Venom

21: Shaky Breaths, Steady Steps

I once heard someone say that doorways are the gateway between one place and another, the outline marking such separation between the two. If you leave the door open, you invite anyone and anything from the other side to step through. One step. That's all it takes to leave or enter. One step into the future, one step away from the past. A step into freedom.

I was blinded for a moment, the transition for more than just my eyes, but I heard the dirt shift from under my shoes as I stepped out and felt a coldness disappear from behind me. In a second, the door was gone. I did not turn to check for I knew, but the notion that I would never go back was so freeing that I trembled. I could have also been trembling from the overflowing emotions surging in me. I lifted a hand to block out the sun for but a moment, without fully looking, I knew Venom had taken a step closer on my right, nearly reaching out to touch me. Viper behind him. When my eyes adjusted, I dropped my hand and took in the familiar sight.

"Where the heck are we?" Viper asked.

The sky was green, blues fading in the background as red chased after it, as if to claim the little space it took in the sky. Where I was facing, as far as I could see, there were fields of tulips of all colors. It was a never-ending sea of red, white, and yellows up front. Later off, green, blue, and purples gathered until a black line of the darkest began to outline the world like a border. We stood a few feet from where it first began, to my left the only tree around, vacant of leaves, branches twisted and twirled around one another, branched out in all directions. I knew that over my shoulder alone shack would be there. A darkly colored home with a faded red roof and a shovel leaning against the wooden door.

"Mykela?" Venom spoke, sounding worried at my silence.

"Shh," I lifted a finger as I closed my eyes and tilted my head back. Feeling the warm wind, the rustling of the flowers, the silence, and acceptance of our very presence.

Within the deepest corners of my being, my soul trembled, the box buried in snow shook, and I simply smiled. I basked in this peace for a moment more, before returning to my senses, the smile vanishing as my mind plucked and pruned all that I knew, removing the impossible and putting the improbable to the side. So many things to do, so many people to see, and so little time, never felt as true as in this moment.

"They call this place The Painters House," I looked over at Viper, she looked entirely beautiful, her black skin and attire striking against such color. "Those who stand inside and look out of the front window will see whatever their minds can conjure, be it the night sky and beyond or the bottom of the sea."

She waited with expectation. I liked how she did not simply believe that I had first wanted to come to such a beautiful place upon my return. She was right. Sightseeing was for those who had the luxury of it. I took a couple of steps over to the field but retained the safe distance.

"But when the council owned it, they used a different name, The Final Flower," I shook my head. "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, the person within the house chooses what they see if they can dominate the house, but the person within the field must break free of the illusion and come back with a single black flower as a show of passing." Memories came to life as I spoke, how deceiving a pretty picture was at times.

"That's a bit difficult to do when the flowers are fake." My lips curled back as I smiled humorlessly.

"How do you pass a false test?" Venom walked over to the field and lowered himself to the ground. He poked at a flower, and it moved.

"You don't. Two types of people were brought here, the examples and the person standing within the house."

"Why do I have the feeling this story is going to take a dark turn?" He looked over his shoulder, golden eyes gleaming.