217 Babel Street | Outside
The box moved through the air. Past each floor in turn it fell. Voices called from within, from the closed centre. Whispers, fragments of sound...
... quiet ticking of a clock... the lonely wail of a saxophone... I'll be there in thirty minutes...do you have what I asked for... it's still early, I thought we could... hiss of fat in a pan... put plenty of garlic in there. I'm catching a... roll the ball, baby... more to life than books, you know... bounce... bounce...
All the box had learned up to now, all the traces of human life it had caught and preserved...
... bounce... you're at it, aren't you... in the stockroom... slam of a kitchen window... sometimes life is so... so random... the light bulb buzzed... on and off... on... off... on... the rapid beating of a heart... busy night, love... not bad... not bad... creak of a bedstead... I thought you were asleep... that it had meaning, that it might reveal itself... contestants screaming on the No Exit show... soft footsteps... one... two... a young girl's breath held in her mouth... three...
All the barely thought about, half forgotten words, the flow of sounds passing by in the days, the nights, passing by...
... four... crash of furniture from the floor above... I'm waiting for a parcel... I was hoping it would... keys turning in locks, doors opening... a very important person lives there... in the dark, surrounded by... like a dying star in the twilight... but Lordie, I almost broke a...
The box hit the ground. It landed on a small patch of lawn where it cracked in two, and two again, the various pieces scattering across the grass, the concrete.