Barn Doors

What do you do when you think you’ve lost your mind? There it is again. The doors are there again and now the footsteps behind the doors are ringing in my mind. I can’t make it stop. What is happening to me? Who or what is behind the doors? Someone please make it stop. Make the footsteps stop.  I raise my hands and scream to the heavens in the sky to make the doors go away and the noise stop but it is useless. Nothing stops. It never does. 

The red door is on the right. The yellow door on the left. It is always the same. The doors are big and they remind me of the doors at my grandmother’s farm. I used to love to go to the farm in the summer with my kid sister. We would run in the corn fields until we got to the barn doors where the horses were. I loved the horses. I loved feeding them and petting them and of course riding them. My grandmother wouldn’t let me ride them until I was 9 years old. I didn’t like waiting but she was right. I needed to learn how and needed to learn all about my horse, Tang. Tang was all white with a touch of brown in his tail at the very end. I named him Tang after my favorite teddy bear.  

The barn doors were always painted different colors when I would visit Grandmother Ann. One summer when I returned they were a bright purple. My grandmother said that she just loved the color purple so she told Hank, my grandfather, to paint them purple that summer. The next year they were not purple anymore. Over the years she had painted them an array of colors including: green, black, brown, white, orange and the last summer I visited before she died she had painted them red. It was not a bright red though. More of a dull reddish color. I asked her why that color and she just looked at me and shook her head and said because she couldn’t find pink. I shrugged it off because that was just how Grandmother talked sometimes now.  My mom told us that Grandmother was sick now and sometimes she would say or do things that she never has done before and sometimes she wouldn’t even remember us telling her something or even remember our names. So, I had gotten used to Grandmother not remembering certain things now. I didn’t like it but I had gotten used to this new normal at Grandmother’s farm. 

The last summer I spent on the farm with Grandmother was right after my 12th birthday. I was looking forward to seeing her that summer because I had just started the 7th grade and had a lot to tell her about my new best friend, Gail Sweets. I remember packing my suitcase and packing my riding clothes. I was also looking forward to seeing Tang. My kid sister, Ellen, wasn’t going with me that summer. She was going to spend the summer with our other grandmother, Martha. They were going to Disneyland. My sister asked why I would pass up Disneyland to go to some stinky farm. I told her it was the farm I was going to see it was Grandmother, Grandfather and Tang and I would rather spend summer on a stinky farm than in make believe land with a dumb mouse that was wasn’t real named Mickey. She rolled her eyes at me and tossed back her head then looked at me like I was nuts. I guess I was a little nuts. 

When I got to the farm that year Grandmother was sitting in her favorite chair in what she called the parlor. I just called it the living room. Grandmother was sitting there looking out of the big window which showed a view of the front of the farm where the chickens were. Occasionally a crow would fly by and sit on the fence and Grandmother would always say something about the deep black color of the crows. I think that besides the chickens, crows were her favorite bird. Grandmother was wearing a long blue dress that touched her toes. She didn’t have on shoes. She told me that she didn’t really have a need to wear shoes anymore since she didn’t go out much. She had on some bright blue socks that almost matched her dress. Grandmother’s hair is very long now. She hadn’t gotten a haircut in almost a year. I picked up the silver brush from the coffee table near the chair and began to brush Grandmother’s hair. Her hair was now all grey and went to the middle of her back. It was soft and curly. Grandmother used to say that she was the only one of her siblings who had curly red hair like her dad. I guess that is where my red curly hair came from. I also was the only one in my family who had the same hair as Grandmother. I had curly red hair and light brown eyes. Grandmother turned a little to look at me out of the corner of her eye and she smiled. I parted her hair and braided it on one side  than the other side. 

I noticed that the barn doors were a different color. I asked Grandmother about the color changes and she just looked at me and winked. She said, “Granddaughter, you know how I am.” I just laughed because I did know how she was. 

Grandmother passed away two months later. After the funeral I went to the barn. I just stood there looking at the outside of the doors of the barn and admired the new colors. I noticed that the new colors were my favorite colors. I stood there for a long time until my Mom told me that it was time to go. There were a ton of family members in the main house and apparently they all wanted to see me. I just think my mom wanted me to get away from the barn and the doors.

Now, it’s 15 years later and I am in my small apartment standing there completely naked wiping water off of my body with a towel. I hated getting out of the shower. I loved the feel of the water beating down on my skin. The gentle way it seemed to calm me down after a long day. I wish I could just live in water. The thoughts of the barn doors were haunting me. The two doors that lead to the opening of the barn. The doors I had walked through many times in my childhood. Why now? Why were they consuming my thoughts and dreams now? What was wrong with me? I didn’t know the answer but I knew where I could go to get them. 

Two hours later I was getting off of a plane and heading towards Grandmother’s barn. After Grandmother died her cousin, King, took over running the farm for a few years but then he passed away and the animals were sold and the barn and the house sat empty. It looked deserted like something out of an old horror movie. The barn doors hadn’t been painted in a decade and the house was still fully furnished with all of my grandmother’s furniture, including the old chair she used to sit in and look out of the window. The inside of the house was covered with spider webs and dust. The furniture was all covered up with old white and yellow sheets and the window in the kitchen had been boarded up with a big piece of wood. 

I was instantly transported back in time when I entered her house. I moved an old sheet which was covering the sofa and wiped off the dust the best I could and plopped down. A mouse ran across my foot and I screamed. I screamed and then I laughed. I laughed because I remember doing that one day when I was with Grandmother screaming when I saw a field mouse and Grandmother ran out of the kitchen with her wooden spoon in her hand ready to attack whatever scared me and when she saw it was only a tiny mouse she laughed and turned and went back into the kitchen. I remember that like it was yesterday.

I tossed my bag on the sofa beside me and walked across the old creaky floor and walked to the back door. I walked through the door across the field to the barn. The barn had two doors. The doors were different now. I guess King changed them when he worked out here. I hesitated and just stood there looking. Could these be the doors I keep seeing in my mind? Are these the doors that are driving me mad? Are these the doors haunting me? I took a step back. 

I heard it. I took a step back and I heard it. I thought that I was back in my bed in my apartment dreaming. But, I was not. I was standing right here and right now and I was hearing it. I walked a little closer and I heard it again. I heard the footsteps. It was the same footsteps that were driving me mad in my dreams. I knew that the barn was empty. Here I was though, standing in front of the two barn doors hearing the same footsteps I had heard in my mind many times. I walked closer. I didn’t know what to do. I had two choices. I could either open one door or open both doors or just walk away and forget this ever happened. 

I moved a little closer to the doors. I was now standing a couple of inches from both doors. I took a breath. I closed my eyes. I exhaled. I put my hand on the red door. Do I open it or do I open the other door. I had a choice to make. The footsteps got louder and they seemed to be getting closer to the door. I couldn’t let my imagination get the better of me. It probably was a rat or something behind the door. Maybe a bunch of field mice. It couldn’t be anything else. I looked at the yellow door. The footsteps were behind that door too but they weren’t as many. I didn’t think I heard as many. They were lighter footsteps than behind the red door. I decided to open one door. The other door I was not going to open. 

I blew a kiss to the bright blue skies. I always did that when I had a major decision to make. I sent a kiss to the heavens to my grandmother. I closed my eyes again and I asked her for guidance or some sign. I think I got that sign. I moved closer to the yellow door. I listened. I slowly and carefully pushed it open. 

What I saw inside of the door were two things. I call them my two angels. I saw my grandmother’s spirit. She was standing there wearing the long blue dress and the socks which matched the dress. She didn’t say a word. She just smiled at me. Standing next to her was Tang. They were both there only for a few minutes but it felt like longer. I reached out my hands to both of them and then as fast as they appeared they were gone. Their footsteps went to heaven. I actually heard them leaving. I needed to see them one last time. I needed to know that they were alright.  The dreams stopped after that. The noises in my head stopped. But, there was one last thing I needed to do before I left the barn. 

I stood there and watched the red, blue and green flames of the fire as the heat of the flames and fire engulfed the barn. The barn was gone in a matter of minutes. That was the end of an era. I had the barn rebuilt and my family sold my grandmother's house a year later. I painted the barn doors red and yellow.