The Door That Was Open

There was a door at the end of a hallway.

It was usually closed.

Nobody thought much about this.

When the door was closed, people walked past it.

When the door was open, people walked through it.

This seemed perfectly sensible.

One morning, the door was open.

Nobody had opened it.

A woman walking down the hallway stopped.

She looked at the door.

Then she looked at the room beyond it.

There was nothing unusual in the room.

There was a chair.

There was a window.

There was a little table with a plant on it.

The woman walked through the doorway.

She stood in the room for a moment.

Then she walked back into the hallway.

She closed the door.

The next morning, the door was open again.

The woman stopped.

She looked at it.

She closed it.

She walked away.

The following morning, it was open again.

This time she left it alone.

After a while, other people began to notice.

Some closed it.

Some walked through.

Some stood in the doorway and looked into the room.

One man said, “I thought that door was supposed to be closed.”

Nobody knew whether it was.

A little boy came along.

He pushed the door until it was almost shut.

Then he pushed it again.

It opened.

He pushed it shut.

It opened again.

He laughed.

He pushed it harder.

The door stayed closed.

The boy walked away.

A few minutes later, the door was open.

Nobody had seen it move.

By lunchtime, people had stopped trying to decide what to do about it.

The door was open.

So they left it open.

People began to use the room.

Someone brought in a chair.

Someone else brought in a book.

The plant on the little table was watered.

In the afternoon, the woman who had first found the door open returned.

She stood in the doorway.

The room looked different.

Not because anything had changed.

There was still a chair.

There was still a window.

There was still the little table with the plant on it.

But now there were people inside.

The woman stepped in.

She sat down.

Someone gave her the book.

She read for a while.

When she finished, she put the book on the table.

Then she got up and walked out.

As she reached the hallway, she turned around.

The door was still open.

She almost closed it.

Then she didn't.

That evening, everyone went home.

The hallway became quiet.

The room was empty.

The door remained open.

During the night, a moth flew through it.

It circled the lamp.

Then it flew back into the hallway.

In the morning, the door was still open.

Nobody was surprised.

And after a while, nobody could remember exactly why it had once been closed.