Preoccupied

The house had always been full of the ghosts of the family who had lived there before. When we first moved in, the ghosts were everywhere - abandoned toys beneath the kitchen cupboards, old tennis racquets in the garage.

Gradually, we exorcised the ghosts. Painting over them or carting them off to the tip. But, every once in a while, they would rise, wailing and rattling their chains. Stripping off the wallpaper in the kitchen revealed the records of children's heights, pencilled on the wall.