The House on the Hill

by Diane Sprague

The church doors stood in front of her. The neon lights surrounding them flashed their garish welcome. She hesitated, but she remembered the teachings she was given from her childhood. This was where love was to be found. She slowly walked up the steps and pushed the heavy doors open. It was cold and dark inside. Forlorn music could be heard coming from the inner sanctuary. She stepped towards the large room. She was frightened to enter. Her experience with this room was that it contained a stern, angry presence that paralyzed her. "Just one more try," she whispered to herself, "just once more to see if this childhood myth had some truth." She entered the room and sat in the rear pew. All the faces inside were turned away from her. The music stopped and the preacher started addressing the crowd. The words seemed sterile and old. She waited. Perhaps the faces would soon turn around with smiles and compassion. Perhaps they were just waiting for something. The preacher spoke about the wretched state of humans and the one hope of finding salvation, but his face refused to show anything but the sullen sadness of saying the words too many times and never finding the meaning of them.

Everyone remained frozen. Nothing could break the dark iciness of the atmosphere that penetrated the whole sanctuary. The crowd sat so still like statues or prisoners awaiting their sentence. The preacher continued to speak. He talked about the outside world. He eloquently described their lost state, and he contrasted it with the state of salvation experienced by those within. He face was calm and controlled, but something seemed to try to break through. He shook his head to avoid the secret, but his features soon fell into the monstrous transformation. He became a beast. The audience began to squirm in their seats. Their faces also began to take on the angry, snarling features of their leader. They arose from their seats and began fighting and shouting.

She was terrified. Must it come to this? Must is be this evil? She fled from the sanctuary and searched for the exit door. She fought back tears. Her childhood myth could be dispelled, but must it taunt her with its blatant inaccuracy? Couldn't their be a small corner where compassion, morality, and love took root? She found a door in the back of the church. She remembered being warned that only the wicked left through that door, but she was willing to accept that designation. She had to leave forever. What she saw left her shaken, broken, and tired. There was no turning back.

She had to continue moving somehow to somewhere new. It was not time for sleep. All that was in front of her was a hard, steep, stony path up a hill. She was alone and frightened. She started climbing the hill slowly and steadily. She did not know where she was headed; only that she needed to get away from where she was.

God was dead...silent, distant, and dead. There was no more myth to sustain her. She kept going along the steep path from habit or from that eternal inertia that plagued her for so many years. The hill became darker as she climbed it. Night had settled in and fastened its blackness to the world.

After what seemed to be an endless stretch of climbing, she reached the top of the hill. It was still and black, and a heavy undisturbed blanket of snow covered the earth. "Maybe I can sleep now, " she said, but a soft light caught her eye. She saw a house ahead of her. It had gentle strings of Christmas lights draped over it the side of the roof and it gave her a feeling of of coziness and warmth. She could hear a joyful light sprinkling of laughter interwoven with music.

She approached the house, wondering who would be living in the lone house upon the hill. Where did the visitors come from? What were they celebrating in this cold, silent wintery world? She dare not disturb them, but she wanted to just feel a little of the warmth from within. She slowly walked up to the house. She could smell the wonderful scents of cakes, chocolate, and spices. She pressed her hands against the cookie textured walls of the house and imagined the inhabitants.

Perhaps they were jolly, friendly people who filled the world with their holiday cheer. She imagined the house filled with festive foods, tastes, smells, and talk that would delight her soul. She could find rest, peace, and love within. It did not seem possible that anything inside could be dark or evil. The soft lights of the house gave no suggestion of anything menacing or angry. Its welcoming gentleness comforted her and surrounded her with a sense of a world that would no longer hurt her.

But it was not her house. She was not their guest. What was within would have to remain a mystery. It was just a possibility, another world she could only imagine, a tiny home of benevolence and joy. The cold still night pressed upon her. Snow began to fall and mix the images in front of her with a blurry whiteness. The symbols faded as she descended back to another land.

She woke up with cookie crumbs in her bed and snowflakes on the cover. She smiled at the way dreams end so ambiguously with their secrets wrapped deeply in their strange elusive language. She had to face the world where some myths are shattered and others are newly awakened. The house would remain on the snowy heights of some distant hidden hill, but part of it was inside of her reminding her of other possibilities in her cold and silent world.

House image from Creations by Dawn