We were standing on a long, unending flight of rickety wooden steps. Behind us, the light didn’t go all the way up to where we had started, and below us was a dark hole that the steps vanished down into. There were no walls, only an endless abyss on either side of us. I held on to the rail as tight as I could, because the steps were steeper than I had realized when we had been going down in the darkness. I leaned forward and blew out the match, and she asked me, kind of upset, why I had done such a thing. I told her it was too far down—I didn’t want to see. She could light a match when we got to the bottom.

She laughed again, and it was louder than before. It made me start to feel once again that maybe she really did like me, that she really did care about me and you and what happened to us. Her laughter was kind, and it seemed like her own laughter even brought her back to this place, reminded her where she was and what she was doing.

Another few minutes of walking down steps and she asked me in a sarcastic voice if I gave her permission to light another match. I mumbled something about not being a smart aleck. Another match spit to life, and she shielded it with her hands.

In front of us were three doors.

She took in a quick breath and froze, staring at the doors, a smile spreading across her face. “This is it,” she said.

She asked me if I could find my way to that spot again, and I said I thought I could. She nodded and pointed at the first door on the left.

“That’s the way,” she said. “That’s the way. You’ll have to come back on your own. I really shouldn’t go any further.”

“Why can’t I go now?”

“The night is almost over,” she said. “It wouldn’t be any good now. You need to come back at night.”

I asked if this was the door we had been looking for when we cut up the carpet, and she stood there for a very long time, silent, staring at the door.

“Yes.” She hesitated. “I’m almost certain.”

“What do I do when I go through the door?” I asked.

“You’ll know.” But she said it in such a way that made me think she didn’t really know herself what I was supposed to do or what I might find there.

“Can’t you tell me anything?” I asked. “I don’t understand how something can be so important to you but you don’t know anything about it.”

“I already told you,” she replied in a soft voice. “A long time ago, someone took something from me when they went through the door. I can’t go through myself—I’m simply not able to—so I need you to go inside and bring it back out, the thing they took.”