a green door

(a story that writes itself)

It was supposed to be just a regular day. One of those when you’re dragged out of slumber by an annoying (and they’re always annoying no matter how beautiful the tune you pick is) sound of an alarm clock, like a fisherman pulls his unperceptive catch out of deep waters, and immediately plugs you into a routine algorithm loop. But this morning, Emmy woke up with a question. Usually, she wakes up with rattling shards of dreams in her head and lead-filled eyelids, which is an extra daunting task to deal with. But this morning, she opened her eyes, and the question popped up in front of her like a jack-in-the-box.

Where is the green door?

If you say all of the words from the question out loud, you won’t see anything unusual - just simple, regular words. The question itself is not unconventional especially when used with the appropriate context: something about palettes, timber and carpentry. Emmy, her bedroom, dreams and morning chores has nothing to do with identifying the whereabouts of random doors in green. But there it was.

Where is the green door?

…

Shower - check

Coffee - check

Clothes - on

But something is off.

Off the bloody hinges!

...

As Emmy was auto piloting her usual route, her eyes would stop unintentionally on everything green: grass, hats, bags, coats, cars, hair, neon lights, but not a single door. Not unusual, but strange. Doors somehow were scarce, maybe because many of them were open to let spring air in or because people were going in and out all the time not leaving a door a chance to show its facade in full greasepaint, nevertheless, it seemed as if the number of doors didn’t match the number of supposed entrances.

With the feeling that something was off the picture, something she couldn’t explain, couldn’t quite grasp what it was exactly, she headed to the train station.

...

But why a train station?

Many trains - yes

Many doors - maybe

Many green doors - unlikely

She would find a rational answer if she could, and she couldn’t. There was nothing rational or logical about the whole situation, no, the whole morning was a big ball of irrationality growing bigger and rolling faster. "If only this ball hits a strike at the end of the runway," she thought. Suddenly, in the distance, the train station tower clock struck midday and startled her, so for a moment she had to stop walking and look around as the surroundings seemed to have altered in a moment’s flash as if someone removed the background and substituted it with another still looking the very same…at first glance…

...to be continued...

a green door