The room around me was half packed into boxes and stacks of books had cast dark shadows on the floor. The lamp on my cluttered nightstand seemed out of reach when I swung my hand around to find the switch and turned it on. After another thirty seconds of contemplating the day, I finally got the courage to swing my legs out of bed and onto the floor. I batted my eyes several times after rubbing them for a good five seconds or so. The yellow light from the lamp made an appealing ambiance on the clutter around the room. This is one of two inhabited rooms in the house. Everything was packed up and moved out. Everything except the few items that belong to my roommate and I that is.
Adventure, and a necessity to begin the day, pulled me up from my sitting position on the bed to a staggered stance on stiff legs. Pulling the door open, I stumbled out of my room and into the hallway where the bathroom was. Finding the light switch of the bathroom I flipped it on, "CLICK!" A replica of the noise echoed in the room across the hall. Everything echoes in an empty house when the floors are synthetic wood.
Dead eyes stared back at me while I brushed my teeth. Little globs of sleep rested in the corners of my eye-lashes. The sound of a thousand water drops hitting the bathtub floor built up anticipation for getting into the hot shower. Deep breaths fill my lungs as I stood there in the bliss of a shower that contained no echoes, but the smooth, rhythmic noise of rain. The "white noise" of running water provided an escape that washed over me with warmth. My mind was emptied of all stress for just a moment. The stress quickly came back as I start to process the day that was ahead of me.
Getting out of the shower feeling refreshed and much more awake, I got dressed and headed down the hall toward the den where the stairs up to the kitchen were. Each barefoot step I took on that synthetic flooring echoed softly on the den walls around me. It all echoes...
Once up the stairs I slowly made my way through the dark living room into the equally dark kitchen. I noticed outside the window that the sky contained no stars and was hardly any brighter than the dark room I was trying to pass through. I flipped on the light to the kitchen-more echoes...
Another yellowish tint hung over all the random belongings that remained on the table and counter. The fridge was littered with random food items. I managed to put together a meager lunch for the day. Grocery shopping had been put on the backburner of my priorities. I found some an onion bagel and put it in the toaster. The lid of the cream cheese "SNAPPED!" as I opened it. Every stroke of the butter knife across the toasted bagel echoed through the kitchen and living room. "SSHHRRRC, SSHHRRRC!" The sound slithered through my ears and down my spine.
As I sat down at the folding table to eat my breakfast in the poorly lit dining room that was between the living room and kitchen, I looked into the nearly empty living room, where the kitchen light shed an even dimmer light. There were two pieces of furniture left. A wooden chair, and a couch too small to be a love-seat, but too big to be a chair. I imagined myself curled up in the fetal position on the couch in the nearly empty room. The only other things that were in that room were a couple baskets and some empty picture frames. It was a hollow yet beautiful scene that played in front of my eyes. Like the dark stage set of a drama that I knew nothing about, but at the same time, seemed all too familiar.
There was something strange about an empty house that I found haunting. It was a sort of cocoon that stored the memories and fears of those that once lived there. Of course that wasn't true, but in an empty house it can feel as though the walls can talk, and in the moments such as I had this morning, the walls don't seem to ever shut up.
So the echoes kept on speaking. And as I sat there sipping my coffee, I decided to start listening.
-N. M. Cummings
