In the library there is a catalog for things that are no longer in the world.

The drawers are labeled with ordinary letters until you pull them out far enough for the alphabet to give up. Then the labels become habits: the way your mother knocked, the taste of pennies, a specific Tuesday that never finished.

The cards are warm.

I find mine filed under M, for Me, in the event I don’t return myself. The handwriting looks like it learned my hand by watching me sleep.

Location: third floor, between Biography and Weather.
Call Number: 0.0.0.0
Condition: slightly breathing.
Fine: payable in voice.

I try to laugh, but it comes out as a folded map.

A librarian without a face slides along the aisle on wheels that do not touch the floor. Her name tag says PLEASE DO NOT. She points to the elevator, which is a throat, politely open.

Inside, the buttons are little teeth labeled with years. I press my birth year and feel it click somewhere behind my eyes.

The elevator descends, but the numbers go up: 4, 5, 6, 7—each ding a small apology.

When the doors part, there is a corridor made of carpet and sky. Doors line it like patient mouths. Each has a peephole that shows a different version of my living room: one with no corners, one flooded with daylight that speaks in vowels, one where the couch is shaped like a question no one asked aloud.

At the end is a door with my fingerprint already turning the knob.

A note is taped to the frame:

You may enter, but you must leave something with a name.
We recommend a childhood.

From inside, I hear someone whispering my name the way a person tests a knife’s edge with their thumb.

Today's Vote

RANK // BLIND