There’s a room in our house where no one goes. Fairly small, with a heavy wooden door that looks centuries old. Maybe if I looked closely enough I might even find characters from an extinct language, the things archaeologists only find in historic ruins or some such places. It’s a mystery, this room, that no one goes to. There are cobwebs around the huge iron padlock and no one knows where the key is. Not even Grandpa. He doesn’t like talking about the room, it makes him nervous and he starts mumbling something about the weather or the garden. We don’t have a garden, you see.

I have spent many summers drawing up elaborate plans to get inside the room. We are forbidden to talk about it or go near it, you know. My brother and I, both. My brother is as eager as me to know what’s inside, but he’s more eager about girls. Girls are horrible, I don’t talk to them. My best friend, Matt, doesn’t like girls either. That’s probably why we’re best friends. He helps me out with the plans these days, but I know it doesn’t mean as much to him as it means to me. I mean, its MY house and there is a room in MY house where no one goes.

One summer, we were repainting the house and I heard Father tell the painters to leave the room and paint the rest of the house. Why wouldn’t they paint that room? That day, when we were driving down to the local farmers’ market, I asked Father about the room. He braked so hard, I hit my head on the dashboard in-spite of the seat belt. I never brought up the room with him again. That day was the one time I saw fear in Father’s eyes. I asked Mother about it when we got home. There was an audible gasp and she dropped the cup she was holding. I was asked to go to my room and not come down till dinner time. Not even for my favorite show on TV! I wonder what made her so mad.

It made me very curious indeed, the room. The room that no one goes to. The room that no one talks about. The room that I think about all the time.

The plan I made last night is perfect. I found a way to unlock the broom-shed in the backyard, where Father keeps the ladder. When everyone is asleep tonight, I will use the ladder to reach up to the window of the room. There is a small hole in the windowpane on one side, like the hole a ball makes when it hits a window. I wonder who broke that pane. Maybe the ball that made it is still inside the room. I’ll look for it when I go inside.

I just have to wait now, till everyone falls asleep. And then I’ll enter that room. The room where no one goes. The one with the broken window and the big padlock. It doesn’t scare me, that room. Does it scare you?

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