The Little Door

By Gypsie -Ami Offenbacher-Ferris

In response to KL Caley’s Write Photo Challenge.

I found them accidentally, late one afternoon. I wasn’t very old, just starting my teenage journey. I hated it, being a teenager. If I were honest, it wasn’t being a teenager exactly, although the pimples, flat chest and stringy hair I now sported, did not endear me to these years.

No, it was the other teenagers. Hateful creatures all, or at least most. I had gone from being a happy-go-lucky, out-going, nature-loving tomboy, to an outcast. I don’t know what happened the summer before, but whatever it was didn’t happen to me.

The girls I had played kickball with and climbed trees with; now had breasts and wore makeup and painted their nails. The boys had grown whiskers and gotten taller, and cuter.

Anyway, I became the whipping girl for the entire school. Of course, this is fifty years ago, way before anti-bullying rallies were being held.

There was one girl though. She looked to be my age but she was tiny. I don’t mean little, she was the smallest almost adult I had ever seen. She started talking to me and we became best friends very quickly. Only, she never invited me to her place and never accepted my offer to have her come to mine.

She got on the bus at the stop right after mine. I figured her mom dropped her off, because I didn’t see any farms or houses anywhere near her stop. That’s why I decided to follow her, curiosity mixed with concern. Mostly curiosity.

Except, on the bus home that day; the kids were especially vicious. Calling me names, saying I was crazy because I talked to myself all the time. I told them I was not crazy, I was talking to my best friend. One of the girls yelled out that I had an invisible friend and everybody started laughing. I turned to talk to my new best friend, but she was gone. She must’ve gotten off the bus early to get away from the awful teenagers. I felt very sad that I didn’t see her go.

On impulse, I decided to get off at the stop after mine. My friends bus stop, hoping she would be there. After the bus left, I saw her walking through a field, towards a mound I had never noticed before. As I got closer, I saw there was a door, a little door!

My friend fit through it perfectly. I waited a few minutes and then knocked lightly on the door. My friend answered wearing the prettiest dress I had ever seen. As she moved, the colors ran together and seemed to glisten.

I asked if this was where she lived and she said yes, this was where all the little people lived. I peeked inside and what I could see was wondrous. Multicolored flowers everywhere, a bright blue sky dotted with silver- lined clouds. Hills that went on forever, covered in bright green grass slowly moving back and forth in a sweet, warm breeze.

She started to close the door, but I asked her to please let me see one more time. I asked if I could come in. She shook her head no and said you had to be one of the little people to come in. I said I wished I was a little person. She looked up at me and asked if I really and truly wanted to be. I said that yes, I did, more than anything.

Anyway, this is my letter to you, Mom and Dad, to let you know I’ve gone to live with the little people in the mound, up the hill and in the field. Don’t worry, I’ll be happy here.