by Shelley Zehyr

Likes: 5
Words: 200

I found a secret door up here in the garage loft space. I’d never been up here, though I knew my brothers had. Stepping off the step ladder, and gingerly climbing up here, then navigating among the metal garden stakes, the bale of old peat moss, stacks of boards, and unused shingles, I had come upon it. Set where the wall met the house, and slightly ajar, with no knob just a rusting hasp without a padlock – puzzling. Had this been here long before my parents renovated the house? It must have been. There was no purpose after the kitchen renovations that enclosed the porch. Hearing a noise below me, looking down on the nearby shelf I saw two squirrels, the one in the lead carrying a large black walnut. I’d seen plenty of those husks in the garage through the years, and a lot more lately. I recalled the scurrying feet seeming to come from the wall/ceiling juncture in the kitchen, all the way along to the cabinet over the washing machine. Nathan’s complaints about noises in the wall, and the occasional racket in the attic stairwell wall. Their entry point that had been a mystery was no longer.

by Mary Zuelke Author

Likes: 5
Words: 200

Tad wandered the street, alone, afraid of going back home to nothing — to no one who cared.

Grown-ups passed him like he didn’t exist.

Stow’s Drug Store chimed as the door opened and closed. Its display frosted over, but he could still see a Christmas train circling a miniature town with glowing lights, shops and homey homes—like candy for his eyes.

Being only seven, Tad slipped inside unnoticed by the grumpy Mr. Stow. He sidled behind the desk while Mr. Stow talked about the newest ice scrapers.

His heart raced as he opened the cabinet below the display case. The warmth of the room made his eyes grow heavy and sleep soon took over.

Tad woke with a start. It was dark. Close.

He listened. Nothing.

Golden light shimmered deeper in the cupboard. Crawling toward it, he found a small door where the golden glow crept. His tiny fingers wrapped around the brass knob. It turned with a click.

Beyond lay a snow covered woods

“I’m in the store. Does this lead to the backdoor?”

With a shrug he stepped into a the magical night.

Toot toot.

Chug, chug, chug. A steam engine screeching stop before him.

“All aboard.”

by John Cox

Likes: 4
Words: 200

I was 6 when I found it. I had just started school a couple of weeks before. Classrooms, kids my age, and teachers, my life had changed. It changed again when I went though the door in my closet.

My mother put my clothes in my bedroom closet. She told me as she hung them, "You need to get up and put on your own clothes now." As she was hanging them and giving me a lecture I saw a little door at the back only partially concealed by neatly hung outfits. I wondered if she saw it. Did she know it was there?

For days I stayed away from the object of my obsession. Instinctively I knew my parents would not approve but my will was giving way.

At first I would just stare at it. Then I touched it and I would swear to you to this day I felt something. My chest swelled, my breath caught in my throat, and my arms started shaking like they had somewhere else to be. It was several days before I got up enough courage to open it. At night it calls to me but in the morning it is silent

by Jesse R Traynham - Author

Likes: 4
Words: 200

They're in the walls. I can hear them, but I can't see them. Faint music drifts from the space, driving my cat crazy.

One afternoon, in a last-ditch effort, I decided to move the couch from the wall. It left deep divots. That's when I found it.

The door was as tall as a ruler and as wide as my palm. Tiny, really. I lay prone and investigated. It was elegant. Ornate. But minuscule. I jiggled the fingernail-sized handle. Nada. It was locked. I attempted to pick the lock with a paper clip, but it was too big. A butter knife only scratched up the door.

Finally, I decided to knock. I knocked three times. Enough to express how ridiculous this was.

I heard the door unlock. A small man, about nine and a quarter inches tall, poked his head out, and then opened the door.

"You're so tiny!" I said.

The man went flying down the hall of his house.

As I tried to help the man, there was a knock at my own door. Three knocks. I poked my head out to see a giant face staring back at me. It was then that I went flying, too.

by Kathy Goddard writer

Likes: 3
Words: 200

Everyone dreams of finding a secret door - an escape hatch. I found mine when the arguments started. My two older sisters were forever fighting, leaving me shaking, huddled in a corner of our shared bedroom as missiles flew; Barbie dolls (theirs), pillows (whoever’s was closest at hand), books (mine) - whatever was available. Large and athletic they were forever in competition with each other. Small and weedy, I flew beneath their radar, if not their missiles.

The day I was smacked on the cheek by the corner of my favourite book I stumbled, fell and hit my head on the wall.

I wasn’t knocked out. I could still see my sisters chucking all and sundry at each other as I slid down the wall. Their shrieks muffled as, inside my head, there was a flash of light as a door opened.

‘Come and play with us.’ The characters from my book beckoned me. I closed my eyes as the door grew big enough for me to enter.

As an adult I can open it at the first sign of conflict - and no one knows about it. My escape hatch is a secret never to be revealed; not even to my psychiatrist.

by Eolas Pellor

Likes: 3
Words: 200

The rector almost overlooked the door. It wasn’t particularly impressive, after all, nor was it placed in a prominent location in the cathedral. Instead it was tucked behind a corner in the narthex, a plain wooden door, without handle or key, with no raised panels or mouldings to mark it off.

He might have thought it served some utilitarian function — hiding plumbing or electrical circuits, perhaps, if he hadn’t noticed the old, wrought iron hinges that it sported. Curious, he approached the sextant, who accompanied him back to look upon it.

“I’ve never seen it before!” the sextant exclaimed, “And I’ve been in charge of the fabric of this cathedral for four-and-twenty years.” they repaired to the rector’s office and searched diligently through the old plans of the building, seeking some explanation.

It was the bishop who told them what it was, many hours later, when they returned to the alcove with hammer, screwdriver, and pry-bar to make the old wood yield to their desire to find out what lay beyond it.

“It is no great secret,” he told them. “Each place has such a door, though in the rush of life we often ignore it. It is memory.”

by Neviena Dēls

Likes: 1
Words: 200

The door appeared three days after Mum died. I found it while looking for the tin of tea she kept hidden from Dad, although Dad had been dead for eleven years. The pantry was too small for another door. I measured the wall twice, then stood there holding the tape.

It was painted the same cream as the shelves, with a green knob and a scratch near the bottom. I remembered that scratch. When I was seven, Mum had caught me drawing on the wall and made me scrub it away. I had forgotten the door, but apparently the wall had not. My sister Claire came over that afternoon. She said Mum had never mentioned a door, which was the sort of thing Mum would have done if she wanted us arguing after she was gone.

We stood in front of it for a long time. Claire wanted to open it. I wanted to know where it went, but I was beginning to suspect that knowing would make some things harder to remember.

In the end, I left the door closed. The next morning it was gone, and the tea tin was sitting on the floor where it had been.