The Unhinged Door

The house on Maple Street had a peculiar smell, like old wood and dust, but we were used to those kinds of scents after living with Grandma for two years. My parents were thrilled to have their own room, my brother Derek, who was autistic, had his own space, and I shared a cramped room with my brothers Leo and Max, and my cousin Shane, who would sometimes crash with us. The room was a squeeze, but we managed. The only odd thing was the closet door. It never stayed shut. At first, we thought it was the house settling, but it happened every day, multiple times a day. We’d push it closed, and within minutes, it would creak open, sometimes slowly, sometimes slamming against the wall. We tried wedging a chair under the handle, but the chair would slide across the floor as if pushed by an unseen force. We tried taping it, but the tape would snap. It became a joke at first, but then it became an annoyance, and for me, it became a personal grievance.

One afternoon, I was eating a bowl of chili, standing in front of the closet because I was too lazy to sit at the desk. The door swung open with a violent thrust, startling me so badly that I dropped the bowl, sending chili splattering across the floor. I cursed, furious. ‘That’s it!’ I yelled, and I grabbed the door knob, swinging it open and shut, open and shut, as if to show it who was boss. But then, I stopped. The door hung still for a second, then slowly started to close on its own, and I heard a faint, childish giggle from inside. My blood ran cold. I looked at Leo and Max, who were watching from their beds, eyes wide. ‘Did you hear that?’ I whispered. They nodded. We all stared at the closet door, now ajar, the darkness inside seeming to pulse. From that day on, the door wasn’t just an annoyance; it was a presence.

The presence grew bolder. At night, we’d hear soft footsteps in the closet, and sometimes the sound of a ball bouncing. One night, I woke to find Leo sitting up in bed, staring at the closet. ‘It’s looking at me,’ he said, not turning his head. I looked and saw nothing, but the hair on my arms stood up. Max, who usually slept like a log, started waking up with scratches on his arms, and we found his toy soldiers scattered across the floor every morning. We tried to tell our parents, but they chalked it up to our active imaginations, or maybe the wind. But we knew better.

One evening, I decided to confront it. I waited until everyone was asleep, then I crept to the closet, my heart pounding. I grabbed the handle and yanked it open, but inside, I saw nothing but old boxes and clothes. I felt foolish, but as I turned to leave, I heard a whisper behind me, so soft I almost missed it: ‘Don’t you like them?’ I spun around, but the closet was empty. The door slowly slid shut, and I heard the sound of a lock clicking, though there was no lock on the outside. I tried to pull the door open, but it wouldn’t budge. Panic set in, and I pounded on the door, shouting for my brothers. Leo and Max woke up, and together we pulled, but it was sealed tight. Then, from inside, we heard a low, guttural chuckle, and the door swung open on its own, hitting the wall with a bang. Our room was cold, and we all felt a presence in the doorway, though we couldn’t see anything. We huddled together, and I swore I saw a faint outline of a small child, its head tilted, watching us before disappearing.

From that night, the activity escalated. The closet door would open at random times, but now, we’d see objects fly out—shoes, a belt, a flashlight—as if thrown in anger. We tried to move our beds to the other side of the room, but the door seemed to follow, creaking open no matter where we were. One night, I woke to find Max standing in front of the open closet, his eyes glazed, his mouth moving as if talking to someone. I shook him, and he blinked, looking confused. ‘He said he’s lonely,’ Max said, his voice trembling. ‘He wants us to play with him.’ I felt a chill run down my spine. We decided to ignore it, hoping it would go away, but it only got worse.

Our parents finally noticed something was wrong when they saw our terrified faces and the scratches on Max’s arms. They hired a priest to bless the house, but the priest took one look at the closet and refused, muttering something about a ‘spirit of a child who died in a fire.’ We later learned from a neighbor that a family had lived in our house years ago, and their young son had died in a fire in that very room. The closet used to be a door to a small attic space, where the boy had been hiding when the fire broke out. We had only been living there for three months, but it felt like an eternity. We pleaded with our parents to move, but they said we couldn’t afford it. So we tried to make peace with it. We left a small toy car and a drawing on the closet floor, telling him we were sorry he was trapped. The door stopped opening as violently, but we never felt alone. Sometimes, at night, we’d hear a soft humming from the closet, a lullaby that would lull us to sleep, but we knew it was the boy’s ghost, watching over us, waiting for us to accept him as part of our family. We never fully did, but we learned to live with the unhinged door, always ajar, a constant reminder that some doors should never be opened.