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The Doorman [continued in comments]
It was with nervous excitement that I accepted a copy of the master key to my high school. Before me, no other student had been given the privilege of carrying one. To be honest, I?m not sure the principal even knew I was given it. The school kept a private inventory of course-required text books that were checked out to students at the start of each year, and for the past two years I had been a volunteer worker helping to sort inventory and keep track of the thousands of books as they drifted from shelves to students, and eventually back to the shelves. Ms. Jones, the middle-aged and overworked manager of the book depository, built enough trust in me during my freshman and sophomore years of service to allow me the use of a powerful tool: a key which could open every door in the school. Officially, I was to use it to sweep the school to reclaim unreturned text books. Unofficially, it was my all-access pass to explore the old school building to whatever depth I desired. The idea struck me early on to visit the city records for a copy of the building?s blue prints. It became my goal to explore every room of the school by summer vacation. In three visits, I was able to sketch my own rough copies of the floor layouts in my moleskin journal ?an accessory which made me feel mature and responsible, especially when I would jot down in it ?important information? like phone numbers or to-do lists. I felt like a phantom as I wandered the hallways of the school, opening new doors whenever I could do so without being witnessed. The sense of intrigue thrilled me, and I became acutely aware of how to take advantage of blind spots and breaks in hallway traffic to slip through doorways into yet-unexplored wings of the school. My moleskin began filling up with my notes about each room, and I marked my hand-drawn maps to indicate what each new location contained. As I became more familiar with the hundreds of rooms and hallways in the school, the basements offered a chance for real exploration. There were actually two basements; though they were on the same level, they were not connected in any way and had to be accessed by separate stairways. Only one of them had elevator access, and contained the book storeroom, a room to which I was frequently sent with a cart of text books that were no longer being used. The inventory room upstairs contained fresh, clean, new editions of books on Biology, Art History and Calculus, and the store room in the basement held all the old editions and books for classes no longer taught. The store room sat at the end of a long hallway lined with doors on either side. The elevator was on the opposite end of the hall, across from the custodial offices. Through my frequent trips past the door, I was introduced to Pete, an older African-American man who was the custodial manager for the school. We would shout jokes to one another down the white-washed hallway as I tucked old books away on to the wooden shelves of the store room. The other basement was far less used. At some point in the school?s history, the room farthest from the stairwell was used as a detention room. My map indicated that the floor had a horseshoe layout, with the stairs being at one tip of the shoe and the detention room being on the other. On my first visit, I saw that there was a door on the wall to the left in the first room after exiting the stairwell. Though the master key opened the deadbolt, there was a 6-digit combination lock that prevented me from opening it. I closed the deadbolt and decided to explore the rest of that floor the next day, when I would have more time. I left for class. After classes, I had a final trip to make to the book store room. I rode the elevator down with my cart and gave my hello to Pete as I passed his office. I reached the store room and unlocked the door, leaving it open to let enough light in until I could find the pullstring for the single light bulb that hung from the ceiling. I rolled the cart inside and walked up an aisle in search of some World Geography texts. I had just finished loading the amount I needed onto my cart when the lights in the room suddenly went off. I wasn?t very concerned ?the bulb was probably old and had just burned out. As though to taunt me for my attempt at rationalization, the door slammed shut. From my vantage point, I was unable to see who had closed it, but I rushed out of the aisle to open it and shout to Pete for whatever kind of prank he was trying to play. I found the door locked shut from the outside, where my keys were still in the lock. The only glass in the door was a small window panel, textured on the inside but smooth on the other surface. Though I couldn?t see through it very well, it let enough light through for me to see the silhouette of a tall human form on the other side of the door. The figure leaned close to the window, and my heart started to race. ?Pete!? I shouted through the door. ?Pete, this isn?t funny!? There was no reply, but the figure breathed a raspy, heavy breath on to the window, further distorting my view. A single finger began tracing its way through the fog, drawing six numbers backwards for me to read: 451208. Six digits to match the six numbers needed for the combination lock. As the hand pulled away from the door, the light flickered back on and I heard my key turning in the lock through the door. The instant I heard the characteristic ?ka-thunk? of the deadbolt disengaging, I burst out into the hallway, wheeling around checking up and down the hallway. There was nobody in sight. At the other end of the hallway, Pete popped his head around the corner. ?The Hell happened, boy?? His concerned demeanor cast doubt on my original theory that the whole event had been a prank he orchestrated. ?Nothing,? I lied. ?The door just got stuck is all.? I stepped cautiously back into the storeroom to retrieve the cart, which was fortunately within distance for me to be able to keep one foot in the doorway. Several books had fallen from the more precarious shelf ledges, presumably from when the door slammed. I decided to clean them up later, once my nerves had settled. I carted the World Geography books back upstairs. Curiosity got the better of me. After I made my delivery, I wandered a bit before deciding to return to the other basement and the door with the combination lock. The stairs groaned reluctantly against my steps, and it took a moment for the lights to come up once I flipped the switch. I went straight for the lock. I turned my master key, pushing back the deadbolt, and lifted the combination lock where it hung. I rolled each wheel in to place: 451208. The mechanism sprung and slipped out of its hold, falling from my hands to the ground where it clattered loudly in the cavernous room before resting silently. The side which had been flush with the door was now facing up, displaying a small glyph etched into its metal side. It looked like three concentric circles inside a diamond, with a semi-circle intersecting the diamond at two opposite points. I kicked the lock over to the wall, took a deep breath, and opened the door. The stench that billowed from the corners of the square room beyond sent shudders down my spine and made my head feel light. It was obvious from the stale air and the stick of the door in the frame that it hadn?t been opened in years ?maybe even decades judging by the age of the lock. The room was very nondescript; it was essentially square with a cement floor to match the rest of the basement, with matching cement walls. There were no light switches, and apparently no lights either. Only the light from the adjoining room bled into that dank place to reveal what was on the floor. Scattered across the floor in no particular order was a very large number of antique door knobs ?brass and nickel-plated relics from years and years ago- looking like they?d been pulled off of houses from as long as 2 centuries ago. Strangely, there was no dust on any of them. Whatever had kept that stench in must have kept the dust and debris out as well. I marked the find on my hand-drawn map, making a note to perhaps sort and count the door knobs another time. I loved old stuff and antiques, so the chance to look through history?s relics, even door knobs, excited me. I stepped back into the relatively fresher air of the antechamber, shutting the door behind me. I secured the deadbolt and picked up the combination lock. Fastening it back into the loop, I tried to shut the mechanism, but it seemed to be jammed. I thought the drop must have busted it, so I marked in my moleskin to buy a replacement so I wouldn?t get in trouble. I trotted back up the stairs out of the basement, grabbed my things from my locker and left for home. My classes dragged by the next day as I waited less than patiently to be able to return to the basement and the door knob room. I completed the duties Ms. Jones had lined up for me for the day, and took off for the basement. I skipped steps on the stairway down to expedite my trip to the strange door and arrive in the antechamber to a different scene than I?d left the night before. The door, which I was certain I?d deadbolted, was hanging open. The area around the lock had splintered, and there was visible strain on the hinges. It was as though something had kicked the door open from the inside. The light from the antechamber illuminated a wedge of the floor, and every single door knob was missing. A chill ran down my spine as I wondered what could have busted the door like that. Suddenly there was a mystery for me to solve. I pulled my mini Maglite from my back pocket and progressed farther in to the basement. As I mentioned, that wing of the basement had a horseshoe layout. I reached the end of the first hallway, which was divided into three rooms, and turned left. The hallway attaching the two parallel wings was more like a tunnel. It contained only a single flickering light bulb, and the walls were entirely cement. Along the interior wall was a large iron gate which was chained shut. Just past it, a large hole in the ground made a very hazardous obstacle to anyone trying to progress to the hallway beyond. I slid carefully against the wall past the hole. It wasn?t very deep ?only a foot or two- but it could easily sprain an ankle. The hallway at the other side ended quickly, leading in to the old detention room and the proctor?s office beyond. I unlocked the door of the detention room and flipped the switch, but no lights came on. I lit my flashlight and eased my way in to the room. When I reached the other side, I shone my light through the office window ?no door knobs. There were no rooms beyond there, so I turned around to leave. From the direction I came, a cacophonous noise reached my ears, like metal on stone. My mind jumped immediately to the iron gate in the tunnel, and I stumbled haphazardly through the dark detention room back towards the tunnel. When I arrived at the dark corridor, I saw my path blocked. The gate stood open, revealing the doorway behind it which it had previously been blocking. In its open position, however, it blocked the rest of the hallway beyond. The single light was on the other side of the gate, so I was forced to use my flashlight to see. When I shined the light on the floor to find the hole, my blood ran cold. The hole was now filled to the brim with a black liquid, like some kind of sludge had seeped into it from underground. I stepped past it, being extra careful not to allow any of the sludge to touch me. It took ten solid tugs on the gate for me to resign to the conclusion that the gate was stuck where it was. Trying not to panic, I decided to explore the newly opened hallway that the gate had previously blocked. It let in to the center of the horseshoe, where it quickly split to the left and right. The path to the left quickly dead-ended, so I made my way along the path to the right. The floor in this tunnel was dusty, gritty dirt, and there were absolutely no lights. The ground was littered with rat droppings and a few rodent skeletons. Shining my flashlight on the maps in my notebook, I realized I was directly under the school?s indoor swimming pool. The tunnel, I realized, was a spillway in case of drainage problems in the pool. It followed a rectangular path, and came to a dead end that had to be adjoining the one from the left path where the tunnel had split originally. I turned around to leave, and my flashlight landed on the wall now in front of me. The same glyph from the lock was painted on the wall in some sort of tar-like material. It looked like it had been there for years, judging by the dryness of the material, but a large scratch had been put through the middle of it, interrupting the three concentric circles. With a proper feeling of dread, I made my way quickly back to the entrance of the tunnel and the iron gate. I poked my head cautiously out of the doorway before stepping out in to the corridor. When I looked back at the sludge-filled hole, I saw that there were now streaks of the black liquid smeared across the floor originating from the hole, and leading towards the detention room, as though something had dragged itself out of the slime. Just as I looked up in the direction of the detention room, I heard a door, to either the proctor?s office or the detention room, slam shut. The walls themselves seemed to shake from the impact and a low, deep rumble echoed through the corridor from the source. I started pulling desperately at the iron gate, trying to unblock the way out. I was still pulling when I heard a second door slam ?whatever it was was now at the detention room door. Sweeping the room for anything I could use as a tool, I spotted a piece of steel pipe lying against the wall to the side of the hole. I grabbed for it and began making use of it as a lever arm to try and pry the gate off the ground where it seemed to be stuck. Another low roar shook the air right before the gate finally gave way and started swinging back to its original position. I slammed it shut and sprinted down the hallway towards the stairs. The doors in the wing were now all closed, even though I?d left them open on my way towards the detention room. As I yanked the first one open, its door handle felt different. Instead of the industrial, handicap accessible door handle standard to the rest of the school, it now sported one of the brass antique door knobs from the room. Too panicked to consider the meaning behind the change, I dashed to the next door, flinging it open to continue on my way out. Each door I opened was now equipped with one of the ancient door knobs. Behind me, I heard each of the doors slamming back shut, and the roar grew louder and closer to me. I finally reached the door to the stairwell and burst through it, running straight into Pete, who was carrying a half-gallon can of paint. As soon as he heard the roar, he slammed the door shut. ?Hold it closed, boy!? He grabbed a paintbrush from his back pocket and dunked it into the can of paint and started furiously painting on the door. As I held the door, I suddenly felt a powerful force slam in to the other side of it. Through the fogged glass in the door, I saw the shadow of whatever it was rearing back to strike. It pounded and pounded on the door over and over, roaring incredibly loudly, until Pete completed his crude painting of the familiar glyph on the door. The pounding stopped almost instantly and the roaring died down. I sank to the ground, eyes wet with tears from my panicked flight. Pete grabbed me by the shoulder and lifted me to my feet. ?Get outta here, son. Be quick.? I stumbled up the stairs without a word and ran. I didn?t sleep for a second that night. The next day I returned to the school, still shaken from the previous night?s events. As I drifted between classes I saw no sign of Pete. On my way to Ms. Jones? room, I decided to stop by the basement door. I had to know that I didn?t imagine it all. I wish I had never seen what was waiting for me at the bottom of those stairs. The window in the door had been smashed outwards, interrupting a piece of the glyph Pete had painted on it. The door handle had been replaced with one of the antiques. I rushed back up the stairs and towards Ms. Jones? room; by that point I just wanted to see a familiar face and to get some chores to occupy my mind. One such duty sent me to the basement book store room. I rode the elevator down as usual, but when I stepped off, Pete wasn?t in his office to wave at me. I wheeled my cart down the hall to the store room and went about my business, moving books from the cart on to the shelf. As I left, I turned to lock the door behind me, and found an antique door knob on the store room door. My head whipped up just in time to see the lights go out at the end of the hallway by the elevator and to see Pete?s door slam shut. Every door between me and Pete?s office flew open, and I saw that every one of them had an antique door knob. One by one, the lights went out at each doorway, and then the door would slam shut. The darkness was so black, so immutable, that I couldn?t see what was causing the doors to slam. With a feeling of utter dread, I realized the path to the elevator was closed to me. I remembered from the maps that the third door down from me on my right led through a large room to a stairway which led to the main hall of the school. In a split-second decision, I sprinted for that door, leaving the car behind. The same roar from before blasted through the air from the black, filling my nose with the rotting stench from the door where I?d first found those damned door knobs. I dashed through the doorway and around a short corner into what must have been an old locker room. Showers against the back wall were caked with grime and the opposite wall was covered in dilapidated old gym lockers. The room must have been utilized as a storage room for old desks, because there were hundreds in there. I leapt, vaulted and dove over them towards the door on the opposite side. Behind me, I could hear desks being shoved out of the way of whatever was pursuing me. One desk flew past me, narrowly missing my head. I shoved on the door, which opened outwards, and sprinted up the stairs. I burst through the door at the top in to the main hall of the school. I ran in the direction of the cafeteria, noticing along the way that many of the doors in the hallways had had their door knobs replaced with the ones from the room in the basement. I kept running through the cafeteria until I was at the exit on the other side. I burst out of the school and ran straight to the bike rack where my bicycle was stored. I almost dropped my keys unlocking the chain, and hopped on to the bike to ride home as fast as I could. The next day was Saturday. I would say I woke up first thing in the morning, but I hadn?t slept anyway. I rode my bike to the local hardware store as soon as it opened and bought a large canvas sack, several permanent markers, a set of screwdrivers and a combination lock. I went immediately to the school. I had made up my mind the night before that I would take every one of those door knobs and put them back in the room and lock it up tight. I reached the school by about noon. It was almost too easy to break in. One of the doors into the cafeteria has a wide space between it and the frame, so it was simple to slip a screwdriver underneath the lock and pry it out. I slipped inside and went to my starting point. The night before, I had chosen my route through the school, choosing the path that was most efficient to reach every door in the building. I reached the first door, and found that it did, in fact, have an antique knob on it. I unscrewed the fastenings attaching it and dropped the knob in to the canvas sack, which I had fasted to myself like a backpack. I pulled out a permanent marker and drew the glyph Pete had used on the door, hoping I was right in my assumption that it would block the passage of whatever entity had been let loose in the school. I heard the familiar roar echo down the hallways, originating from somewhere on the other side of the school. I knew I needed to move quickly. I moved on to the next door on my route, then the next one and the next one. At each stop, I quickly removed the antique knobs and dropped them into the bag, marking the door with the symbol. As I continued, the roaring seemed to be getting closer to me. I tried to push back a realization that dawned on me, but the inescapable truth of it was too persistent. Each time I marked a door, I limited the thing?s mobility. If it could only move through doors without the glyphs, and I was stopping to mark each unmarked door, then I was effectively funneling myself and the entity towards eachother. I pushed the thought to the back of my mind and continued with my mission. more