A fire dying down (a sleep story), if you are doing this instead of scrolling — for an overtired night

The story, in full

The dog is asleep on the rug, on the side nearest the heat. The fire will be out in half an hour and nobody needs to watch it happen. The window is black, and the glass is cold if you touch it.

There is a smell of woodsmoke in the room that will still be there tomorrow. The heat reaches about a metre from the fire and stops. The ash in the grate is deep and soft and grey at the edges.

Let your breathing get slower without deciding to slow it. Let your thighs be as heavy as they want to be.

Your fingers can stop doing anything at all. Notice your hips, wide and settled.

Every few minutes a piece of wood falls in on itself with a small collapse of sparks. The logs beside the fireplace are down to the last two.

Let your upper arms fall wherever gravity puts them. Your eyelids can be too heavy to open, and that is fine.

Let the back of your neck lengthen out. Let your toes stop holding on to anything.

The room has gone darker than you noticed, and the light is all low and orange. The fire has stopped being flames and is now mostly red shapes that shift and settle.

If you're sleepy, sit up a little. Or let the sleepiness be there. Notice any part of you that wants this to be over.

Now feel your whole body at once, lying here, being held up. Feel one shoulder go heavy, then the other.

Nothing here needs following closely. Sleep.

Stay with the weight of your body. Let the next part go past without you. Let it all get further away.

Choosing this over scrolling counts as a good decision, even a small one.

Let everything get quiet, including this.

14 paragraphs, roughly 2 minutes read slowly aloud. Written for warm, winter.