Two Doors
The man said his goodbyes, and shut his eyes for the last time. The faint voices of his little children faded, as did the ambient noises of a busy hospital. The bloody red tint caused by the sun beaming down on shut eyelids turned to black. He could no longer feel his tongue or detect saliva in his mouth. His final breath escaped his shriveled lungs, the rattle marking the end of a lifetime of loving whispers, wise words, fearful gasps and angry shrieks.
He awoke to find himself lying flat inside of a dark place. All around him was what appeared to be an infinite void. All apart from two beige wooden doors. The man stumbled to his feet and spun around a few times in a panic. He began biting his fingernails. His eyes wide and his mind filtering through every possibility of what this might be. He remembered his death. What sort of afterlife was this? Was he supposed to go through one of these doors? His upbringing brought him to the conclusion that one of these doors lead to Heaven, and the other Hell. Yet the doors themselves looked perfectly identical.
“Um,” the man spoke, “What are these doors for?”
No answer.
So the man studied the doors and looked for any difference between them, and yet he couldn’t find a single one. The brass doorknobs had small scuff marks in all of the same places. The wood was the exact same hue on each. The temperature of the doorknob on his fingers was exactly the same. Identical height and width. He attempted to walk behind the doors to view the other side, but whenever he would try to move behind them, the doors matched his movements, and wouldn’t allow him to see what lay beyond them. The man tried standing still for a few minutes and quickly sprinting to see what was on the other side, but to no avail. The doors were simply too fast for him.
He studied, and he studied, and he studied some more. He knew this must be some kind of test. Somebody had to have been watching him. Whether God or the Devil. The man cried out, “Where do these doors lead?”
No answer again.
“If anyone is there, can you please tell me which door I should choose?”
No answer once again. How was he supposed to respond to an answer if one did come to him? No man knew the voice of God or the voice of Satan. He couldn’t trust any voice that might wriggle its way into his ears.
“What a stupid question,” the man thought to himself. The man continued to inspect the doors, and as time passed, he found himself going over things he’d already discovered over and over again. Yes, the doorknobs are the same. Yes, quality of the wood is the same. Yes, the frame on each is the same, the hinges the same exact level of rusted, and the location of the rust on the hinges was identical as well. More time passed and the man began to go mad. There must be something there had to be something!
Then, the man saw his son’s body fade into the room lying on his back. The man rushed over to his son, now an old man. An older man than he.
“Son! Son, I would not wish this fate on any other soul let alone my own flesh and blood! We are trapped here.”
“Father,” his son said, “but I see two doors there."
“I know not where they lead, my child,” the man said with manic fervor, “I know not which door leads to Heaven and which door leads to Hell. I don’t know which door was chosen by your mother. Neither God nor her spirit has given me any clue as to which I should choose!”
“Father,” his son said with a stoic affect, “Choose a door please.”
"How do you know where the doors lead?" the man asked.
“I don’t,” the son said.
“I don’t understand,” the father said on the verge of tears.
“Dad,” the son said, “You’ve taught me much in life, but perhaps now I may teach you. If given the option between being tricked into Hell by the Devil, or willingly withhold the goodness I might share, I feel I’d rather be a naïve fool walking a road paved by his own good intentions than a suave and scared person trapped here forever.”
“What do you mean?” The man asked.
“When the Devil is tricking you, Heaven and Hell look exactly the same. The trick isn’t getting you to choose wrong. The trick is getting you to not choose at all. After all, which is a greater Hell? A place you were tricked into due to your foolish trust in others and a dull childish fantasy that everything might be okay, or a cold empty place where you’ve decided to stay yourself? For eternity.”
“Why am I here then? Why has this cruel decision been put before us?” The man asked frantically.
“Father, I don’t know. This world seems like a cruel and hostile place to you, and it can be a cruel and hostile place, but due solely to the fact that you think it’s a cruel and hostile place. Perhaps it is not Heaven and Hell before us, but two different Paradises. Two different Hells. Maybe both doors lead to the same place? You’ll never get enough data to predict this, dad. You’ll never know whether what lies beyond these two doors is safe. You cannot know whether this place will be safe forever either. We cannot cheat death. We cannot know everything.”
“I don’t know if I can, son,” the man said, near to weeping, “I cannot make the choice for myself and I doubly cannot make it for you. What if I lead us directly into a pit of fire? An eternity of torture? A place of pure hatred and violence? A fate worse than the fate we’ve found ourselves in?”
“Remember father, bravery comes in stepping forward without knowing what might lie ahead. Bravery is the doing of the heart. It’s okay to let it lead you for a while. You’re not a fool for following it from time to time. Feeling scared, or feeling loved, does not necessarily mean you are being tricked.”
The son clasped his father’s hand and led him to the doors.
“Father, pick a door please.”
“I can’t.”
“You must.”
“Will you blame me if we end up somewhere terrible? Somewhere horrible?”
“Father, I also must choose which door I will walk through. I am an old man as well. I am responsible for where I go just as much as you are. This decision is for you, it’s not for me. I just do not wish for you to go mad in this place.” The son said.
The man began to tear up once again, “But what if we end up in different places? Don’t you imagine that different doors lead to different places?”
“They might. They might not.” The son said, looking up at his father with a sentimental smile on his face.
The father embraced his son tightly, and the son embraced his father just the same.
“I’ve missed you son,” the man said.
“I’ve missed you too, dad,” the son said.
“I’ll miss you again,” the man said.
“I’ll miss you again too, dad,” the son said.
And so the father chose a door, walked through it, and shut it behind him.
As did the son.