Emily

 

Doors of fear

“Welcome to the place that will get rid of your fears. Live a life that you want to live.” She read the sign. The door opend automatically as soon as she finished reading the sign. A man stood right in front of her with a smile on his face that should have scared her.

“Well, don't be afraid to come inside.” he said while staring Ambre right in her eyes.

She took a step back, but realized that she had to do this so she could move on own with her life and that she would have no fears stopping in the future. So, she stepped through the door and all she could see was a long spiral staircase going downstairs.

“BOOM!” she heard the doors slam shut behind her and she felt a gush of wind hit her from behind. She looked back and the man was gone.

She heard a husky voice coming from the bottom of the staircase “The first step is to come down the stairs.” she looked down and all she could see was darkness.

With each step that she took down the stairs a little light bulb lit up. As she got to her last step the room was pretty much lit up so Ambre was able to see everything.

 

It was a long slim corridor with a lot of tiny light bulbs that were lit up. There were several doors and each one looked different, as if each one came from a different time and place.

 

For example, there was one made of steel with a big black handle and another one that was teal and made of wood. She tried to see what was all the way at the end of the corridor. The harder she squinted her eyes the more she was able to see. It was a big white door way bigger than the other ones, it looked modern and very clean.

After a couple of seconds, the big white door opened and a black figure came running out of the door towards her. She curls herself into a little ball and shouts at the top of her lungs. “Aaaahhhhhhhhh!” 

A couple of meters before her the figure starts to slow down and came to a stop. Ambre lifts her head to see what it was. She realizes that it was the man who greeted her at the beginning. She is relieved but at the same time she's was still afraid because she doesn't know the man.

The man has a smirk on his face but proceeds to tell Ambre what was going to happen.

“You see all these doors?” he asked.

“Yes” Ambre responded.

“Each door is one of your fears” The man said.

“Now it's your choice to pick which fears you want to face?” He said right after.

“Well how many do I need to do and which door is which fear?” She asked. You could hear that her voice was brittle and shaky as if she was about to cry. The only thing that was going through her head was why am I here.

“You have to pick one door, and you see the big white door at the end of the corridor that is your final one. Each one will be a test if you fail you will have to do it again. Remember the only way out is to pass each test.” He said, you could hear he found it amusing to tell people bad news and look at the fear in the people's faces.

“Don't forget as soon as you open a door you have to proceed with that task there is no switching doors.” He said.

 

A tear built up in her eye and rolled down her cheek. She already knew that this would be terrible. She walked up the corridor and takes a good look at each door. As she is looking at each door, she thinks about what fear each door could be. When she made it to the end of the corridor, she looked up to the big white door. She heard her breath getting faster and faster. She closed her eyes as hard as she could and slowly calmed down.

She tried to pinch herself and tell herself it was a dream but in reality, it wasn’t. She walked down the corridor and looked at the doors. When she arrived at the end of the corridor the man is gone and the stairwell was gone too. She wished that she could maybe still ask him a question before she did something, but it's too late for that.

 

She walked down the corridor even slower this time, so that she could have more time to think about which door she would choose. As she was walking down the corridor, she turned so that her head and faced a mat black door where the paint was scrapped off a bit.

 

She slowly raised her hand and placed it on the door handle. She took a second to wonders what would be behind the door but she went ahead and opened the door. As she opened the door, she heard extremely loud music which sounded to her like EDM.

 She saw a bunch of people standing extremely close to each other and they are dancing and singing together. As soon as she saw that she knew what fear it was. The fear was agoraphobia it was when you're scared or don’t feel safe in big crowds of people. Amber never like being in big groups or going to concerts because she never liked being around so many people that she didn’t know.

She didn’t want to go in but remembers what the man told her.

“Don't forget as soon as you open a door you have to proceed with that task there is no switching doors.”

 

As she remembered she took her first step through the door. She closed the door behind her and as soon and the door closed the door was gone.

She could only see little heads bobbing up and down all the way to the horizon. She kept on turning around to try and orientate herself. She could hear her breathing getting faster and faster and she felt herself getting warmer and warmer.

People started bumping into her from all sides and she started to feels attacked. She screamed and the people next to her looked at her but assumed she was screaming because she was having a good time, but in fact it's the opposite.

 

 She still was having a hard time trying to get over the fact that there are probably more than 400,000 people there but tried her best to focus.

She wondered what she had to do to pass the test but was clueless. She looked around to try and find signs and found one.

All the way at the podium where the DJ was there is a big Sign that had her name on it. She didn't know if it’s a coincidence but she followed her gut.

Ambre thought that the way out was to make it to the DJ. She was not too far away from the Podium but it was still a bit.

 

She started to push herself through the crowd but realized that it was harder than she thought. Some people shouted at her, others just pushed her back and others just ignored her. She pushed and pushed and after a good 5 minutes she has made it half way. She pushed again and again. 4 minutes later she has made it close enough so that she could properly see the DJ.

 

She pushed herself to her limits and pushed one last time. At this point she made it past everyone and waited till she got out of there but nothing happened.

Everyone kept on pushing and crushing her against the metal gates. She was in absolute agony and a security guard noticed.

 He went up to her and asked her "are you ok?”

“NO, I'm not everyone is pushing me against the gate!” Amber shouted back.

He proceeded to grab her and pulled her over the gate and as soon as he got her over the gate she was back in the corridor.

 

She let out a big sigh of relief.

“Thank God I'm out of there” She said slowly.

She realized that what she did in there was all her and was quite proud of herself.

She heard a thud and turned around and saw the man standing right there. She got scared and took a step back.

 

“Good job!” He said with a smile on his face.

“Now that you have done the first door it's time for you to face your biggest fear.” He said while pointing at the white door.

She looked at the white door and wondered what could be behind it.

She asked “so when I'm done with the white door I will be let out and I won't have any fears in the future, right?”

“Well yes but everything comes with a risk.” He responds

“Wait, what is the risk?” Ambre asked

“The risk is that in the white door there is a small chance that you can die and I can't control that.” He spoke.

“there's a chance of me dying. I don’t understand on the flyer there was nothing about dying.” Ambre said. You could hear she was frustrated.

“Well, the people that don’t embrace the fear enough wile in the white door have a chance on dying.” He said quickly.

“So, while I'm in there I need to make sure that I am scared the whole time or something could go wrong.” She replied.

“Exactly don’t forget that.” He spoke

 

She walked up to the door her hands were shaking and she was walking slowly. The only thing that was going through her head was that there was a chance of her dying.

 

She walked up to the door and hesitated again. She just wanted to be back home in her bed but she can't because she was here and can't get out unless she opens the white door and faced her fear.

 

She reached out with her hand and grabs the door handle. She pulled the door open with all her force. And all she can see was the Dubai’s skyline. She freaked out and realizes that she was at the top of Burj Khalifa. She knew that she had a fear of heights and she can barely look out at the skyline without wanting to curl up in a ball and die.

Now she was standing there looking over the skyline and wondering what she is supposed to do to pass the test.

In the distance all she could hear was cars and some planes.

Then she heard a female voice shouting “JUMP, JUMP, JUMP” she asked herself was this meant for me and remembers that last time she followed her gut and it worked so she tells herself to jump. She doesn't want to jump but realizes that she needs to if she wanted to leave.

 

She took three deep breathes and ran out the door with full speed. She started screaming and her body was tumbling all over the place. All that was going through her head wad that she had to be scared so she didn't die.  she kept on tumbling around but with all her strength she tried her best to stay one position.

 

At one point she realized that there are only a couple meters until the ground. She screamed at the top of her lungs and right when she was about to hit the floor, she was back outside the building where it all started.

 

She was confused why she was back there, she didn’t know if it had ended yet or if she was still is the fear simulator. She looked around and saw people walking up the street.

 

Ambre asked one of them “what day is it?”

An older woman responded “it's a Tuesday” and the women kept walking.

She noticed that it was the real world and that she was finally out of there.

She screamed “Finally!” and had a huge smile on her face.

 

She lived a happy life with no more fears.