A Brief Glimpse

I heard kids’ voices come through the window on the back of the summer-day wind. When I got up, though, and pushed back the curtain, I saw no one outside.

Then I heard one of the voices again. “Shit,” a boy said, “did you see that?”

“See what?” asked another boy. Still no faces appeared.

There was a pause before the first boy’s voice returned with an answer. “Nothing,” he said. “I swear I saw the old man’s ghost,” he added, speaking more quietly.

“You saw the wind move the curtain,” said yet another boy I wasn’t able to see. “Come on. I hate this place.” The voices disappeared then as they always did, cut away by the wind that moved between us, as thin as a razor, separating the world into two.