The house fell open like a book dropped from a great height. Pages—no, walls—flapping in the sudden silence. And in the center, where the cracks all met, there was no void. No darkness. Just a small, vertical version of you, curled on the floor, knees to chest, exactly as you had been at seven years old, waiting for someone to finally see that the crack had always been there.
You knelt down. You picked her up. And for the first time, you let the crack run all the way through you—from crown to base, from beginning to end—until there was nothing left to split. vertical cracks
The second crack appeared in the hallway mirror’s reflection. No, not in the mirror—behind the glass, splitting the silver backing into two distinct worlds. On one side, your face, tired but familiar. On the other, a version of you that hadn’t slept in years, eyes hollow as wells. You turned around. The real wall was smooth. But the crack in the reflection stayed. The house fell open like a book dropped from a great height
That was the story you told yourself. The safe one. No darkness
You named it settling. You named it seasonal change. You named it anything but what it was.
Not in the wall.
One afternoon, you pressed your ear to the largest crack—the original one, now a gaping seam in the bedroom. From inside, a sound like a zipper opening. Not metal on metal, but flesh. Skin parting. You pulled back, but something tugged from the other side. Not a hand. A direction .