Tales from an empty hallway

My flat is very clean, and very quiet. The sheets are washed, clean towels are folded and the Poetical Histories are stacked, rebelliously historical, neatly on the new Ikea cabinet next to the new Ikea sofa on the new Ikea rug on the newly sanded and sealed boards.

I love the boards. They are old and warm, the colours of summer and baking, just uneven enough to be appealing but not so much as to ruin the meditative soothe of their lines. Sometimes I put my hands to them in the hope that everything will stop seeming so absent of history, so ferociously new-in-box.

My kitchen is red, and fast friends with the boards. They talk together about red wine and bare feet and toast crumbs and while I wash the dishes I tell them my stories.