You are driving a small, black, and shiny car down a nearly deserted street. You stop next to a tall, light yellow house on your right. You walk up to the door, which is stark white with a black handle and knocker. There is no doorbell nor a peephole.
You touch the handle, and the door swings open gently, moved by your light touch. As you walk in, you take in your surroundings.
The only carpeting is in the form of some rugs, which are in different shades of black, green, and red. The remainder of the floor is hardwood. There is a wooden cabinet for a television, but there is none. There is a soft couch in what would have been the tv room. It is black like the rest of the furniture in this house. There are clear chandeliers hanging in the exact middle of every room except for the kitchen. The kitchen has sheer red and green curtains on its 2 windows.
There is a hallway to the left of the entryway, if you had still been facing the same way as when you walked in. You hadn't noticed it before so had walked right past it.
It is dimly lit and splits off two ways about halfway down. You gingerly take a few steps into the hallway, then a few more, and a few more still. You reach the split and realize that one continues strait, and the other leads up a staircase. You choose the staircase and grip the warm handrail. You take tender steps up the stairs, testing each board before putting your weight on it. As you near the top, it begins to swirl around an imaginary center, throwing off your balance.
Mirrors begin to take up the space on the closed sides of the stairwell until there is nothing but reflective glass on both sides of you. There is light coming from what looks like long, thin bulbs set in the top corners of the wall. You continue to climb the steps, going seemingly nowhere until you reach a long, brightly lit landing at the top. There is a door at the end. You run to it as if compelled.
The handle is made of some sort of gold- colored crystal. It feels cold in your hand, a great contrast to the warm mahogany of the handrail.
When you open the door, you are in the bedroom of a young Victorian era girl.
The bed has a white frame with soft baby-blue pillows and mounds of light blue, gold, periwinkle, and white comforters and sheets.
In the middle of the room sits an oak table, covered in a black lace tablecloth. On the tablecloth, there is set a teapot, several teacups and saucers, two miniature pitchers, which presumably are for milk and cream, and a small bowl stacked well above the brim with sugar cubes. There are a total of five chairs around the table, all of which are white with a dark green pillow on the to sit upon. Three of these seats have guests already seated upon them. There is a brown stuffed bear, a life-sized doll of a little girl, and a porcelain doll.
You sit in the chair closest to you and wait. A small girl dressed in a light pink princess gown, complete with a silver tiara and white silk gloves, walks into the room and sits at the other empty chair. She sighs lightly, her brown ringlets bouncing up and down.
She pours tea into every cup, adds a cube of sugar, and pours "just a drop of cream". She picks up her cup and puts it to her mouth, cueing you to do the same. When you do, she puts her cup down and smiles at you. 
"welcome back," she says, "I hope you had the decency to pass into the next room when I change for tea. It would have been quite strange if you had stayed."
You return her smile, as sarcastic as it seemed to you. She can't see you, but you smile nonetheless.
The tea party is finished and before you know it, you feel as if you are being pushed out of the room, though you quite enjoy the small girl's- Joy's- poetry. It speaks to you as none ever has. You are compelled to seek the next room, being pulled to your right as you exit her room. This room is dark. It is done up in shades of gray and brown, making it look like a picture taken in sepia.
There is a small boy with a train in his lap sitting on the small four-poster bed. The floor in this room seems poorly maintained, even though it is smooth as glass under your now-bare feet. Your shoes seem to have disappeared since you left Joy.
The boy looks up at you, so you wave at him. He gets down off his bed, putting on his shoes and walking out the door- right through you. A shiver runs down your spine and you turn around into the darkened hall.
There is nothing pulling you now, nothing guiding you. But you know you must leave this place of in-between. You run to the stairs, where the mirrors have disappeared, and where the steps have straightened out so that, looking down the stairwell, you can see the bottom.
You slide down the banister, praying the handrail won't break under your weight. It holds, and when you reach the bottom you walk as calmly as you can through the hallway, sprinting to the front door once you turned the corner. You burst out the door and practically tear off the handle on your car door. You shakily start the engine and peel off the curb without a sound. You made it out. Your soul is set free and you no longer feel burdened with what was once your life. You can live the life you would have loved in death.