Sleep story · quiet, books
A library at closing time — a slow story for the end of the day, when the weather has kept you inside — for an overtired night
The last hour, when the lights go down row by row.
Lights off. Press begin and let the story read itself to you, at the pace of sleep.
Screen on or off — we suggest dimming it, or simply closing your eyes after the first paragraph.
The story, in full
The last of the day's light is going out of the high windows. The reading room you are in has one lamp left on, and it is the one above your table. There is a trolley of returned books beside the desk, waiting to be put back.
Someone is pushing a trolley two rows away, and you can hear each wheel separately. Everything here will still be here tomorrow. The air smells of paper, dust and floor polish.
Let your hands be completely still. Feel one shoulder go heavy, then the other.
Let your toes stop holding on to anything. Now feel your whole body at once, lying here, being held up.
Your own book is heavy in your hands, and you have stopped reading it. The library closed twenty minutes ago, and the staff are working along the far shelves, switching off sections.
Let everything you were holding today stay on the floor beside the bed. Let the mattress take all of it.
Your fingers can stop doing anything at all. Let your shoulder blades spread out and drop.
The clock above the door is the old kind, with a second hand that moves in small jumps. The carpet has flattened every sound in the building down to nothing.
If you feel emotional, you don't have to explain it to anyone, including yourself. If you're counting the minutes, that's fine. Count them and come back.
Feel your heartbeat somewhere far away. Let your ribs stop working so hard.
Let each breath be a little smaller than the last. Leave it there.
You can stop listening properly. Nothing here needs following closely. Nothing needs deciding tonight.
Bad weather is a decent excuse to stay in and do this.
That is the end of the story. Sleep is the next part, and it does not need instructions.
14 paragraphs, roughly 2 minutes read slowly aloud. Written for quiet, books.
If this story does not settle you, try A library at closing time (a sleep story), when your attention is scattered — for a restless night, Sleep story: a hotel room somewhere, when you have just finished work — for a night when you do not want to think or The house after everyone is asleep — a slow story for the end of the day, before something difficult — for a restless night.