Stream of thoughts flowing in blank space

The people on the second floor

I never liked the second floor. The rooms were just used for sleeping, and were never actually soaked up with everyday life.

The cracks were loud enough to hear them in my sleep, but I always kept my eyes shut, believing that it's just the wood. Probably it's old, and plus we had the flood. It's normal. The whole story was filled with plot holes that were ingesting our choice of belief. And later, at the dead and dreary hour, they would spit them in our faces, to punish us and remind us that they are real.

Your neighbours tell you it must have been the wind forcing the door. You smile and believe them for a second, letting them alleviate your maddening thoughts. But then again, how do you explain the gravelled footprints staining the yellow carpet of the staircase?

When a person stops breathing, they say that they have passed away. But what is the word for the people who stop breathing and come to your house just to hibernate above you while you sleep?

Nobody believed when the neighbour's kid had a playdate with the child from the second floor. She has a wild imagination and bruises on her knees. She is so clumsy, that's why she is not allowed to get near the fireplace. And yet she swears on the child with glassy eyes and thorns in his hand, with no one around to feed it.

I finally went to the place where purple hands get out of the ground. So, I gave them a glass of white rum, assuring them that I have the perfect place for them to stay. Because I finally realised what my mom meant when she said that our second floor was built for the people who never even lived there.