Stephanie followed in her father's footsteps. Dr. Stephanie Stuart decided to take over his practice after he passed away. Moving all the old boxes and machines out of the way to make room for new paint. She ordered new furniture a few days before opening the clinic. Stephanie added better lighting and dimmer switches. All she has left to do is hire staff. One night as she went through applications for front desk schedulers, she heard a door slam! Startled!� Stephanie walks down the hall and notices a window open. She closes the window, gathers her folders, and locks up. As she walks to the car, she notices she left a light on but when she looks again it's off. She decided to call an electrician to make sure everything was up to code. A few months later she is swamped with patients and the clinic is doing well. The electrician said there was nothing wrong with the wiring in the building but every so often the lights flicker or turn off. She might get a second opinion. As she's going to her next patient's room, she hears a scream! Running down the hall to see what is going on. A woman looks panicked and says the drawers in her room keep opening and closing. "Are you getting enough sleep?" Asks Dr. Stephanie. "Are you calling me a liar?" "No. Of course not." The lady left and did not come back.� As Stephanie was getting ready to lock up, she heard a scream! She thought she was the only one here. She goes to the back and sees a woman standing in the hallway. "How did you get in here?" She asks. The lady walks away, and Stephanie calls out "Hey!" As she turned the corner the lady was gone.� She tells herself she's losing it. She decides to just lock up and go home.�
It was finally her day off and she started going through her dad's old journals. He talks about spirits and portals. What is this? She thought. She didn't look more into it and decided to make some tea. The next morning, she goes into the office to set up for the day as she goes to stock the closet with more medical supplies, she feels a breeze coming from behind her. She doesn't remember leaving the door open. As she shut the door it gets cold inside, so she goes to check the temp. The temp was 68. She thought it shouldn't feel freezing here. The staff walks in to start the day. "Good morning, Dr Stephanie.� "The staff would like a word with you." "Yes. What is it?" She speaks. � "We have noticed some strange things in the clinic lately."� "Like what?" Stephanie asks. "Cabinets closing by themselves, medical supplies missing, I could have sworn I saw a shadowy figure the other night."� "Look. I know the clinic has been a bit stressful." "Let's all take a deep breath and get to work."� "This is our last day, Stephanie. I'm sorry." "You're joking?" "Guys. It is an old building and things go missing." Everyone goes to their stations and Dr. Stephanie gets back to work. That night she decides to stay behind at the office to get to the bottom of all this spooky nonsense.� As she went through resumes to hire more staff, she started seeing lights flicker and hears whispering. Stephanie goes down the hallway but the whispering and light flickering stops.� She locks up for the night.�
She gets home that night and starts reading her father's journals. He talks about ghost sightings. A secret portal that can only be opened at midnight inside the clinic. � Stephanie brought the journals to the clinic at midnight. She hurriedly turned the page and read the instructions to open the portal.� "Light is light, and dark is dark, break beneath the earth apart." As she kept saying it the ground began to shake. Desks rattled; lights flickered then a flash of light.� Screams echoed throughout the clinic.� She saw a woman approaching her.���
A hand reached out and grabbed her then a flash of bright light.� She squinted and she was no longer in the clinic. Stephanie couldn't tell where she was? Shadows danced around her. Whispers get louder and louder. Until she opens her eyes, and she is back at the clinic. What on earth? She thought.� Heading home she thought to herself well that did not explain anything. Did her dad open the portal? Was the portal there the whole time? There were so many questions unanswered. Cracking opens her father's journals she decided to read thoroughly through them. After she went through them all she turned to the very last page. The last sentence was found the key, find her. Who is she?� Her first thought is if there is an afterlife maybe he was looking for mom? She was always told ghosts only stay behind with unfinished business. As far as she knew her mom didn't have any unfinished business. The next night she decided to make a phone call to her Aunt June. "Yes. Hi. June.� It's Stephanie." Yes, your niece." "I know it has been a while." "The reason I am calling is because I was wondering if Mom had any unfinished business before she died?" "Have you been reading your dad's journals?" says Aunt June. "Well yes." "He spent years trying to find your mom in the afterlife." "He did?"� "How, how do you know this?" "Because he called me right before he died and said he finally found her and that when the time came, they would be together." "Did Dad have unfinished business?" "We all do Hun."� "Wait, so if I go into the portal I will see Mom and Dad?" "I don't recommend it, honey." "Hey." I got to run." Says Stephanie. "Sweetheart, listen to me." "Nice chat Aunt June. Bye." She cannot believe what she just heard. She breathes in shakenly.� Hands covering her eyes, she rubs the sleep out of them and plops down on the sofa. Could she really see both of her parents again? She thought. She rummages through the journals again going back to the beginning. She can barely read her dad's chicken scratch handwriting. It says:
The portal opens at midnight and only stays open for ten minutes at a time.�
The portal closes at exactly 1:15 in the morning. Delilah my beautiful bride I will find you one way or another.
She looks at the time it is past midnight. She would not have enough time to open the portal before it closed again. Stephanie decided to call it a night and figure out what to do about her ghost problem tomorrow. The next day at the office she was swamped with finding new staff and interviews. She had to turn patients away until she had a full clinic again. As she was closing for lunch, the lights started flickering and drawers opened and closed. "Enough is enough." She yelled. "Listen I am not sure why you are hanging around or what business you think you have here, but I have my own business to take care of!" She feels silly screaming into the wind at nothing. Finally, she thought after waiting a moment all the commotion stopped. She should have the clinic back to normal in the next week. She waits till midnight and then recites "Light is Light, dark is dark, break beneath the earth apart."� As the light gets brighter, she steps inside the portal and sets her watch to 9:00 minutes. She looks around and can only make out shadows. She tries to move faster but everything feels heavy and in slow motion. She hears whispers, growing louder. "Mom?" "Dad?" she says. She hears a piercing screeching sound! She quickly covers her ears. "If you're here please tell me what I need to do to help you." A shadowy figure gets closer and she feels like it is suffocating her and she gasps for air. Grabbing her throat, the only sound is her trying to breathe or yell. She starts heading back to the portal opening. Screams get louder. She squeezes her eyes shut. As she looks around she realizes she is on the floor covering her ears and the screams are her own. She shakily stands up and gasps for air breathing hard and fast. What on earth was that? She pulls a journal from her bag and begins to read again.�
The light grows dim and the soul cries out, be light to keep the dark out.
Growing impatient she throws the journal down on the desk. What does it mean? She cries. "Stephanie." she hears her name being whispered down the hall. "Hello?" Slowly walks down the hall to the last door on the left. The light inside is so bright she shields her eyes. A woman stands in the corner whispering. "Can I help you?" Stephanie asks. The woman turns and says, "Dear, could you turn down the air, it is quite chilly." "I'm sorry?" She grabs Stephanie's hand. Stephanie is transported to another place. "Where am I?" As the one point for her to look at. It is Stephanie a little girl having a tea party. "I remember this," she says.� The memory is different though. A man and a woman sit down with her. "Who are they?" Before she can see anything else she is transported back to the clinic. "Why did you show me that?" That is not what I remember." Before she says anything else the woman disappears.�
She sends out emails telling her patients and potential staff that the clinic will be closed until further notice. That memory will not leave her head. She remembers having tea parties all the time by herself. Maybe she was dreaming, and she didn't even go to the clinic last night. As she scans her dad's last journal, she notices names she has never heard. Pam and Stan. Why does that sound so familiar? She thought to herself.� As Stephanie gets ready for bed, she ponders what those names mean. She closes her eyes, then she sits straight up and gasps! My imaginary friends, we named Pam and Stan. "Are you telling me they were ghosts?!"� She rushes to the clinic as she notices the time says 11:30P.M.� This time instead of looking for her parents she looks for Pam and Stan. "Pam?" "Stan?" She calls out. She walks a little further. Shivers run down her spine, and she hugs herself for warmth. "Hello?" She sees a woman sitting on a bench. Stephanie walks over and puts her hand on her shoulder. "Pam?" "Oh. Hello. Dear." "Did you finally join us?" "No. I am not dead." "At least I don't think I am?" "Would you like some tea?"� "No thank you." Stephanie says. "Pam, do you see a light?" "No?" "Should I?" "I have been waiting for Stan." Have you seen him? "No, Pam. Do you think he crossed over?" "Why would he go without me?" I don't know Pam. Maybe he has no business here anymore?" "What business do you have Pam?" "Pam puts her hand on Stephanie's hand. "Listen dear. Your parents are fine. "Everything is fine so you can stop searching. Live your life with peace knowing everything is ok." "You saw my parents?" "Of course, dear. They love you and are so proud of you." Stephanie smiles. "Pam?" "Why do you not see if Stan is in the light?" "What has got you stuck?" "Sometimes we could be waiting for the right message to be sent and once that message is sent then we know it is our time to go." "Ok?" "What is the message?" "If I knew that, I would see the light dear." "Do you remember our tea parties?" "Yes." "Do you remember what you used to tell Stan and I?" "No?" "That we live for the people we care about and that when we die the people, we care about will always care about us in their own way." "You were such a special child." "You know what Steph?" "What?" "I see the light you mentioned, oh my. I see Stan. I must run dear. Can't keep him waiting." Pam disappeared shortly after. The next day she waited at the clinic to see if any new occurrences happened. She must have nodded off because when she awoke, she felt a cold breeze fly past her. Stephanie pulled her jacket close to her as she shivered the cold away. She heard whispers coming down the hall. She hugged her jacket close and walked down the hall. When she turned into the room the lights flickered, and drawers opened and shut. "What do you want?" She shouts. The whispers get louder. She covers her ears and yells STOP! Just STOP! The room fell quiet. Stephanie ran to her desk to read through the journals once more. She notices a symbol at the bottom of each page. Is that a tree? She says to herself. Before she can read anymore the phone rings. She jumps and almost drops the journal. "Yes? Oh Hi. No. There will be no interviews at this time. The clinic is going through renovations. I am hoping by next week." Yes. Ok. Bye." She unplugged the phone so no more interruptions. She started reading the bottom of every journal and it all read the same, "ancient and magical properties fill the air with one touch of the bark beneath your hand they all will despair."� The last time she was in the portal she did not see a tree. What does the tree even look like? She starts flipping through journals trying to find clues about this tree. As she's flipping a page fall to the floor. She reaches to pick it up and turns it around and sees a hand-drawn massive tree that is very detailed with high branches and very green leaves. She waits till midnight and goes in. This time it is dark and there is no light guiding her so she pulls out her phone light and tries to move forward as she can to get to this tree. It felt like she was walking for hours, and the whispers had grown quiet. She starts seeing what looks like fireflies dancing around. She follows the trail; it looks like hundreds of tiny lights. As she follows the lights, she sees a brick path leading to a gate. She pushes open that gate and standing in the middle of what looks like a park is a massive tree. As she reaches the tree it grows dark again. She goes to put her hand on the tree as the journal said to do. But as she reaches out her hand a vine comes off the tree and wraps around her, grabbing her hand. She screams and tries to pull away. The tree then tries to pull her up into its branches. The whispers grow louder again. Stephanie tries to squeeze free from the branch's grip. She's kicking with all her might as she is lifted by the tree. From the corner of her eye, she sees a glowing handprint on the right side of the tree. She tries with her free hand to reach the handprint. She starts swinging her body to press her hand to the tree. Finally, with all her might she reaches the handprint. Suddenly, the branch releases her hand, and she falls to the ground. Light from all directions streams out of the tree. Stephanie shields her eyes. A big gust of wind pushes her back and she hugs her body tight. Her eyes are closed as she hugs her knees. She lifts her head and looks around. The room is quiet. She is back at the office. It is morning. She stays to clean up the office and finishes making an interview schedule. The hours pass by and something weird or strange has happened. Maybe. Did I lose it forever?� She decides to Go home and get some rest and try to come back at night to check one more time. That night She says the words to open the portal. � "Light is light, and dark is dark, break beneath the earth apart." Nothing happens.� When she is sure it is not going open again. She takes her father's journals home and destroys them. She never speaks about the portal to anyone. The next few weeks go by and she has a full staff and running the clinic like she always wanted. That night going through her dad's old things she finds a letter that says how proud her parents are of her, following her dreams, and that they love the woman she has become.