CURSED ROAD - Part 4

I didn't run. My legs stopped listening.

The empty place in the first row was not empty. There was dust on it in the shape of a man. When I looked closer, the dust was breathing.

My uncle held my hand. His hand was cold like a temple stone in winter.

"You cannot say no," he said. "If you run, the road will bring you back. This road only ends here."

I looked at the walls of the temple. The walls were not walls. They were faces. Hundreds of faces. All my family. My grandfather, my great-grandfather... all staring, all with closed eyes.

And slowly, the wall near me started to become soft. Like wet mud. Waiting for me.

Then I remembered what my mother told me before I left, "If you reach that temple, don't sit. Lie down."

I lay down on the floor.

The moment I lay down, everyone stopped.

My uncle's smile disappeared. The black teeth were gone. For one second, his face became normal. Like when I was a kid and he used to carry me to school.

"You remembered," he whispered, but not to me. To the wall.

The temple started shaking. Dust fell from the ceiling. But it was not dust. It was hair. White, long hair.

The faces on the wall opened their eyes at the same time. All of them were crying. Not water. Blood.

An old woman's voice came from the floor itself, from right under my back.

"Get up, beta. Don't become the floor. Become the door. Only the door can go out."

I understood then. My family was not giving one person to the temple. The temple was eating us. Sitting makes you a wall - you stay forever. Lying down makes you a floor - people walk on you forever.

But a door... a door can open.

I crawled to the temple door on my knees and I pushed it.

Outside, it was not a road. It was my village. And my mother was standing there, holding a lamp. She was not surprised to see me.

She said, "I also lay down 20 years ago. I became the door."

----- END -----