Today I went into my attic because a madman told me to. I saw him walking in the streets somewhere dark and cold. He had white hair and red and green glasses and he looked at me with slightly crazed eyes and he said, “Go to the attic! You never know what you’ll find up there.”
And he cackled to himself and he walked away, and even though he looked at me I don’t really think he saw me, maybe just through me or maybe he saw no one at all, and I left the encounter changed and lost.
I walked through empty streets under layers of jackets and I shivered. There are madmen here, I thought, madmen who walk the streets in the dark and cold and look people in the eyes but never see them. They grin wild grins but never let you in on the joke, and they come and go like whirlwinds–a blink and then gone–and leave fuzzy memories in their wake.
And later that day I went home and I opened the door and it was warm and bright, and it smelled like food and family. And I took off my coat and my hat and my gloves and my boots and I didn’t shiver. My home is safe. Unlike the dark and cold outside there are no madmen indoors.
But, I can’t help think, but his words are in my head, and my head is on my shoulders, and my shoulders and my head and so his words are all indoors, and now I can hear the attic calling for me. I can feel it groan in the wind, hear floorboards creak and wooden beams shudder, and I can see the darkness and feel the coldness tucked up and away up there.
I go to the attic.
Because how could I not? Like a door in a closet to Narnia, or a mirror into a broken reality, once you know about a secret world in the familiarity of your home how can you not be curious? And the attic whispers, croons, every creak a promise and every howl a lullaby, and I walk up and up and up until I stare up at the doorway where the attic purrs and dwells.
The door to my attic is a trapdoor in the ceiling. I jump up and grab the dangling rope and hold on, letting my weight drag us both down. Everything seems to shake. Right after I release it, the house goes dead. The attic no longer calls for me and all I hear is a deafening silence. I don’t know what I’ve done or why I’ve done it, and now there is a hole in the ceiling, a hole into a void, it’s that dark and cold up there.
The void smiles.
And I run. So so fast I fly through doors and stairs until I’m tucked away into a little corner of light in my house. I can see my coat and my hat and my gloves and my boots from where I am, and I can see how bright it is and superficially I know it’s warm, but I don’t feel warm. The cold from the attic seeped beneath my skin and poisoned me, slowly creeping up my veins and through my bones, and coiled around my lungs so every breath I take is freezing and white.
I left the door open. The void in my ceiling to my attic, the gateway to another world in my home, I left the damn door open and I can practically see the cold creep its way down the ladder, curl itself around the rungs and settle upon the floor like a cool mist, curious tendrils expanding outwards exploring and the attic creaking as the darkness up there, the creature the madman paces and cackles and says, “go to the attic!” and then leaves.

And I’m scared. Scared out of my wits out of my skin and my joints have frozen over and they groan like ancient machinery when I move. I have to close the door. Have to go up the stairs and to the doorway, through the mist and cold and close the door so the madman cannot leave the attic. Every step is rigid, and my mind fogs over in crystal terror. The world is a dream and the terror is muted: the carpet on the stairs is soft and far away, the light is pale and bright but thin, the air feels chalky and I can see every particle of dust flit and float around me. I’m so mesmerized I run into the attic ladder, shooting reality and terror back through me at every point of pain.
And as I hold onto the ladder and look up into the deep inky dark beyond, I can feel the mist waterfall onto my face, unfurl itself down my neck, fall onto the floor below and dissipate. Fear. A molasses-like coldness blooms in my chest, but it’s so slow it’s almost comforting and I know, I know that I’ll always be afraid if I never face my fears, and my grip on the ladder tightens and I hoist myself up, one step at a time, each step taking longer and longer until my head is right below the doorway, and once again the attic beckons.
There is a white light switch above me. It’s on the ceiling, and I can only reach it by stepping up another step, thrusting my head into the velvety darkness and then flicking it on.
I give myself a moment to prepare, think about anything else than what I’m about to do and then WHAM I surprise myself and just do it. I jam my fingers into the light and it hurts but it turns on, and the darkness screams an angered scream and disappears, and the whole attic  is bright and beautiful and chilly, and I ride the rush of overcoming fear and lunge the rest of myself into the attic.
Alone.
Up here, there is no time. The floorboards protest my every step like they’ve never been stepped on before, the air is stale the light is thin and the wood is cool under my feet. My attic is big and empty, so big that there are some spots the light does not reach and where the darkness stalks and lurks.
I stand there like a child, feeling time trickle past my arms and down the ladder into reality, and then I sit. I sit and I look at the ceiling and I look out one of the windows in the attic, and it’s later than I thought it was because the outside is even darker and colder than before. I sit and then I look at the floor and see smiley faces scratched into the knots of the wood. Cute.
...Except, not really cute. Because the longer I stare at them the meaner they look, like cruel parodies of smiles that know about me my past my future, know how I end, and know that I will be ending very very soon.
So I stop looking at the smiley faces and look around, and I shiver because it really is cold up here and I see a dark corner. And I stare. And it stares back.
And then it blinks.
And I freeze and it blinks again, and it smiles a smiley-face smile and it moves, almost imperceptibly, the darkness wavers and it blinks and smiles and moves closer to me, and I need to get away away away faster than the light does when I flick off the light switch and start to leave.
And as soon as the light’s out the darkness roars back to life and I scream and fall off the ladder. The darkness coils and snarls above me with rage and fury, and I try to close the attic door but the darkness won’t let me so I run, run run away back downstairs and I lock myself away in a bright bright room and wait for someone, anyone to save me.
Anyone.
Please.
Later, much much later, too much later, my mom comes home and she sits on the couch and all the lights are on so I creep out. I ask her if we have a mirror in the attic and she looks at me kinda funny and then chuckles. “A mirror? Why would we have a mirror in the attic?” My blood freezes and I look at a corner filled with darkness and I blink.
And the darkness blinks back.