My house makes noises when I'm alone at night. It somehow neglects to make these noises at other times, or perhaps it does, only to be drowned out by the constant hum of my computer, by the incessant ringing of the cellphone.

My house makes noises in the quiet solitary hours asleep on my couch; there's the sound of scurrying feet on the ceiling above, the creaking of the floorboards below, the strange, strangled clicks and groans of the radiator, the intermittent sounds of doors swaying, squeaking on their aged hinges.

My house makes noises that are amplified by the stillness of the silence that falls over it like a blanket when my only companions are the dark, unlit halls, and the slivers of incidental light that fall across them.

On my phone, there are only burnt bridges. On the screen, only unfamiliar names.

I grab my coat, pull the blue ski mask over my face and prepare for the winter.