The Locked Door 3-13-22

 

Story Slingers

March 13, 2022

Myrna Flynn

THE LOCKED DOOR

Hiram Hoffemeister was born April 1st 1876in a small remote village in Germany, so small that it was unnamed. When he was 10 years old, his father decided to leave Germany and sail to America.

His father, Wilhelm, a skilled blacksmith and farrier, knew that he would have no trouble earning a living. They settled in Maryland, to be near the hub of the nation. He built his house and business on a heavily trafficked road. It was not long before he became known as the best man to take horses to for shoes and shoeing. 

He had one handicap, he needed to learn to speak English. His friend, Heindrick, introduced him to the tutor who had taught his family to speak English. Wilhelm met with her and they set up a schedule for lessons for him and his family. Hiram was the most eager to learn, not just to speak English, but to learn all that he could about his new country. 

Hiram was a very unusual  and extremely intelligent individual. Although he had become a good farrier, he was not interested in doing that for a living. One of his younger brothers, Johann, was better at it and liked doing it.

On his 20th birthday, he asked his father for his wages and a loan so he could pursue his dream of becoming an inventor.

Wilhelm thought his son's ideas were a little crazy. When Hiram asked for the loan so he could have a place where he could turn his dreams into realities, he gave him the wages and the loan.

Hiram found a small shop with an apartment above and bought it. To have money to liven, he became a handyman, fixing appliances, doing odd jobs, even milking cows and slopping pigs, anything to earn money.

Working almost night and day, he soon was able to start buying supplies and started building. One of his first projects was making a suit for underwater exploring. It had a long tube that protruded out of the top of the suit's helmet, sort of a very long snorkel.

(I must hurry on to his biggest accomplishment.)

With the help of a friend, who was a building contractor, he built a two story house just the way he imagined. They put in a small room that his friend could not figure out what it was to be used for. Hiram told his friend that he watched to finish that room himself.

When the house was ready, he proposed to Marlena, the girl of his longings. The day they chose for a fall wedding was October 23rd 1906.

Hiram put in the door to the before mentioned room. It had a doorknob but no key hole. The door was locked and shut. He was the only one that knew the secret to open it. Throughout the generations of Marlena and Hiram's posterity, the mystery of the locked door and what might be behind it, intrigued each family, especially the children. They pondered and tried everything they could think of to open the door. They did not want to destroy the door because to was so unique and beautiful, so they shrugged their shoulders and stopped trying. Finally in the year 2022, Hiram (the 23rd grandson to have his name) decided it was time to give up and bring down the door. THERE WAS NOTHING IN THE ROOM!!!

Story Slingers Prompt

The Locked Door

Daren Flynn

BYRON AND THE LOCKED DOOR

Byron was just three years old when he first tried to open the door. It was a black painted door in the third floor bedroom of his grandparents home. The door was locked which explains why he was unsuccessful in his attempt. This was frustrating to young Byron. So much so that he sat and stared at the door for some time, gritting his teeth and flexing his fingers, while trying to figure out why the door would not open. He had opened every other door in the house.

This was Byron's first visit to his grandparents home. When his family, consisting of his Mom, Dad and Byron, their only child, were ushered into the home and the front door was closed behind them, Byron immediately reopened the door and proceeded to open every other door on the main floor of their three story house while his grandparents watched.

When Byron started up the stairs to the second floorGrandma and Grandpa looked questioningly at their daughter, who explained that Byron had a thing about doors. He always opened every door he sawing moved on the the next one. 

They followed the child up to the second floor and into the two bedrooms located there. They watched, and sure enough, he opened every closet door then moved to the stairway and made his way to the top floor and opened the door into the bedroom there. HE opened the closet door and turned to the only other door in the room and tried to open it, but it was locked.

Byron sat on the floor and stared at the uncooperative door, saying nothing. After a few seconds his parents and grandparents went back down to the living room to visit. 

After staring at the locked door for awhile he got up and left the room. Looking back at the door he could not open, knowing in his heart that someday he would figure out a way to get it open. He liked to open doors because he wanted to see what was on the other side and he really wanted to see what was on the other side of this locked door.

At each annual visit to the grandparents farm. Byron performed the same ritual of opening doors, starting on the main floor and working his way up until he faced the locked door on the third floor. Every year it was the same. He tried to open the door but it would not open. Each time he failed to open it, he sat down on the floor and spent several minutes staring at the only door he was unable to open. Byron was a very determined little boy and he never gave up and he would never ask for help.If there was something he was unable to do after a few tries, he would walk away to return later for another try. He would repeat this procedure until the desired result was achieved. So it was with the locked door at Grandma and Grandpa's house.

Finally, after the yearly visit when Byron was 13 years old and he had experienced another failure, the youth decided on a plan that he was sure would guarantee success. He would purchase, with his saved up allowance money, a locksmith course. He had enough money. The only problem was that the course would only be sold to someone 21 years of age or older. To get around that, he added eight years to his age saying he was 21.

He made sure he was the one to get the mail everyday until the course arrived. When it was finally delivered, he hid it away in his bedroom and studied it assiduously, then practiced on every lock in his house until he was proficient at the art of lock picking.

The day finally arrived when the family packed up and headed to the farm for the annual visit. Byron surreptitiously placed his lock pick tools in his suitcase while contemplating his upcoming encounter with the heretofore unconquerable , locked door. At last, he would open that door and see what was on the other side. He could hardly wait!

Upon arrival, Byron proceeded to open all the doors in the house according to the pattern he had established and followed at each annual visit. With lightening speed he had all the doors to the first two floors opened and hit the final flight of steps on the run. He quickly opened the bedroom door and stepped into the room then stopped so suddenly you would have thought he had slammed into a brick wall. Byron stood motionless for a good two minutes before shouting, "It's not there!" 

Where the indomitable door had been, there now was a window through which a view of the barnyard and pasture beyond met the eyes of the crestfallen youth who felt cheated.

The Locked Door

 

By: Carrie Keiser

Her grandfather had passed away a few weeks ago leaving her this big house and 30 acres in western Montana. For as long as Matilda, or Matti as he affectionately called her, could remember there was a door in this house that had always been locked. She had asked Gramps many times what was behind it, but he would change the subject and lead her down the hall away from that door. Now, Matti stood in the entryway of the home she had visited so often as a child, excited to unlock the secrets it held. 

In her hand was a bundle of papers the lawyer had given her after the reading of the will. He’d told Matti that everything she need to know about the property and house was in those papers. He had also handed her a big ring of keys with a “good luck” expression, shook her hand and walked away. That had been three days ago and she had yet to try a single key in the lock.

Matti walked into the kitchen, set down the paperwork and the keyring then took a seat on the nearest barstool. She had been given the house because her mother wasn’t interested in having it and had told her father, Gramps, that on many occasions. Her mother was an only child and had carried on that tradition with Matilda being an only child as well. Matti often wished she’d had a built-in playmate, but her parents always insisted they had the perfect daughter so they didn’t need any more children. The thought had crossed her mind as she got older that maybe they had had a difficult time getting pregnant and that was the real reason she didn’t have a sister or brother.  Not that it really mattered, but she wanted to have at least 2 kids, one day. Maybe she would raise them in this house.

Unconsciously, she sifted through the ring of keys, which should she try first? The buzzing of her cell brought her back to the present. Matti glanced down, it was her mom, she really should answer it, they were traveling, as usual, Europe if she remembered right. As she stared at the phone, it went to voicemail and she reached for the keys again, closed her eyes and selected a key. Matti swung her legs around and stood up from the barstool. Determination set on her face, she marched off towards the stairs that would lead her to the locked door.  She would open that door today if it was the last thing she did! 

Her heels clicked smartly on the granite tiles and her skirt swished gently around her knees. She had chosen to wear this outfit because she felt confident and powerful in it. That confidence wavered a little as she took the first stair, reaching out to steady herself, Matti clutched the banister and took a deep breath. As she exhaled, she said out loud to the empty space, “You’ve got this, Matti! It is time to see what’s behind door number 1!” She gave herself a shake and ascended the staircase. 

Upon reaching the top, she looks down the hall leading off in both directions and chooses the right turn. The door she’s looking for is at the end of this hall. She is instantly transported back in time to the first time she walked this hall, well really, she had been running and that had brought Gramps out of his study to catch her as she attempted to open THE DOOR. She could almost hear his laugh now and feel him guiding her away from the door, sending her to the kitchen for a treat instead. She wiped the goosebumps down her arms and stepped quickly toward the object of her desire, the locked door. 

The hall had seemed so long when she was a child, now as she stood in front of the door, she realized it wasn’t really THAT long. Matti reached out a shaking hand holding the ring of keys and attempted to fit the key into the lock. Were her eyes deceiving her, did the lock just change shape completely?  With her left hand, she wiped her fingers across her eyes, praying silently that they were playing tricks on her. The trembling fingers of her right hand were still extended but the keys were no longer in them. Shock and disbelief registered in her mind and across her face. Matti searched her hands, the hall and the door for the keys. Where could a keyring that large and full have gone in the blink of an eye? What kind of games were being played here? She took another half step toward the door and leaned in as if to hip check the door and fell right through it onto a soft spongy surface.

She hadn’t realized that she’d closed her eyes and forced them to open back up. What she saw unbelievable! She was no longer in the house! She was lying in a field of grass, not the normal green grass of home but the soft purple grass of her childhood dreams!

Sure that she had fallen and hit her head against the solid wood of the locked door, she closed her eyes again and said, “I’m ok this is normal I’m still in the house.” Slowly she cracked her eyelids, and she was met with the same sight, purple grass and now, she also noticed, in the distance what looked like a small cabin or house with smoke lazily spiraling up out of the chimney into the hazy azure sky.  

Matti put her head in her hands, the locked door lead to another land or universe. She could hardly contain her excitement, her grandparents house held a bigger secret than she would have ever imagined as a child.  The next thought to cross her mind was, how would she return to her own world?  Would the door appear again and let her out?  Did she have to say or do a certain thing to cause the door to appear? She shrugged her shoulders, and took a step forward, her new goal was find that house and explore this land with spongy purple grass. Matti looked out again, noticed trees so tall, they seemed to reach the heavens. 

What would she find? Who would she find in the house?  She’d never know unless she took that first step forward.