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The Report Was Written While the Building Was Awake

by Miles Rooker
Chapter 2
The paper smells like cleanser and rust.
Ink skips where the pen hesitated.
There are checkboxes drawn by hand
that no one ever checked.

Time Recorded: after closing
Location: service hallway
Condition: unresolved

I was told to inventory what remained.
Chairs stacked correctly.
Glasses inverted, drying.
A radio playing to itself in the back room
with the volume set to apology.

Something had been eating the sound.
Not noise.
Sound.
The shape of it.
Words arrived lighter when spoken twice.

I noted a footprint near the freezer.
Not a shoe.
Not bare.
More like the idea of weight
pressed briefly into tile
and then reconsidered.

There is a line here where I stopped writing
and started listening.
The building knew my posture.
The lights adjusted.
The exits practiced being exits.

Someone knocked from the inside of a wall.
Not asking to be let out.
Keeping time.

I wrote that nothing was missing
and crossed it out.
I wrote that everything was accounted for
and circled the word everything
until it tore.

Final Entry:
If you find this log
do not file it.
Do not correct the times.
The incident is still occurring
in rooms that have learned how to look finished.

Signature: illegible
Handwriting resembles mine
on a night I do not remember working