SPECTRE

It grew slightly louder and you gently came to, realizing you’d fallen asleep at your desk for the third night in a row. You had recently moved and rented an old apartment while the owner was abroad who entrusted you to look after his belongings. Over the past couple weeks, piano melodies would prick you from slumber and you could’ve sworn the sound came from the study. You were determined to see if it was real or just lack of sleep from being in a new place. The dim lantern light danced across the mess of pages before you. As you gather and stack them neatly, you hear the delicate chirp of a piano. You glanced up and across the darkened study to stare at the piano, but saw the fallboard was still completely encasing the keys. You slowly shook your head as a big yawn and a reaching stretch crept up, as if your body was saying you needed to get some sleep. 

As you stood from your desk, the chair’s feet screeching across the wooden floor, a gauzy white spectre revealed herself on the piano bench, dressed in regal attire. Mouth agape, you watched as the ghostly hands danced across the keys, though the fallboard was still closed, as the piano released the notes of a beautiful, lulling sonata. Her fingers floated across the notes and you continued to watch in awe, once for the confirmation you weren’t losing your mind, and second for the unthinkable happening before your very eyes.