Hotels have always been a kind of liminal space so when she opened the slightly scuffed wardrobe and found a series of seemingly endless hallways, it felt about right. In the distance she could hear water and wondered if the hotel was hiding a swimming pool.
To the mind of a young child, few things seem impossible so as she happily strolled through identical hallway after identical hallway after vast empty room, she never found it strange how so much could fit into such a mid-sized hotel to begin with.
Every turn she took brought her closer and further from the sound of rushing water, seemingly at random. At times she began to feel frustrated enough to want to turn back but, as if the building could read her mind, some small new thing would be just around the corner - a bag of sweets or a cold drink - and she'd be right back on her quest.
A child's mind is an easily fooled thing thinking that empty air is food, believing whatever it needs to believe until all that's left is a half-starved shell still crawling towards the ever-enticing sound of water, still clinging onto a fantasy that never was.
And in those final minutes of life, the belief fades away and she sees the wardrobe her mother locked her in.
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