The Book of Doors

by Gareth Brown

He was lonely, Cassie knew, but he carried it lightly, never imposing his loneliness on others.

“I’ve read it before, but as I get older, I find comfort in rereading favorites. It’s like spending time with old friends.”

Life is like a train that just keeps getting faster and faster and the sooner you realize that the better. I

“The best place to enjoy a stormy night is in a warm room with a book in your lap,”

This is the Book of Doors. Hold it in your hand, and any door is every door.

The bookcase was a map of her life: the books she had devoured as a child; books she had bought or picked up on her travels through Europe; the books she had read and treasured since living in New York.

She pulled the book off the shelf and flicked the pages, catching the ghost of a scent that made her heart crumple at the memories and emotions it conjured, the contentment and comfort of those days in her childhood.

She could return to any door she had ever been through, anywhere on the planet.

Paperbacks, classics and contemporary books, an eclectic mix. Cassie nodded as she ran her finger across the spines, appreciating the taste of whoever had brought the collection together.

It was her usual sort of kindness, offered as a mild scolding.

“It scares me,” Izzy admitted, her voice quiet. “And it scares me that you are not scared by it.”

The house still existed, with all of its books and furniture, its windows and its doors, but there was no way to reach it now, not in the shadows. Unless, of course, someone could open one of the internal doors from a completely different place. If someone had the Book of Doors.

These books are like weapons and power: it’s always the wrong people who end up possessing them.

“All books are precious; believe me, I know.

“I’d like to be happy,” Izzy said. “I know it’s childish. If you’d asked me five years ago, I would have said I wanted to be a movie star. But now I think I just want to be happy. With someone I love and children, living somewhere nice.

“The young have the loudest dreams,” Drummond murmured, more to himself. “Unfettered by life and reality.”

“You can open a door to the past, Cassie,” Drummond said. “That’s why people will want your book. Because it means you can travel in time.”

Happiness is not something you sit and wait for. You have to choose it and pursue it in spite of everything else. It’s not going to be given to you.

But you have to let things go or it will eat you up. Let things pass.” “I don’t want to,” she said through her tears. “Nobody does. But you have to.”

The rain continued to beat down on her, like the world was crying with her.

“I love your collection of books,” she said. “I always wanted a library like this, a place I could just sit by myself and read.” Mr. Webber sat in his chair and let his eyes wander over his books. “Yes,” he said. “So did I. And now I have it.”

You are allowed to just enjoy your life. You are viewing this period of your life as an agony, but you can choose to see it as a gift.”

Don’t waste your life hidden away in your own mind. Make the most of the time you have, otherwise before you know it, you’ll have no time left.”

Where else would she put all these things, but in books? Where else could she lock away all of her emotion, but in the place where all of life’s joy and delight were to be found? And as she created these books, these special books, born in the nowhere and everywhere, each one created from her memories and emotions, from the fragments of her reality, she threw them out into the world, propelling them away from her, scattering them throughout reality and time, their pages full of languages old and new, known and unknown, images and words, the language of everywhere.

Oh my gosh it was her all along

With her books. Because Cassie knew now that the books were hers. Created by her in the nothing and nowhere. The books were hers. And she couldn’t let the woman continue to use them. She wouldn’t allow it.

Why was she surrounded by so much sadness?

Then it was on, and Cassie gasped as she saw three things in quick succession. First, it was early March; months had passed since the events in the ballroom. Second, she had received a voice message from Izzy’s phone, in the days after Izzy had supposedly died. And third, for the past three months, someone had been sending Cassie text messages every few days, each message containing only a picture of a door, and every door different from the last.

By the time he was on the plane, the voice had shut up, and Azaki felt oddly at peace.

She wondered then if experiences were always better in retrospect, in reminiscence. Was it possible to truly enjoy something in the moment?

There was nothing but despair. And then there was fire, sudden and furious and angry and beautiful, because it was something, something instead of nothing.