April 23: King Tut’s Other Cottage

 Today’s prompt:

I.

A room becomes a haunted house.

Without costumes, it’s just a series of predictable jump scares.

We’ll shuffle through the order and try and surprise someone with timing.

It’s something of a ritual.

2 by 2

In and out the rotating old, wooden door.

II.

This was cavernous

Until I grew a little more.

Before we spent more time on the games and the computer

It was an endless runway.

Feats of amateur acrobatics.

Each of us: a ball of frenetic energy.

Now, it feels like a hallway to a smaller space.

The tunnel to the hovel.

III.

I went in the last time I was there.

So strange that nothing is the same.

Everything is familiar.

A museum for simple joy.

Every time I think this is the last time

I’ll come here,

All I think about is how perfect this place is.

It might be because the past is powerful magic

It might be because I am nostalgia’s willing accomplice.

It might be because I’m on the nose with my feelings. Maybe not, too.

All of the adventures and the miracles of this place screech themselves to a halt in my mind matinee.

IV.

So strange that you’re not here to see it.

I feel like I should call, but then I get stuck in the present

And then the Future Dread

And then the Dread Immortal.

I feel like sometimes I’m waking up

And realizing that I’ve been stumbling asleep through life like that haunted house

Looking for jump scares

And squealing with laughter each time it happens.

Infinitely surprised.