Overnight

 

What consoles you in a haunted house, not windows -- fierce eyes -- nor corridors of air -- breath of the beast -- and there's only a grey sun ever and the lands around, they're weeds, and you've always a chill and coming down with something

And the estate agent refrains from the stories of the prior owners, who've 'moved on' due to a death in the family they had to dispose of the property quickly which is why a place this large can be sold at such an available price

I rise very thirsty having trouble with the covers, my feet not finding the slippers and my calf cramping and there floats a tiny -- a fly that is just an infant -- fly in the water glass it must have dipped and been overwhelmed now placid on the calm

And in skimming it dry onto a raft of kleenex, its dim twitching and I rinse the glass and swab the lip before drinking so very much of the water and flipping a switch and having only the nightlight to follow back to the flat place where I am to lie

And it is nervous and 3 and I dream about pushing on the heavy doors and outside is my dad, he of the long-passed-on, wearing a sick-cap and smiling and glad to see me there and hugs my hand and I know that the house is a house for the dead

I want to say something true but grind mum.  Lilies.  Taken at long exposure, the recumbent quiet of Victorian child corpses.  The dream shakes, dehydrated by caffeine and cold-meds, and the dawn world, unrested, is unalive outside and by me goes a fly.

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