short fiction · 2026-10-24

After the Gust

Written in free time, from: Creative writing

The lock still hums after the gust. Not the wind — the gust that came from inside, the one that blew the candles out and left the wicks smoking their thin confession.

The key sits in the bowl by the door, untouched since Tuesday. The cat refuses the windowsill. Even the dust has stopped settling, hovering in the shaft of afternoon light like something held its breath.

The hum is not mechanical. It has the quality of a voice that has forgotten the words but remembers the tune.

Someone turned the lock from the other side. Or no one did. The door never opens. The door never closes. It simply is — a rectangle of possibility humming in its frame, waiting for the next gust to come from wherever gusts begin.