Quiet.

Sitting on my grandmother’s bed with my legs stretched out, warm under the duvet, and my laptop on my knees, I feel as though I should be trying to type silently. It’s so quiet. It’s been this quiet all week. Even the high ceilings and empty spaces are discovering the impossibility to find anything to echo. Only in the evenings, when my grandmother leaves her temporary bed in the conservatory and stretches out on the sofa to fall asleep in front of the telly, does the noise escalate. The tv is on “loud” throughout waking and sleeping moments alike.
But now, when the television is off, and she’s reading in bed, and I have this time to myself, as I have quite a bit this week, the silence reaches round me and wraps me tight, so that I find myself being extra careful with every move I make. Even the tapping of the keys makes me flinch.
This quiet is a strange thing. In other occasions the quiet would be a release. Creativity and enjoyment of my craft tends to follow, when I have time to myself, but here, in this quiet, nothing happens. It’s almost as if it satiates me. I feel as though I’m soaking it up like a sponge, until I’m heavy with the apathy of it.
I hit the enter key and the click makes me jump.