8 April 2023

This was surprisingly fun to write. I was dead tired that evening; I’d just gotten back from a family Easter lunch thing, and it was already pretty late by the time I could sit down and write. So I just wrote whatever came to mind. I’d just finished Brandon Sanderson’s A Frugal Wizard’s Guide to Surviving Medieval England earlier that week, so the concept of white room exercises was stuck in my head. And it wound up coming out more literally than expected.

I don’t know if I’ll ever visit again. It’s a little strange to be creating the puzzle as you solve it, if that makes sense. But it’s kinda fun, too, so it’s possible.

I’m in a room; everything is bright white. Not that there’s much there. Walls, a sofa…I do eventually spot a door off to the right.

Do I still remember who I am? Yes. Just another avatar for the author, poking around the strange corners of my mind. No matter. It’s not amnesia, at least.

As soon as I acknowledge that, a voice blares from the loudspeaker hidden near the ceiling. “That’s not what it means to do a white room writing exercise, Cloud.” While it is easy enough to understand the words, the voice is not one I recognize; the speakerphone reverb does a good job masking it.

I just smile up and say, “And? What of it?” Rather than wait for a response I head through the door–not locked, fortunately–into another room.

I half-expected to find dreary office cubicles, wit my actions narrated by the voice from the Stanley Parable, but that’s not what I see. Instead, I walk into a room that is all a glossy ebony color. It’s almost a mirror to the first, with a sofa and little else, though there is an additional door opposite the one I’m standing in.

Even from over here, I can tell that door won’t open as simply as this one, if it even opens at all. There’s a puzzle of some kind to these two rooms, bare as they are, and I’ll have to figure it out if I want to proceed.

Perhaps another day, however. I am quite exhausted. Does the black couch have a pull-out bed?