The brittle grass digs into the bare skin of my thighs, but it doesn’t really hurt when I’m not looking at it or running my fingers over the sore red dents it leaves on the surface. Mostly I’m staring down the coastline in the direction of the house, watching the dust clouds rolling and tumbling like starlings crazed in a swarm. As the dust settles and shifts, the house emerges at the edge of the ragged new coastline. All that noise and it’s still standing, but I can’t feel as relieved as I know I should. From this distance I can see the rip in the cliff running under the back door. It curves down under the back of the house and then east and around the edge of the island as far as I can see.

The front door is the only way in now. The knob is still stuck. Really fucking stuck. I have to wrap the hem of my dress around it, grip it as blood soaks all the way through the gauze and drips out. Finally the knob clicks and turns and pulls itself out from under my weight, making me fall over the threshold. I’m stiff for a second, paralyzed, wondering if the house can stand the impact of my fall, wondering if I’m still falling.

Inside everything’s been rattled off the walls and spilled onto the floor. Picture frames are mostly twin L’s on the carpet with hooks and spikes of glass. Lolly’s watercolors underneath the debris are just colors and shadows, familiar but they mean nothing. The phone’s an upturned turtle by the desk that’s given up. The TV’s smashed its face in.

I click the light switch but nothing happens. That should have been obvious. I’m not sure whether or not to carry on, whether getting my stuff is actually worth it. It’s like I can’t work out what surviving means in this context. Finally I decide I’ll stick with Plan A until something creaks or shifts under me.

It’s hard to lift my legs the height of each stair. There are just as many as there always were, I don’t feel like there are more, but the pulling and pressing and lifting of climbing the stairs, the strain of moving without making too much impact against the floor, makes me swear silently at each one, panting, pulse harassing my aching throat. The sweat that runs into the edges of my lips does nothing for my thirst, but the salt is satisfying.

On the last three steps I lie down to push myself the rest of the way, wiping the sweat from my face into the carpet of the landing. And I stay there for a minute, feeling my heart beat into the floor and imagining that I can feel it vibrating through the rest of the house. Wishing for another slip.