ghosts of belfast

In the stillness of the night, the sound was unmistakable. Creak, creak, creak. I held my breath. The noise of my beating heart seemed to reverbate throughout the corridors of this place.Straining my neck to listen, the stretching of the muscles almost dropped me dead still again. No. This was not happening. I sat up suddenly. What better way to deal with this sounds than in such a decisive manner. And then at that point the cup of tea on the sidetable fell and echoed for what seemed like eternity.Quiet again, I listened to the sounds. They were clear and unmistakable. Movement. Unhurried. Sometime hurried. Stamping and at times subdued. Muffled and a suddent burst of speed. What am I doing here.Reading a book would have required a lot more effort than television. I settled for the latter. Not that there were many channels to watch. The television sounds seemed to drive away the sounds on the wooden floors. Or was it the sounds in my head I wondered? It did not help a great deal that my favourite programme at the time was a macabre ghostly narrative called A Haunting.

There was nothing that was wow about The Royal when I arrived. Landing at night had hidden the true nature of this place. Conversely, it had reinforced the feeling of alienation and intrigue. The episode of A Haunting the previous night had been especially harrowing and now I was in the middle of a nightmare and yet I was wide awake.

I lay my head back on to the pillow and watched the ghastly movie. I can never tell you that what it was about except it was one of those e-tv special harking back to the days when my father was a young man. I tried to separate the sounds of my heart, my belly with what seemed to be the sound out there. Off course it was marrying the terrible sound off the terrible movie and it got to the point where I had no clue whether I was coming or going.

I woke up startled. The birds were singing. The light was seeping through the heavy curtains. It was morning. I was sure I had closed the curtains tightly. But then again, I was sure that there had been sounds...