They say not to light candles
outside haunted places.
Spirits mistake them
for invitations.
I laughed.
Lit one anyway.
Set it on the cracked stone
and packed my bowl,
letting the smoke
rise into branches
that hadn’t moved
all evening.
Then…
the upstairs curtain shifted.
Slowly.
As though someone
had stepped closer
to watch.
The house never made a sound.
It didn’t have to.
Old things know
silence is louder
than screams.
I smoked until the stars
blurred together,
pretending
I wasn’t counting footsteps
inside a house
that had no one living in it.
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