First a glass breaking against the sink.
Then someone saying
This is it
This is really the end.
A child, kind of dreaming, kind of awake,
hears keys hit the wall,
a laughing sound,
he thinks, sleigh bells.
He listens as footsteps go down.
A door opens,
a screen door closes.
Night air moves up the stairs
and into his room.
It smells cold and filled with stars.
The car starts, stalls, starts again.
The road is wet under the tires,
yawning, just waking up.
He pictures the car riding through a toy town,
past doll houses with green felt lawns,
and tiny families frozen in the moonlight.
It is the very last car in the world,
skating away.
Quiet fills up the house
like warm water in a bath.
You could drown in all this quiet, he thinks,
and that would be nice too.
Published in Rip Rap
Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash