I woke up in a bed, same as every day.

I didn’t feel tired, but what else is new?

Nothing much else, as every day goes by similarly than the last, just as it has for years now.

I sat up in my old bed; it’s old cause I have yet to change the sheets and the wood creaks with the wind.

Pretty sure if I was any heavier than it would fall apart, but thankfully that’s not an issue for me.

The floorboards are just as bad, but they have the excitement of nails in them, so I believe it has become more of a game, not one of whether I step on a nail or not, because I know I won’t since I know where every one of them is. (Yes, I have been here that long, don’t judge, I like reading and watching people go by. It’s very entertaining)

Anyway, the game I like the play is ‘what dance can get me through?’, and it’s basically where I start at my bed or the door – depending on if I am coming home or getting up – and I do a different dance each time to get from one side of the room to the other, or just to go around it.

It is very fun.

Also, it’s not even actual dances sometimes and it’s just random poses and positions that get me through.

Since I am the only player in the game, it means I can do as I please, so I can either dance around like a ballerina, a ‘break-dancer’ if I so wish, or even just have fun with it like I’m a little kid again who thinks they’ve found ‘the next big dance thing’.

Either way, it’s all my choice and since the nails are all found and their locations almost ingrained in my memories like looking at the back of my hand, so it doesn’t matter what I do, it’s just what I feel like in the moment. I’ve even swapped between 2 or 3 styles at one point just to ‘spice things up’, as the children would say anyway.

And on this day, I felt like doing pirouettes, so after standing up from the edge of the bed – that I had moved to whilst explaining my ‘daily ritual’ (if one might call it that) - I placed my hands in position and stood up onto my right tiptoe whilst pointing my left one out to my side.

I usually imagine I’m dancing on a stage, as that had always been my dream since I was a little girl, but obviously, life, family, money, and everything got in the way, so I never truly got the chance too. Then I grew up and as life went on, I forgot.

However, now I have loads of time, so I try to make up for all the time I could’ve had whilst growing up back then. Kinda like when someone does something soul crushing their whole life, and once they get reminded of what they wanted when they were a child, then they get the courage to finally follow their dreams as... well they have less time left, so... you want to spend the most of it. Right?

With my ‘stage set’ and my mind imagining the audience and picturing it in my mind like I’m actually there, I kick off and beginning spinning – making sure to keep my right leg ramrod straight I remind myself as I go – and with my left foot that was stuck out, I pull it up straight in front of me similar to the ‘karate crane kicks’.

Don’t know why it’s called that, but I have no place to ask since it’s not my time anymore.

As I spin, I feel myself lose momentum, and that is when I let my right leg bend down slightly, and my left kicks out and sort of, pushes me onwards to keep me spinning and ensuring I don’t stop or overbalance myself.

I did unfortunately do that a couple times in the beginning, and it very much would’ve hurt had I actually hit the nails.

The spinning would usually make people dizzy, but setting your mind on a point helped me get over that, it’s another reason I like performing for an ‘audience’.

As I spin, I go in a sort of.... well, I’m not sure how to describe it other than a flower pattern when I go around the nails. They’re kinda dotted around like stars in the sky which is why it’s so fun to try different styles.

It kinda feels like it too as I go past each one, and wasn’t it every child's dream to reach for the stars or dance through them like you’re the only one in the universe who understands?

I know I certainly was one, but it’s a bit easier to do now than it was in my time, and by that I mean visit the stars, cause the closest i ever had was a telescope my father got me for Christmas one year.

I loved it, and made sure to watch for every shooting star, every comet, solar eclipse, all of it.

I was wonderful.

Where was I?

Oh, right!

Dancing!

So, after – in this case anyway – pirouetting through the room and over to the closet to pull out todays wear,

I had two choices in my wardrobe: plain daywear, and the yellow dress reserved only for Church. Of course, I picked the former, a plain linen tunic-dress and black leather slippers. I slipped my long brown hair into a bonnet and made my way downstairs, returning to my usual gait so that Mama didn't chastise me again for my frivolity. The stairs were not as sturdy as the floorboards: the third step groaned, the seventh sighed, and the last one let out a dreadful crack that I swear could wake the dead. (I have always found that funny, though I can’t say why.) I knew better than to stomp, so I glided down with my hand on the rail and my chin up, the way a lady ought to.

The kitchen was warm when I reached it. The hearth was lit and the pot hung over it, steaming gently, and a loaf sat on the board with the knife beside it, waiting. Mama stood at the table with her back to me, kneading dough with the quick angry shoves she used whenever she was thinking and didn’t wish to say her thoughts aloud.

“Good morning, Mama,” I said.

She didn’t turn around.

“There’s bread,” she said eventually, to the dough.

“Thank you.”

I sat at my usual place, the stool nearest the window, light coming in cold pale ribbons. I tore a piece from the loaf and held it for a while. I didn’t feel hungry, but I rarely did in the mornings, so I only turned it over in my fingers and watched the dust drift through the sunlight. It’s very soothing to watch dust. It moves so slowly, as though it has nowhere to be, and I understood that feeling better than most.

“You were dancing again,” Mama said.

My stomach did a little flip. “I wasn’t.”

“The floor was screaming. I could hear it from here.”

“It’s an old house, Mama. It creaks on its own.”

That earned me a sound that was half a sigh and half a laugh, and for a moment her shoulders softened. She pressed the heel of her hand into the dough once more, then stopped and stood very still, with her flour-dusted fingers resting on the table, as if she had forgotten what came next.

I knew that stillness too. I had seen it every morning for as long as I could remember.

“The yellow dress wants airing before Sunday,” she said quietly.

“I’ll see to it," I said, just as softly. Then, louder: “You always say that.”

She turned her head then, just slightly, enough that I caught the edge of her profile, tired and older than I remembered. Her eyes drifted toward the stool where I sat and then, as always, a little to the left of it, to the window behind me.

“Well,” she said at last, and picked the dough up again. “Mind the market. You’ll want to be back before the light turns.”

I set the bread back on the board, whole, and got up. Mama began humming as she prodded at the dough, and I stood in the doorway for a moment longer than I needed to and listened. Then I tied my bonnet beneath my chin and stepped out into the lane, because the morning was waiting, and there was a whole village of people to watch.