The Visitor

A week after the ghost incident, someone broke into my house while I was there and stole my keys and all my credit cards. I was laying in my bed when it happened. I wasn’t entirely sure that the noises I heard from the kitchen were about anything, although I’m sure somewhere in my body I knew they were. I ignored them once, and then again, as I scroll -scroll-scrolled the morning away. I’m sure a box of cereal fell. I’m sure a broom was dislodged by gravity from its place in the corner.

Only this and nothing more.

When I finally dragged myself out of bed to go make coffee, I came into a kitchen with the door to the outside wide open. I’m sure I forgot to lock it and the wind blew it open. We have been in the midst of record-setting storms, biblical flooding. Sink holes swallowing cars, century old trees toppling, crushing homes, and downing power lines. Everything here has felt like crumbling, like the rains washing the entire earth away. It made sense. All collapsing makes sense today.

I then heard a sound outside that made me realize what was happening. My keys and wallet were gone from the usual place I keep them. There had been someone in my house. They were trying to steal my car. I grabbed a knife that was sitting on the cutting board next to me and ran outside.

I don’t know why I did this. I did not think. I just acted. I had some belief that if there was a person out there, the sight of me charging toward them with a knife might scare them off. There was also a vague belief that if they were armed, I…