• Visiting my grandmother in the middle of no where had never been too entirely fun ever since I hit about the age of 13. Now it was five years later and I was shyly past the age of 18, entering the world of adulthood. I'd always known about the little 1 bedroom house down the narrow, West Virginia road. It sat right past a ditch and the back yard was a woods that led to basically no where, just as the road I was taking seemed to trail on and on. Every time me and my grandmother drove by the house, she would talk about the little old lady she knew that had recently passed away, and I wondered...I wondered how anyone could possibly live in a place so small...and that greatly isolated. I wondered what she heard at night with that winding woods behind her, and if anyone had ever bothered her here on her own. I took a long look at the ground where my fall boots nearly touched their tips together, and at the "no trespassing" sign still dangling by a nail on the door who’s paint was chipped and dulled. after all these years I felt I finally had it in me to go into the house that always seemed to pull strings in my head. I walked up the gravel driveway and twisted the door knob with my fingerless wool gloves that kept my palms warm, but my fingers exposed to the cold of the metal. I was careful going in, this wasn’t my house, I knew I would treat it with respect. On the inside I would tell that the place had been abandoned for years. The floor boards had holes, precious moment dolls lay still on old dressers that collected dust so you couldn’t see the full coloring of the wood. broken window glass and water stains covered the floor, yet still I could feel the energy in the air above swirl around my head, and the house felt not so empty. over towards the living room, there was a hole in the ceiling that the light peeked through, even on this cloudy November afternoon. A brown stand sat still a few feet away in a corner which a small, brown box lay on one of its shelves. The box looked antique, it's lid had detailed, hand carved designs which were hollow so you could see the inside, which there was nothing. the box was as empty as the house, and I questioned to myself why the lady wouldn’t keep a box with nothing in it. I turned around towards the kitchen when out of the corner of my eye, I saw a pulsing light come from the box. I turned around and it sat as dark and quiet as it did before. I thought perhaps my mind was playing games with me, after all, I was a young woman alone in the house near a woods and a road that led to nowhere. I turned around and again, and a glowing pulsing light from the box's hand carved designs flashed in the corner of my eye. I stood completely still, and watched the box with a hard stare for a few minutes on end, waiting for it to flash again. I knew I couldn't stand there forever, if it wasn’t going to flash again, it had to have been my mind. I began to slowly turn away following my box with my eyes, but when my vision began to trail away from the box, I barely saw it, another flash of pulsing white light. This time I knew it wasn’t just my mind, and I couldn’t be sure if I should go investigate further...could this box be evil? Or was there real magic hidden within? I tip toed to the box and took a long hard stare at the hollow carved out lid that seemed to peacefully rested on its shelf. I began to give up on anything happening again, maybe the house itself was playing a trick on me, perhaps I'd disturbed its rest, and this was its way of telling me I should leave. But just as I almost gave up hope another pulsing flash came from the box, right in my center of vision, while I stood hovering above it. I knew then it didn’t mind me seeing, and again, another flash. Something in the air still kept me from being afraid, and I bent over and picked up the box feeling the sides of it with my finger tips. I lifted up the lid and big swirl of glowing golden dust danced up through the hole in the ceiling, and disappeared into the sky. It was fast, it was beautiful, and I knew I had freed what ever it was from the box that had kept it caged for all these years. I sat the little wooden box back down on the shelf, keeping the lid off so nothing more would be trapped inside. I adjusted my hat on my head and walked out of the house, not looking back, knowing I would never again go inside. My job was done, I'd seen all I needed to, and now it was time to leave the house at peace, and let it rest until the day god decides his plans in which it may fall. Still to this day, the old home sleeps on the side of the road with its old dusted windows broken and "no trespassing sign" hanging by a nail. I have no interest in knowing what exactly what could have been trapped in this box, after all, if the world was never meant to have secrets...our universe wouldn’t be so big, we wouldn’t be so small, and the answer to everything would be printed in our minds taking away the part of us we call our "wonder."