The house is quiet, sunk into the night like a decaying ship. It lies tame and peaceful, beautiful in its collapse. It has killed four people. They were found on the threshold, intensely dead.
The first in pieces.
The second, a homeless man, gray-haired and gaunt, as if he had died of old age.
The third, a young man, flayed, his skin lying beside him like an old suit.
The fourth, a girl, dead and pale, her organs rearranged.
The house had swallowed them, chewed them, and spat them out like a foul mouthful.
Mordekai knew what others did not: the house had awakened, and like all things roused from sleep, it was capricious and cruel.
The door was warped, hanging by a single loose hinge. He knocked and coughed.
“I’ve come from afar, my legs are weary. I would like to be your guest.”
Silence.
The door creaked open, cautiously. Mordekai entered of his own will.
Inside, the darkness revealed: a gnawed and filthy carpet, shattered furniture, a cold fireplace, a toothless crystal chandelier. Mordekai looked around. The soul of this house was sorrowful.
“You must be cold,” he said, and lit a fire in the frozen hearth.
The house creaked with its boards.
Mordekai brewed tea on the fire. From a rusty pot he drank the first sips. The house blinked with its wallpaper.
He sat down on a torn couch. Through swarms of dusty motes he looked with pity at the grieving room. The house yawned in its ruin. It had forgotten the comfort of dwelling, forgotten companionship.
Mordekai sipped his warm tea.
The house waited. The trembling floors hummed with fear.
Mordekai began to sing, softly, melancholically. He sang to the floor, the carpet, the chandelier, the upper floor, the stairs, the attic. He sang to the restless house. A lullaby from before memory stroked the hardened walls. Outside, the forest sifted the moonlight. Crickets could be heard.
Mordekai sang quietly.
Had anyone passed along the overgrown path at that hour, they would have seen through the dim glass the flickering light and the house that, like eyelids, was closing its windows.
The house sank into sleep, gently and smoothly, like a tired child. It would harm no one again.
Because all things in this world just need a little love.
More from Mordekai Stories: The Inverted Tree, The Glass Field, The Railway in The Plain, The Man Who Was in The Way
