I was warned never to close all the doors in a room, written by Skinny Tinkles.

There has always been a role in my house.

You must leave at least one door or window open in any given room of the house whilst you're in it.

It was drilled into me since I was old enough to reach for the door handle. I didn't understand why for a while.

My parents usually weren't superstitious in the slightest.

I even saw from pictures that they owned a black cat a while before I was born.

I rarely, if ever, questioned them though.

My parents were kind, calm people,

but if I ever came close to breaking the rules or even asking too many questions, they would turn serious,

and wouldn't let me off without a 30 minute lecture first. I didn't

actually believe in the superstition. Thanks in part to them not telling me what the consequence would be for not doing so.

But I didn't want to anger them, even if it meant leaving a window or door open in the cold.

When I was 19 years old, however,

my parents had gone to my grandmother's house to see my aunt who was visiting from Australia.

I quickly volunteered to watch over the house while they were gone, which seemed to make them happy.

In reality, I was just using this as an opportunity to have my girlfriend of six years over.

My girlfriend, Anya, her father didn't really like me very much,

so I wasn't in her house very often.

And my parents didn't allow guests, so he mostly saw each other at school.

That weekend though, I invited her over.

She arrived less than an hour after my parents had left. And she knew about the rules,

knew about the rules, of course.

...