The Blue Glow

“The scariest things don’t go bump in the night—they sit very still and don’t say a word.”

That night, we had soup and soft bread rolls. Pumpkin soup, the kind Grandma makes with little flecks of herbs floating on top like tiny boats on an orange sea. Usually, I'd dunk my bread and watch it soak up the soup like a sponge, but tonight my stomach felt tight and knotted. Grandpa didn't come to the table.

The kitchen light cast long shadows across the tablecloth, turning the familiar room strange and secretive. Outside, the winter night pressed against the windows, dark and cold. A branch scratched against the glass occasionally, like fingernails asking to be let in.

Mack ate half his bowl and said he wasn't hungry. He pushed the remaining soup around with his spoon, making swirling patterns that disappeared as soon as they formed. I finished mine, but I didn't taste much. The soup slid down my throat, warm but somehow empty of flavour, as if worry had dulled my senses.

Grandma barely touched her food. She sat with her back too straight, her eyes flickering toward the lounge room every few minutes.

Afterwards, Grandma read to us in the lounge. A book about a pig who wanted to fly. It was one we'd heard before, a story that usually made us laugh at the pig's silly attempts to grow wings. Grandpa would always make snorting noises during the funny parts. Tonight, the story felt flat without his sound effects.

Grandma sat in her armchair, the one with the antimacassar that always slipped down the back, while Mack and I curled up on the floor near Grandpa's empty chair. The lamplight cast a warm circle around us, but left the corners of the room in shadow. Grandpa's mug sat on the side table, half-full of cold tea that no one had the heart to clear away.

Her voice trembled halfway through, when the pig's friends help build him a flying machine, and she had to stop and clear her throat before finishing the last page. Her fingers gripped the book too tightly, creasing the pages slightly. When she closed it, she kept her hands on the cover for a moment, as if drawing strength from its familiar weight.

When she tucked us in, smoothing the blankets with hands that weren't quite steady, I asked, “Is Mum coming tomorrow?”

“Yes,” she said. Her voice sounded surer than it had all day, though something flickered behind her eyes—a shadow I couldn't quite name.

“Are we really going to Queensland?” I twisted the edge of the blanket between my fingers, watching her face for clues.

“Maybe.” The word hung in the air, neither promise nor denial.

I wanted to ask more—about Dad, about Grandpa, about the doctor who was supposed to come but didn't, about why Grandma locked both locks after Colleen left—but she kissed my forehead and said goodnight before I could.

“Sleep tight,” she whispered, but her mind seemed elsewhere, already walking down the hallway to whatever waited beyond our door.

The ceiling above our fold-out bed was full of shadows that moved and shifted as the curtains stirred in the draught. I stared up at them, watching as they formed shapes that dissolved before I could properly name them. Beside me, Mack lay with his back to me, but I could tell from his breathing that he wasn't asleep either.

Later that night, I woke up.

Not because of a noise. Just… woke up. The way you sometimes do when your mind knows something your body doesn't yet understand.

The house was still. Not the peaceful kind of still, but the holding-its-breath kind. Mack was breathing soft and slow beside me, his arm flung across his face in sleep. Ribbons the Rabbit had fallen to the floor, her one good eye staring accusingly at me from the shadows.

The clock in the hallway chimed once, softly. One o'clock. The witching hour, Dad called it. The time when the world balances between one day and the next, and strange things can happen.

I crept into the hallway. The floorboards were cold beneath my bare feet, and I stepped carefully over the creaky one outside our door. The lights were off, but a sliver of lamplight came from the kitchen, casting a thin gold line along the passage carpet. It trembled slightly, as if someone had moved between the light and the door.

I stood by the corner, quiet as I could. My heart thumped so loudly in my chest that I was sure it would give me away, but no one called out or turned around.

Grandma sat at the table, phone in her hand, staring at it. The small screen illuminated her face from below, making her look older, the shadows deepening the lines around her mouth. Her hair hung loose around her shoulders, not pinned up as it usually was, making her look somehow vulnerable, like a different person altogether.

She wasn't crying, not out loud. But she was wiping her face with the edge of her dressing gown sleeve. One hand pressed against her temple, as if trying to contain the thoughts inside. The other held the edge of the table like she was worried it might disappear. Her wedding ring caught the light as her fingers tightened, a brief flash of gold in the dimness.

She said something I couldn't hear. A whispered word or name, spoken to the empty kitchen. Then she placed the phone face-down on the table with a soft click, like closing a door.

For a long moment, she just sat there, her shoulders curved in a way I'd never seen before, as if the weight of whatever she knew was too heavy to bear upright.

Then she turned off the lamp and sat in the dark.

I waited, not daring to move, barely breathing. The darkness felt thick and watchful. After what seemed like forever, I heard her chair scrape softly as she stood, followed by the hushed pad of her slippers moving toward the hallway.

I tiptoed back to bed, my heart racing, and slipped under the covers. Mack stirred just a little as the mattress dipped, and muttered something about pancakes, his voice thick with dreams. I envied him then—safe in sleep, in a world where pancakes were the most important thing.

I curled up beside him, seeking comfort in his familiar warmth. Outside, the wind had picked up, sighing around the eaves like a sad lullaby. A dog barked once, far away, then fell silent. The house creaked and settled, old timber adjusting to the night's chill.

I didn't sleep for a long time. My mind kept returning to the image of Grandma sitting alone in the dark, her face illuminated by the phone's blue glow, waiting for something or someone who might never come.

In the morning, I knew, we would all pretend everything was normal. We would eat breakfast and wash dishes and colour in pictures. But something had changed, like a thread pulled loose from a familiar garment. And no matter how carefully you try to tuck it back, the weakness remains, waiting for the next tug to unravel everything you thought was secure.