Dares of Yore

There’s nothing quite like it.

She sat on the ledge of her apartment building, staring out into the dark blanket. The street was empty but she could hear the sounds of life in a distance. Or was it? Maybe life was simply in front of her, except she’s successfully managed to block it out. Deleted, erased, emptied.

The blankness – there’s nothing quite like it.

What she could feel was what she failed to see. The figure in her room. The darkness she was forced to return to. After all these years, she’s finally come to accept being embraced by the black cloak that broods in every corner of the room she was in. The silence it brings. The cold, hard solitude that others resented and tried to avoid was what she learned to held on to.

The stillness - there wasn’t anything quite like it.

It didn’t have a shape, or a name, or any intent. She tried sitting quietly once, with the lights off and a pencil in her hand. She tried to draw what she thought she saw. But she couldn’t, because really, there wasn’t anything there at all. So what was it? What was it that welcomed her home every night?

The heavy breath that lingered - there's nothing quite like it.