No boiling kettles; no bare feet in hallways in the middle of the night; no bumping into things while going to the loo with the lights off; no running taps; no brushing teeth; no low moans; no cursing all-of-fate when warm flesh sits on a freezing toilet seat. At sundown, there is no click of lamps going on up and down each floor. No running for the morning bus and slamming the stairwell door. No Sunday mornings in hungover pits. No middle-of-the-night waking, soaked in existential dread. No turning the radio up. No dancing without anyone there. No looking out the window. No drawing the curtains, or the shutters, or doodling in the margins of a diary while blinking at the TV. No diarrhoea after a shock or too much rum, or a wheat binge, or gastric flu. No waiting for death. No texting an ex. No getting ready to go out. No being happy to stay in. There are no ignored phone calls in between bathtime and tears. There are no other tenants, not at dawn or dusk, nor any of the hours in between.

A scratching sound draws near.

Rats.

It is likely rats.

She turns the broken snib on her front door – so quiet!

Dot looks out onto the landing, keeps one foot inside her own hallway.

It is freezing.

What if rats are flocking here from sewers and catacombs? Rats the size of wee dogs. She could wake to find one eating her toes. Dot sleeps with her boots on every night just in case. Something is circling in the building and it’s not fucking rats. It’s moving in and out of cavities unseen. Dot places both feet out in the cold stone hall. Grips the hammer in a sweaty hand.

Ear cocked.

Blood cold and hot at the same time.

Something is in here.

It belongs to the building just like she does.

Each floor is so quiet. The building is listening to her, too. So are the ghosts. They’re closing in. Not much time left. The stone steps are so worn, each dips in the middle. The pipes clang. She’s not running taps! Faint. Dizzy. Whatever she fears is not real. It isn’t real. It is not. She tells herself this just like people tell themselves they will never be the one to go mad on the street one day – to not recognise themselves – to not even know their own name!

Not me.

Not I.

It won’t happen.

Until it does.

It will.

Then it will be far too late to do anything about any of it.

What if she tore off her clothes and ran from the building? On Hogmanay!

Nobody would pay attention, probably.

What if it is a human (not a spirit) she can hear wandering this building?