[City] Story
Story about a historic building in the city we live in. All places that provide my city's name will be replaced by [City] to protect my privacy.
The [City] Opera House is a beautiful building, though the exterior brick is run-down with age and the upstairs of the inside is much the same, it is what gives this place its richness of life. Being open almost 140 years, this place has seen all that life has to offer, including celebrations of art, education, and love as well as the tragedies of death.
Wooden panels of dark and light lined the floor, meeting in the middle. The south end gave rise to a magnificent stage, upon which actors used to perform, including famous faces such as Marilyn Monroe. Across from the stage, two staircases were positioned on either side of the room and join at the top to form a balcony, the one on the left looking much newer than the one on the right, overlooking the stage. The air smelled of a combination of rotting wood and stale dust, which there did seem to be a permanent layer covering just about every area of the upper floor.
The staircase to the right of the balcony has a very interesting story attached to it. Apart from simply looking different from its counterpart, the staircase is also said to host the spirit of a young woman named Meredith. According to the story, she went to get some popcorn for herself and a man she was seeing. When she returned to the top of the stairs, she discovered that he was flirting with another woman. She fell down the stairs in shock and now is forced to walk up and down the stairs endlessly.
The historic [City] Opera House is a beautiful place where the past meets the present. Both with the physical building and in the minds of those who used to walk the stairs and those who currently do so, whether they be corporeal or not.
This was exactly why I was here, now, standing in front of the very staircase the young woman had reportedly fallen to her death, nearly a hundred years later. I was a novice paranormal psychic and this was my first call, so I needed to make sure that this whole operation went as smoothly as possible. My job was not to disturb or provoke this woman, but simply to discover her purpose for being here.
Once I figured this out, there could be two courses of action, depending on her reason. The first, and most preferred option, to assist her in fulfilling whatever she needed to do to reach peace. The second, less preferable according to the owner, allow her to continue wandering up and down the stairs, but make sure that she doesn't disturb any more of the tourists.
I made my way up the east staircase, gliding my hand across the railing, attempting to connect with the very wood that she would have all those years ago. Each step I made to ascend the stairs became increasingly more difficult; she was trying to push me out. I slowed my ascension to let her know that I respected her boundaries, but that I would persist despite her reluctance to let me in.
By the time that I had reached the top, she gave in and let me see into her past. I could see now why she had been so reluctant; she had been protecting me. I watched, from her point of view, the man she had cared for allowing another woman to sit on his lap. He was laughing and I felt her jealousy twinge inside of me as if it were my own. In that moment, we were one. I felt my body as if it were in slow motion, hitting every step before finally rolling to a stop at the bottom.
With my death, I had closed the cycle. I had finally released her. The past may not meet the present in the same way anymore, but at least now, after almost a hundred years of agony, the young woman would finally be at peace. My job was complete.
