Sleep story · cozy, rain
An attic room — a slow story for the end of the day, when you are waiting for something — for winding down
Sloping ceiling, rain on the roof a foot above your head.
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 radiator is small and makes a ticking sound as it cools. There is a dormer window with a deep sill, and a mug left on it from last night. The roof is holding, and the rain is outside, and that is the whole arrangement.
The bed is pushed into the low corner, which makes it feel like a den. The floorboards are bare and slightly uneven, and one of them always creaks. The lamp is on the floor beside the bed because there is no room for a table.
Feel one shoulder go heavy, then the other. Feel your belly rise and fall without any help from you.
Let your calves spread out and flatten. Your eyelids can be too heavy to open, and that is fine.
The rain changes intensity every few minutes and never quite stops. A carrier bag of shopping is still on the chair, unpacked.
Feel the weight of your head on the pillow. Let the mattress take all of it.
Feel the weight of the blanket on your legs. Let your lower back sink down into the mattress.
The room is in the roof, and the ceiling slopes so steeply that you have to duck near the window. The air up here is warmer than downstairs and smells of old wood.
Let everything you were holding today stay on the floor beside the bed. Your elbows can stop being hinges for now.
There is a box of things under the eaves that nobody has opened in years. The rain on the roof tiles is much closer and louder up here than anywhere else in the house.
Feel your wrists loosen. Feel your cheeks let go.
The roof is holding, and the rain is outside, and that is the whole arrangement. The lamp is on the floor beside the bed because there is no room for a table.
Let your thumbs rest where they landed. Let your forearms get heavy and warm.
The air up here is warmer than downstairs and smells of old wood. A carrier bag of shopping is still on the chair, unpacked.
Notice how you're sitting. Adjust if you need to. Then settle again. If you're sleepy, sit up a little. Or let the sleepiness be there.
Let your toes stop holding on to anything. Let your palms open if they were closed.
Nothing here needs following closely. They will find their own way out.
Softer. Let each breath be a little smaller than the last. Slower now.
Let the breath be the only thing you are doing. Let the sound of this go soft at the edges. Nothing needs deciding tonight.
Waiting is dead time you can spend on this instead.
The room is dark, the day is finished, and nothing is required of you.
21 paragraphs, roughly 4 minutes read slowly aloud. Written for cozy, rain.
If this story does not settle you, try Sleep story: an attic room, after a long day — for a racing mind, A kitchen late at night, when you need something unremarkable — for jet lag or A hotel room somewhere (a sleep story), when you are somewhere noisy — for a racing mind.