Rolland blinked, surprised. He distinctly remembered hearing his alarm going off a few minutes ago-maybe more than a few. He assumed he had rolled over and hit the snooze button like usual, yet now he was clearly awake and there was no trace of sunshine even starting to creep through his window. In fact, he couldn't even see his window. There was only darkness. Not even the neon green light of his alarm clock shown. He figured that he was no longer in his room and fought back the urge to panic. It was a long and seemingly hopeless fight, but in the end he won over fear and mounted its carcass in the confines of his mind. He took pride from his victory and converted it into excess bravery. He got on all fours and slowly crawled until he found a wall, stood up, then proceeded to walk around the perimeter of the room, feeling the wall as he went in the aims of finding a door. After he had been going for some time with no results he crawled back to where the middle of the room might be, stood back up, and started thinking, "Flipping out now won't do me any good. Maybe if I talk enough someone will answer." He shrugged his shoulders. It was at least worth a shot.
"Why I am here?" he asked loudly. "And I don't mean, 'why am I here on this planet. That's a purely philosophical question. I mean why am I being held captive in this dark room?" No answer.
"Someone has to pay attention if I'm annoying enough." He thought silently to himself. It occurred to him that this was a strange, bordering on crazy way to act in this situation, but with fear's carcass still on display and his common sense still reigning control over his head, he figured talking to himself, or whoever was listening, was better than crying and pleading.
"Dost thou not understandeth me?" He said aloud, "Or dost thou ignore me? Have I committed a felony against thine person? Or art thou deranged?" Still no one answered.
"Maybe he doesn't speak english...." He murmured quietly, trying to recall to memory what little he did know of foreign languages. "Ce´ la vie. Ce mai faci? Ich liebe Pommefrittes! MUCHO MUCHO QUESO!!!" He yelled that last while simultaneously dropping to the ground, cross-legged. Still no answer. He sighed, not knowing what to do. He decided to just start thinking out loud, the dark and the silence was deafening, and any noise at all, even if it was just crazy ramblings, was better than a whole lot of nothing. He started up again, this time talking carefully and concise as if he was shooting ideas off a committee for an important business idea.
"What if... this a top secret government facility and they kidnapped me and are using ma as an experiment? Maybe the air in here is filled with mutagens that will turn me into some kind of monster that they plan to release upon their enemies? What if I've actually gone crazy and I'm just actually wandering around my dorm, babbling like a maniac while my friend try to calm me down? " He started talking faster, to where it was actually starting to sound like the ramblings of a madman. "What if I died and this is just how ghosts see the world? What if I'm a top secret android sent by the Russians to collect data on the Americans and they've come to take me apart and collect their secrets!? What if...."
"FOR THE LOVE OF GOD STOP!" His half-crazed musings were cut off by a hoarse voice that sounded like it hadn't spoken in a long time. "Please just stop. You passed the damn test." Rolland saw a light appear from above and the silhouette of a man in front of it. The silhouette seemed to pull down on something. A wall began to lift, flooding the room with light and blinding poor Rolland. He stayed on the floor with his head cradled in his arms for at the least ten minutes before he dared test his eyes against the light again.
He finally made his way to the light, stepping into a room that had twenty or so large doors that all showed every sign of leading to nowhere at all. He glanced curiously at these and then averted his gaze upwards, which is where the voice had come from in the last room. He saw an old man looking down from a balcony, his snowy white beard dangling from his chin.
"I hope this isn't a Romeo and Juliet type thing." Rolland said suddenly without thinking. The old man laughed at his joke kindly and said in the same hoarse voice as before, "What is your name son?"
"Rolland Charmaine."
"Hello Rolland," the old man replied just as nicely as before, "and welcome to the Room of Writers!"
Rolland thought about it for a minute then replied "seems a bit cheesy don't ya think?" The old man nodded in agreement. His beard bobbing up and down along the edge of the balcony. There was something endearing about that beard moving about everywhere when the old man spoke. "Oh! What's your name?" All of the fear had melted away. Even the carcass of his foe was now just forgotten dust beneath his feet as he walked around the large room.
"My name.... My name is Ernest Hemingway." Rolland thought he felt his eyes bug out of his head.
"THE Ernest Hemingway!? No way!"
Ernest let out a jovial laugh, "No, no my boy. I had forgotten my name long ago. I just chose this name from one of the people who have been here in the past. I have each of their names written in a sort of a log book up here, and their names are also inscribed on the steps leading up to the doors and on the frames of the doors. Oh! I forgot to tell you why you were here didn't I?" Rolland nodded quietly, paying close attention to the either ancient or deranged old man. "Well you have been selected to be a world-class author. I have up here another log book- a list is more like it that has the names of random people. Each are brought here, I know not how, and are tested. Their reactions are what qualify them for passage through one of those doors there. The weirder the reaction, the more qualified you are."
"This is crazy" Rolland replied, "I've never wrote anything other than required essays for school. And what are the doors a passage to, exactly?"
"Ahh, I've never been through one of the doors myself, but from what I can tell from the recent people who have been here is that all the first ones who came to this room are regarded as highly original authors with life-like descriptions and novel stories. So, from what I can deduce, and from what I've seen through the doors that are opened, they are portals to other dimensions where you either view a story as an uninvolved third party, or you yourself are the main protagonist. As to what you do with the experience, that is your choice."
"Did Sir Arthur Conan Doyle come through here?"
"AH! Yes, he did. How did you know?"
"Lucky guess." Roland replied smiling to himself. "So you can guess all that from just a peek through a door and the surprise of others who come here?"
"Yes, and there must be a spacial leak from the door of some sort, because I seem to know each of these authors stories without ever having read them. Now, choose a door with which you would like to pass through. The door on the far right..." Ernest started to explain which authors went through which doors so that he would understand what was waiting on the other side, but Rolland held up a hand to stop him.
"I'd rather not know if it's all the same to you. A little surprise would be nice." Ernest smiled and nodded understandingly, his beard still moving to and fro. "Just one thing," Rolland interjected, "Which door did Stephen King and Edgar Allen Poe go through?" Ernest smiled, no longer surprised that Rolland knew which authors had passed through, and pointed to the door that was lodged in the far left corner.
"Good, I don't plan on going through that one." Rolland said sternly. Ernest let out a small laugh, and watched as the boy walked decisively to the seventh door from the left and started to ascend the few steps that led to the door suspended in space. Rolland opened the door, eyes closed, but Ernest saw what little he could see, which was the usual, and knew that the boy would like the door he had chosen. It would be full of hardships, but not without its rewards, and not without its comedy, which Ernest could tell would be important for Rolland to get through tough times. Before finally stepping through the door Rolland turned to face the old man, eyes still closed, and asked "Are you happy with this life?"
Ernest thought of the loneliness that sometimes overtook him and the occasional boredom, but he also thought of all the interesting people that passed through and the long life he had lived up to that point. He nodded, even though Rolland could not see him, and said "I am happy with my lot in life." Rolland nodded in return,flashed him a goodbye smile, and still without opening his eyes stepped through the door and closed it silently behind him.
