Eighteen doors. Four atop six on top of eight. Their hues ran the gamut of the rainbow, with like colors clustered together within each layer. The bottom eight doors shifted from navy to indigo to cerulean; the middle six ranged from forest to emerald to lime; with the top four a mix of sunflower to apricot to blood.
This tower of doors had appeared in a busy square. Suddenly, where nothing had stood – gleaming in the afternoon sunlight like a rainbow invitation.
Many of us gathered around the mysterious tower, hands shading eyes, chins tilted back. Creaks and clicks sounded as various doors opened and closed on their own, as if invisible people walked through, even the ones at the top which opened into thin air. Within, we glimpsed swirls of colors that matched their respective doors.
Intrigued, I stepped forward. “I’ll go in one.”
A young man also stepped up. “Me too.” He glanced about, as if expecting objection. Everyone else shrank back.
I chose a door from the bottom set. So did the man. The others looked too difficult to reach without a ladder. He and I braced and opened our doors. Mine revealed turquoise and teal, and as I stepped through, the scent of salt filled my nose. I couldn’t help closing my eyes as hues and smells crashed over me.
A roar sounded nearby. Warmth caressed my face and soft sand tickled my fingers where I lay. When I opened my eyes and sat up, I found myself at the sea. No sign of the other guy.
This stretch of shore seemed familiar. I realized then that the doors were portals and mine had sent me to the ocean, almost a week’s journey away. With a sigh, I flopped back down, resigned to catching up later.
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Summer’s Latest
Beneath the Bluebonnets: Tales of Terror by Texas Women
Read my eco-horror short “Well Being” in this fabulous new anthology, in which a mother follows strange impulses from tainted water to find her daughter.
From Mary Shelley to Tananarive Due and Mariana Enríquez, women have long shaped horror—often without equal recognition. Living closest to the genre’s edge, women know these fears firsthand: lost autonomy, violence, childbirth, survival.
Set in Texas, a land of haunted histories and increasingly restrictive laws, Beneath the Bluebonnets emerges from the raw intersection of terror and endurance. Written by twelve Texas women writers: R. J. Joseph, Lauren Oertel, L.H. Phillips, Kathleen Kent, Madison Estes, Jess Hagemann, Emma E. Murray, Jae Mazer, Iphigenia Strangeworth, Jacklyn Baker, S.G. Baker and edited by Carmen Gray, this collection is urgent, unflinching, and deeply haunting—stories that refuse to look away.
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Word Nerd Scribbles 
Great little piece of flash fiction. Enjoyed it! What an unusual (and colourful!) premise!
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Thank you! I’m glad you liked it. Can you just imagine intrepid explorers volunteering to enter each door and mapping where the portals led to? The risk that one might lead to another planet altogether or to nothing at all? The use society would get out of a central hub of portals taking them great distances in a blink. And hanging over all, the wonder of where the portals came from to begin with.
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Definitely can. Beautifully imagined and wonderfully articulated!
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Very nice! Take care and thank you for following.
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Thank you for the follow too! I’m glad you liked the story!
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This was so interesting! I love that it seems kind of like something that could be a longer novel, but I like it short like this, it leaves the reader to imagine the rest.
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And thanks for the follow, too!
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Right? The shortness means the longer version can be whatever any reader might imagine. And thank you for the follow, too!
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