The Writer’s Corner features poetry, essays, short stories, satire and various fiction and non-fiction from SCAD Atlanta students. To submit your own work for the Writer’s Corner, email features@scadconnector.com.
“The Guest Room” by Sasha Tishman
Although the door was always completely shut, I could always feel a gust of icy cold wind that gently tickled my spine as I rushed through the hallway. It felt as if the wind materialized into something or someone that followed me cautiously through the hall, but it always vanished into the void when I turned around to take a peek. Sometimes, it was more than a breeze, and I swore that I could hear the sound of a gentle wailing that came from inside.
Ever since I was young, my mother forbade my brothers and me from going into the room. She always kept it locked and made sure that absolutely no one set foot inside it; not even our housekeeper. I always thought it was because she was saving it for a special guest or maybe because he kept something in there that she didn’t want any of us to see. Either way, I had always been curious about that room, but never curious enough to go inside, until that day.
It was one of those summer nights in which the heat is so unbearable that sleeping is not an option. I remember I woke up in the middle of the night to find my entire body covered in sweat and my air conditioner broken. My mouth felt dry and my head hot, in desperate need for a glass of ice water.
I rushed down the stairs, aching for some relief. I stepped into the kitchen, not even bothering to turn on the lights, and poured myself a big glass of water with frosty chunks of hard ice. I drank the whole thing and then rushed upstairs. As I walked down the hallway and approached the room, I felt that same chilly breeze brushing my back, but this time I felt as if someone was breathing into the back of my neck. I quickly turned around, only to realize I was alone in the darkness of that long, endless hallway. Then, I turned back around to look at the room, which now had a light on inside.
For a moment, I thought that I was still asleep and it was the heat that was causing this feverish nightmare. I pictured myself lying in my bed, waking up and realizing this was only a product of a dreadful combination between the heat and my overactive imagination.
I stood in front of the door for a while, frozen, trying to think of what I should do. A part of me told me to try and open the door, but the other part told me to run off and forget I’d ever seen that, and while I was dealing with my internal dilemma, I suddenly heard something like a screeching noise. It sounded like someone was sitting in a rocking chair.
Something took over me in that moment, because I know there is no way I would have done what I did consciously. I approached the door, and I slowly ducked. I peeked into the crack between the lower part of the door and the floor, and suddenly, the rocking chair stopped. So did my heart. I was paralyzed for a few seconds, as I stared in complete silence and with a grisly, feverish sensation that took over my entire body.
Now that the rocking chair sounds were gone, I began hearing footsteps. They seemed to be getting closer and closer, but I didn’t see any feet; I could only hear them. I stood still, trying not to make a sound, as the footsteps kept getting closer. I could now feel a knot in my throat and my heart beating as if it wanted to pop out of my chest.
Suddenly, the feet were only a few inches away from my face. How had they gotten there without me seeing them is something I still don’t understand to this day, and probably never will.
As the feet stood before me, frozen, and now completely still, something told me to run; and this time I listened. Before anything else could happen, I ran to my parents’ bedroom. I quickly woke them up and together we rushed back to the hallway.
The thing is, when we got there, the lights inside the guest room were turned off. And for the longest time I have wondered if what I saw that night was real or if it was all in my head. A question that still keeps me up at night, and probably always will as long as that room’s door stays unopened.
