The Static Between Floors

In the stairwell, the radio from Apartment 4B spills weather reports one syllable at a time, thin as minnows, slipping beneath doors and gathering around the ankles of the building.

Someone has left a broom leaning like a prayer against the landing, its straw head frayed to light. The thunder outside tests every window, while the hallway keeps its own small weather.

I listen for the elevator breathing open, for the soft mechanical throat of arrival, but all I hear is the transformer’s low hymn and the ice maker down the corridor, thinking.

When the power returns, the dark loosens its grip. The stairwell shows its paint, its handprints, its scars. Even then the static lingers, a salt on the tongue, as if the building remembers being listened to.