Evening Threshold

I crossed back into the building as the park began to empty, following a neighbor carrying a grocery bag through the lobby doors. Slipping into our quiet hallway, I dusted the dried blades of grass from my sandals against the coarse coconut doormat before squeezing past the familiar unlatched door. In the entryway, the warm amber sconce lit up the wooden shoe rack. Sitting on the lower shelf was an open wooden clothes brush with stiff horsehair bristles pointing straight up. I reached up with both hands, hooked my fingers into the polished handle, and hoisted myself onto the level wooden rim. Stepping carefully across the dense row of bristles, they gave just enough beneath my feet to make a firm, springy mattress. Leaning back against the shoe rack's dark wooden upright, I stretched my legs out across the brush top, ready to let the full day settle.