Sleep story: the house after everyone is asleep, if you are fitting this around other people — for a night when you do not want to think

The story, in full

Everyone went to bed an hour ago, and the house has stopped making the sounds it makes during the day. There is nothing left on the list for today. The radiator clicks once as it cools down.

There is a chair by the window that nobody sits in during the day. A glass of water sits on the table, half finished. The fridge hums on and off in the kitchen, and that is the loudest thing in the building.

Feel your heels sink a little into the mattress. Your eyelids can be too heavy to open, and that is fine.

Feel the weight of the blanket on your legs. Let your toes stop holding on to anything.

Everything in the room is exactly where it was left. The curtains are not quite closed, and there is a thin line of streetlight along the wall.

Let your breathing get slower without deciding to slow it. Let your forearms get heavy and warm.

Feel your heartbeat somewhere far away. Notice the places where your body touches the bed, and let them be heavy.

The lamp beside you is the only light left on in the whole house. Outside, a car goes past and its headlights sweep across the ceiling, then are gone.

Now feel your whole body at once, lying here, being held up. Feel your belly rise and fall without any help from you.

The floorboards have stopped creaking because nobody is walking on them. The clock in the hallway ticks slightly behind the one in the kitchen.

Your fingers can stop doing anything at all. Your ankles can go loose now.

The clock in the hallway ticks slightly behind the one in the kitchen. The radiator clicks once as it cools down.

Let your shoulder blades spread out and drop. Feel the back of your knees soften into the bed.

The lamp beside you is the only light left on in the whole house. The floorboards have stopped creaking because nobody is walking on them.

If you're distracted by a sound, let the sound be the object for a moment. Notice the tone of your own inner voice. Is it kind?

Let your upper arms fall wherever gravity puts them. Your jaw can drop slightly. Let your teeth part.

Let the thoughts come and go without you getting up to answer. Let them.

You do not have to count them. Let the quiet be boring. Follow the breath out, and let the next one arrive by itself.

Slower now. Let the dark be ordinary. Just the weight.

It is designed to fit around other people’s schedules.

Let the words go now, and take the quiet with you.

21 paragraphs, roughly 3 minutes read slowly aloud. Written for quiet, home.