"The Locked Door"

The sun had started to peer through the silhouettes of the leafless January trees while he drove down the winding country roads. The coffee he’d bought form the gas station 45 minutes prior had just a couple of lukewarm sips remaining as the last track of the Neil Diamond greatest hits album played on his old Land Cruiser’s CD player. 

With one more left turn, the old gate came into view and he started to slow down the car, eventually reaching a halt on the side of the road. He parked the car outside of the entrance and took a deep breath before turning off the engine and opening his door to go outside. The loud thumping of his dog’s tail hitting the back seat behind him now interrupted the otherwise silent morning, since the old dog knew that they had arrived at a familiar place. “Come on Murph,” he said to his travel companion, who jumped down out of the car. 

Not seeming to acknowledge the “No Trespassing” sign posted n a tree next to the gate, the man gingerly straddled the gate that was no taller than four feet high and climbed over without too much issue. His dog, off the leash, quickly followed him to the other side of the gate, not needing to exert the same effort to easily jump through an open gap where the gate’s hinges met the wooden fencepost. 

He walked slowly up the hill, not in any hurry to make his way along the narrow path through the woods that lied ahead of him. His dog had run well ahead at this point, coming in and out of sight as it would explore one rustle in the leaves down the hill before periodically returning to the footsteps of her owner. The man made his way down the overgrown gravel road, keeping his worn jacket’s hood up to protect him from the brisk gusts that hit his face. After about fifteen minutes, he’d reached the bottom of the hill that now looked up to the remains of an old house on the next ridge. 

The building still maintained the majority of its original structure, but from where the man was looking the red brick on the house’s left side slowly transitioned into a charcoal black color on the right. An oak tree poked through the open roof on the darkened side of the house, and it its branches had begun to intertwine with canopy of the surrounding forrest. 

The man made his way up the long hill to the front of the house, which further showed the extent of this ruin to its right side when he finally arrived to the front door. Oddly enough, though, the front doorway had remained completely intact after whatever event caused this house to fracture. Walking up to the red door, he cautiously twisted the door knob and walked inside. 

The front corridor of the house revealed an entirely open wall to his right, along with a staircase in front of him that contained just six steps before they cut off and failed to reach the second story. Immediately to his left, however, revealed the intact part of the house - a dining room with dust-lined furniture and evidence of some of the woods’ other wanderers having shuffled some things around. The floors creaked with each step he took towards the room’s far corner, which presented a closed closet door. 

After a look around to make sure he was accompanied by nobody other Murph, who had now followed him inside, the man twisted the door knob and pulled back, but the deadbolt kept the door from swinging open. He paused and reached into his left pocket, from which he grasped a keychain. Attached to the ring next to his Land Cruiser’s key was an old bronze key, which had a long stem and two simple teeth at the key’s end. Inserting the key into the large keyhole, he then twisted and released the lock which boomed a louder than expected click throughout the old dark room. 

He then pulled the door open, which creaked as the rusty hinges swung the slightly warped wood of the door back towards him. Inside revealed the expected inventory for a dining room adjacent closet, with several shelves against the back wall stacked with old china plates, cloth napkins, and silverware. The man then crouched down to the floor of the closet, which had a couple of table leafs diagonally propped against the side of the wall at a 45 degree angle. He pushed both leafs so that they stood up vertically, revealing a small wooden box on the ground. The box had rounded edges and a plaque on top that read “January 17th, 1974.” He picked up the box and set it on his lap and brushed the dust off of its smooth edges before opening it. Inside the box were some faded photos of a wedding, a dried corsage, and an opened envelope which he then grabbed and put in his jacket pocket. 

He set the box back down where it was formerly resting and partially shut the door before walking back out the front door of the abandoned house. His dog followed as he made his way around the intact part of the house and up the hill a bit further, where a short fence came into view on the top of the ridge behind the house. With a few more steps, he arrived at the gate entrance to the fence enclosure, which made a rectangle in the grass no more than ten feet on each side. In the middle of the patch of grass guarded by the surrounding fence revealed a stone plaque which read, “Caroline Murphy Walters; 1950 - 1999” 

The man looked down on the plaque for several silent moments and then proceeded to reach for his jacket pocket, where he took out the wooden box’s envelope. His hands now exposed to the cold winter gusts, he reached inside of the envelope and removed a sheet of notebook paper, which he then unfolded to reveal a short hand written letter that he read aloud, 

“Caroline. On this day, I vow to grow how you’ve taught me to grow, to learn how you’ve taught me to learn, and to love how you’ve taught me to love. I am forever changed because of the person you have been to me, and vow to treat the world as you treat everyone from this day forward. I will love you until death do us part, but I will absolutely never get a Golden Retriever.” 

He then took a second to gaze across the horizon that the top of the ridge revealed as a soft smile came to his face. A few moments of silence passed that were interrupted by a loud bark behind the man on the other side of the fence, where the morning sunlight illuminated Murph’s golden fur. Murph sat eagerly with an old stick she’d found in the woods and invited his owner to come toss it for her. The man took one last look down at Caroline’s grave, put the note back in his pocket, and left the enclosure to meet his now eagerly wagging companion. He took the dog’s treasured twig and gave it a hurl down the hill, where Murph swiftly ran back down towards the house. 

All the sudden he felt a buzz in his back pocket. He reached back for his phone, whose front screen revealed that Lindsey Walters was calling alongside a picture of them two from their 10th anniversary trip to Charleston. “Hey honey, I’ll be home in an hour. See you soon.”