Lovely Penguin

by marie gordon

Tap. Tap. From the foyer an old glass cabinet reverberates from the sound. I hear myself, my breath, the house, its noises, in the dark. Tapping, tapping…

This house feels quiet and empty. I creep down the staircase at night, through the dim halls where shadows follow my every step and I feel alone. At the opposite end, down the lengthy hallway, there is another room where he slumbers. But I lay awake unprotected, cold. The covers do not warm me here. The echoes of the walls, the house settling wake me at night. A beat, like the echo of a rusty drum from the center, Thump, thump.

Loneliness shivers through me with the chilled air. And the lights, never come on at night. I stare at blank walls, at canvasses and imagine their pictures filled with faces. But the house has barely two faces but bodies of halls and passages. It is too vast to sit so empty and dormant. Sleep, sleep.

When I dream I see bleak figures at my door—pounding, pounding. They reach through the oak frame for me and I stand back. A violent chill shivers down their spines and they retreat quietly while I lay crying in their absence.

The water turns on and I wake. I lay open-eyed. Pump, pump, the pipes run the walls and the water drenches me in terror. This is my home. Be still, be still and the night will rock me back to sleep. But the house remains unquiet— and I, afraid.

The mice lie dead under the staircase, petrified animals with beady eyes. What will I look like in the end? Has paranoia taken over me, or has this house? I wonder when the hallways will stop quietly creaking at night, when footsteps and shadows will fade back into the walls. When do the guests arrive and this place reawaken with vital sounds of human heartbeats? Waiting, waiting, waiting…

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