Torn Fragility

His Heart was darker than the starless night
For that there is a morn
But in this black Receptacle
Can be no Bode of Dawn~Emily Dickinson



“Stop!” I shouted bolting upright, breathing heavily as I looked around me with fear enlarged eyes. I was lying in my bed, in the guestroom Hannah had prepared for me. It was exactly how it had been before being ransacked, yet...it wasn’t. The bed I was lying in was slightly bigger, the room itself was much larger, and the cupboard of drawers was gone. Instead there was now a long line of closet doors against the wall where it had stood. The knobs were crystal, I could see as much even from here, and the room no longer smelt of lavender but of roses.

That upset me more than anything else and I crawled out of bed to better see my surroundings. My toes luxuriated at the touch of a soft beautifully woven carpet and for a moment the images on the carpet seemed to move, the people on the fringes seemed to dance, and the fairies in the corners winked at me.

I took a step back and looked up. Other than those few changes not much had been altered. But everything seemed an essence richer, with a taste of something long gone. I walked over to the desk which now had cubbyholes for books and envelopes and where a few old fashioned ink pens were positioned in a small jar. I wonder how they felt to draw with...

My sketch book! My fingers scrabbled for the straps of my bag around my shoulders and with soaring sense of hope I pulled it off and zipped the middle pocket open. My sharpener glinted at me from the darkness and my sketchbook was in my hands, before I knew what had happened. I sighed in relief fingering the smooth pages.

Everything else was still in my bag and I wondered at where I actually was. I slung my backpack back on thinking, another trick? Or has her game begun?

I don’t even know Smith very well so why did she assume I would want to risk my life saving him from whatever he needed saving from? Although time was ‘running out’ I felt calm, peaceful in a way. And checking the wall for sockets and finding none my reason for peace was confirmed.

I was effectively cut off from the world I had grown up in. My very room was set back in time. I rushed to my window and saw a neatly trimmed lawn with immaculate oval hedges lining a courtyard filled with roses. I laughed, the sound strange in my ears. That is definitely not my workmanship!

I pulled open one of the closet doors and my heart fluttered. Beautiful silk dresses rustled beneath my touch, while my eyes fell on embroidered white cotton petticoats. There were a few evening dresses of scarlet and dark green velvet but they were in no particular style from any historical era. I knew because my mother owned a costume shop that hired out everything from Edwardian dresses to mid seventeenth century pirate clothes. She prided herself on the period ‘correctness’ of her costumes.

And having worked there since I was fourteen I knew exactly that what I was seeing in front of me was not created by human hands. Standing primly in the shadows of the dresses were delicate slippers, heels with brocaded toes and A sewn pink bird detached itself from the fabric of one kimono and flitted out and away through the open window before I could gather my senses.

I moved to the last door and closing my eyes I wished for something I could put on with ease, without any complications. To my utter amazement the closet widened out into a comfortable bathroom, with a large marble bath, an old fashioned toilet and sink ensemble. The bath was in the form of a cupped leaf whilst the tap head was of a swan’s. I walked back into the room seeing how most of the furniture complimented each other but was clearly not of the same feather. So to speak.

I walked towards the main door, wiping my sweaty palms on my shorts. I had been putting this part off for too long. I squeezed my eyes shut and turned the handle. When nothing ambushed me I slowly opened both eyes and looked up and down a very long corridor. Except for the odd end table and vase filled with roses, the corridor was empty and looked like it had when I had last seen it.

But the silence that swamped over everything was eerie and I kept my door open when I stepped into the corridor, just in case I became lost and wanted to find it again. But as soon as both feet were on the winding carpet that filled the hallway it began to move.

It slowly bore me further and further away, only it was clearly not mechanical. I tried not to look at the moving carpet beneath me nor at the end table with its vase of blue roses that seemed to follow me. I tried not to focus too long on the painted scenes and landscapes, that moved. A cow looked up at me as I passed, gently grazing in a meadow. A girl stopped pulling at the hair of a little boy and gave me a toothy grin. I wasn’t frightened but I didn’t want to know where the carpet was taking me, if the paintings were any indication of how strange things could become.

And I wasn’t about to find out. I clutched onto the latch of a random door floating by and pulled it open, having the weird sensation of my legs still walking but not moving at all. I jumped into the open doorway and immediately the carpet rippled and settled behind me. I was now in an overgrown living room that had a Cape colonial air to it. It was massive and cool with a ceiling decorated in plaster murals.

And sitting in a leather arm chair a shadow moved.

I stopped and took a step back hoping I had not been seen; heavy curtains were drawn over the windows casting the room into dark green shadows. My hand slowly crept and just as it landed on the door frame, the occupant of the chair stirred again.

“Trying to leave already?” a voice purred. “My, my, aren’t you rude? And you just arrived. Come closer and greet your host.”

Maybe this was one big horrible nightmare. Certainly the dreamlike quality of the place, the magic of it attested to that. Once again I was caught in a past nightmare and I thought I saw dark eyes narrow at me from the chair. The creature in it slowly stood up but I didn’t take any notice, my eyes were glazed over, my heart was a faint fluttering in my chest and my mind was caught in a horror of its past.

I was snapped back to the present by the grip of large hands −or were they claws?− on my shoulders.

“You,” I breathed. It was the man. The too perfect version of Smith.

“I’m afraid it’s time to go,” he sneered, his monstrous black eyes burning into mine. “I don’t know what she’s told you but don’t think I’ll make this easy.” His face melted into dark shadows exposing a monster. “I look forward to your next visit my little artist.”

My back was slammed into something solid with a dull thud. I hissed in pain and tried to get into a fighting position only to find myself rolling around on the floor with my pyjamas on. My alarm clock was shrill in my ears and I numbly moved to shut it off.

I looked around in alarm and then relaxed. It had only been a nightmare, horribly realistic but harmless in the end. My room was back to normal and when I checked my phone I found I had at least ten messages and four missed phone calls from my mother. I quickly typed a hurried message telling her I was fine, was busy, had had a bit of a rough time adjusting but I was handling it. My sketching equipment still lay on my desk and when I smoothed my hair from my forehead feeling warm and safe inside my hand stopped midway and dropped to my side.

My sketch was gone. It was still missing just as if the dream had really happened.