments prior, as the sun began to set, we all stood together, wearily approaching the school. The thugs we fought so hard to keep out we now clung to like how a child clings to a teddy bear as they lay down for bed, watching their parents slip out of the room. Once a day before the sun sets, food must be left on the other side of the manor where our fight had begun. As the sun sunk behind the manor, we knew we were in trouble.

If food was not left out on time, those coming to feed would become angry and enter the school in the night searching for food. So, even though the sun had finished setting before we reached the Manor door, we crept back inside, hopeful that we could still make it.

We had no idea how late we were. When we first stepped inside, we saw dark grey walls, a dusty wooden floor with carpeting down the middle. There was furniture and trinkets all down the halls, and everything was wrecked, smashed, or torn asunder. The head of a statue was missing, and even a stuffed fox had a bite taken out of it.

Upon arriving at a double staircase that rose like a diamond around a centralized door, we met with a bigger group of people; there were maybe six to eight people in the other group, friends who also knew that we were late for our job. Unfortunately, there was also a dog with us, poor thing. After gathering by this door, we ascended the staircase to reach the other side of the house, still hopeful that it was not too late.

As we crept through the halls, we fell back a bit behind the others. Then, as they passed into another hallway, our path was suddenly blocked by a tall figure that stepped in line behind them, veiling the hall in darkness and leaving us without a way forward. We took several steps back in shock before deciding to hide inside an open room nearby. All the while, a grey-skinned young man followed us into the room. Growing on his back were huge yellow boils the size of basketballs or softballs, and his eyes were completely white.

The man stumbled towards us with dead eyes, and there was no way out of this tiny room other than the door our pale friend had just come through. As he approached, we tried to stall him by saying, "Why aren't you a model" something akin to this. And he stopped to answer us. However, partway through his answer, the cloaked figure from before ducked through the doorway and stood behind the young man. With one big hand, it grabbed his head, pulled it off, and ate it while the rest of us watched.

Whispering to itself, it said, "I like feasting on his nightmares," implying that it had done so before. Then, as quietly as it had entered, it stepped out of the room, but we knew it was only a matter of time before it would return. Staying in that room meant dying, and moving meant dying. We were out of options. In most of my dreams, I would panic and fight in situations like this, but something about this thing felt off. It wasn't the way it killed so casually, it wasn't the way it walked so quietly, and it wasn't the way it spoke so humanlike.

Something else was off; freezing in place seemed instinctual as if my body knew that approaching this thing was not an option. Then the dream faded in much the same way that the sense of security the headless corpse standing between me and that door had provided. Thank God it was over before that thing could return.