I return here when the world outside becomes too loud.

The hallway stretches into a distance I cannot measure, lined with doors on either side. Each one is a life I have lived, breathed, loved, and lost. Some are heavy with the scent of old wood and happy tears; others are cold, bolted shut against the torture they hold.

At the far end, a light of violet-white pulls at the edges of the corridor, beckoning toward the absolute.

But I turn right. I go to the door that is larger than the rest. This is my comfort. My sanctuary.

Inside, the walls disappear behind a library of yore—countless spines of leather and ink, a silent history of everything I have ever known. An iron spiral staircase coils in the back corner, climbing toward my walls of books. There is a desk here, carved and ancient, holding an open book of blank pages and a waiting quill. Beside it, a large, ornate chair stands like a throne for a version of me I am still meeting—yet have always been.

I rarely sit there. Instead, I go to the soft chair in the corner, pulling my knees to my chest, angled to one side, staring through the sprawling glass of the window, observing, listening, content. Outside, the fields are a radiant, impossible green.

Sometimes I climb out. I let the air—fresh, sharp, intoxicating—fill my lungs. I rest beneath a great oak tree where the sun feels like a physical embrace. I hear the ghost-sounds of laughter and children playing. I search the expanse for animals, for lost things, for people who dwell in the light. It is a seductive, buzzing infinity, and always, I step back through the window before it consumes me. Always, I return to the room.

But today, the room feels different. Today, the desk calls to me.

I leave the small, familiar comfort of my corner and sit in the ornate chair. I feel my guides appear—fleeting, shimmering smiles at the edge of my vision, a warmth of encouragement that hums in the air. I pick up the heavy quill. I begin to write.

I choose to fill the blank page.

I am no longer just the observer in the room. I am the hand at the loom

As the ink dries, a figure takes my arm. He is smiling, certain. We do not go back to the chair by the window. We walk together back into the corridor, past the lives lived and the bolted doors. We open the large door at the end of the hallway, step into the violet-white light, and are filled—held—in warm, liquid gold.