The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Schoolhouse Door
by Marge Simon

Has a big brass latch;
a feathery trail of scratches
mark its passage.

Outside we could hear them pecking rata-tat-tat on the window. Louder and louder it got. I kept my eyes on Sarah. She was whispering to Miss Hayworth, rubbing her back. We were all getting pretty antsy by now. Sarah brought her a glass of water. Miss Hayworth took a sip and wiped her eyes with a tissue. She stood and cleared her throat.

“Time to go home, children. Line up. Don’t rush. We will take our time walking to the road. Your parents will be there to pick you up. Today it’s early dismissal.” She pauses and tries to smile. “Today is a very good day!”

Bobby Joe was at the back of the line by the window. He swiped open the curtains. The sky was full of a million birds. There were so many, you couldn’t see the sun anymore. It was like midnight outside.

Her hand trembles
as the catch clicks,
the door swings wide.

Fiction © Copyright Marge Simon
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com

More from Marge Simon:

The Demeter Diaries
by Marge Simon and‎ Bryan D. Dietrich

‘The Demeter Diaries’ is a record of love and longing and the inevitable horror that arises between the minds of Mina Harker and Vlad Dracula as they court one another in waking dreams. The dialogue, written in both poetry and prose, imagines a psychic connection that develops between the two even before Dracula arrives in England. As Dracula makes his way from Transylvania to Whitby on the doomed ship Demeter, the two would-be lovers transmit their thoughts across the waves and lands that separate them, alternately wooing and terrifying one another with the idea of love eternal and all the dark delicacies necessary to ensure it. Front cover art by Wendy Saber Core, interior illustrations by Luke Spooner.

Available on Amazon!