The House That Lives in My Chest

There is a house inside me.

Not built of brick or stone, but of breath and bone, of fragile beams made from cartilage, of corridors paved with memory.

It is always shifting, always alive.

Its walls rise and fall with my lungs, its lights flicker with my pulse. Sometimes it feels palatial, with ceilings high enough to echo. Other times, it shrinks until I can barely stand upright inside myself.

This house is mine, yet I am never entirely its master.

I. The Closed Rooms

There are doors I keep bolted.

Behind them lie entire seasons of my life I rarely dare to revisit. Childhood corners where shame still lingers like mold. Bedrooms where loneliness curled up on the sheets and would not leave. Letters I wrote in secret, folded into the wallpaper.

These rooms smell of dust and silence. The windows inside them are shuttered, but I can feel the weight of the air pressing through the cracks, insisting on being remembered.

I tell myself I will return one day with a candle, sweep away the cobwebs, open a window. But the key is heavy in my hand, and my chest tightens each time I approach the lock.

And so, they remain closed.

Silent, but never gone.

II. The Open Windows

Not every part of the house is dim.

There are wings flooded with light, with curtains that breathe in and out with the wind. Here live the moments I still lean on: laughter spilling over meals, voices that rise like music, hands that steadied me when I faltered.

The windows here are always open, spilling gold into the rooms, and sometimes even the neighbors—friends, strangers, passersby—can glimpse the glow.

In these places, I am transparent. The world sees not a mask but a view: messy, yes, but radiant with everything that makes me human.

When I feel hollow, I come here, sit by the sill, and remind myself that warmth exists—even if sometimes I forget how to kindle it.

III. The Staircases

The house is threaded with staircases.

Some spiral downward into basements where the air is damp and the walls pulse with echoes. These steps creak with every mistake, every unspoken word, every memory that still burns with shame. If I descend too far, the shadows close in, and it feels as if I will never climb back out.

Other staircases ascend—narrow, bright, perilous. They lead to attics filled with fragments of dreams: notebooks of unwritten stories, half-built futures, fragments of faces I once longed for. Dust floats in shafts of light, and broken glass glitters with sharp reminders that hope, too, can cut.

Yet up there, beneath the roof, skylights open to constellations I do not yet recognize. It is the highest part of the house, and sometimes, when I dare to climb, I catch a glimpse of the life still waiting beyond the horizon of my chest.

IV. The Inherited Foundations

Every house has a foundation. Mine is no different.

Beneath the floors of my own making lie stones laid by others: parents, ancestors, strangers whose blood runs through mine. Some of the foundation is solid, holding me steady. Other parts are cracked, crooked, built from griefs and traumas that were not mine to carry, yet press upward through the floor like stubborn weeds.

I have spent years patching leaks that are not my fault, repairing walls built too thin, learning which beams were strong and which were rotting long before I entered the house.

Sometimes I am angry at these inherited fractures. Sometimes I am grateful for the resilience they forced me to build.

Either way, I cannot escape them. They are part of the house. Part of me.

V. The Visitors

People come and go through this house.

Some remain only in the entryway, wiping their feet politely, leaving behind faint scents that fade with time. Others wander boldly into parlors and kitchens, opening cabinets, studying the portraits that hang on the walls.

A few—rare, precious—find their way deeper. They stumble upon the hidden staircases, or I press a key into their palm, trembling. These are the ones who sit with me in the locked rooms, who bring candles instead of torches, who help me sweep the dust without judgment.

They don’t ask me to repaint the walls or tear down the beams. They sit with the creaks and the drafts until the house feels less haunted.

Some leave again. Others stay. But all leave marks—fingerprints on doorframes, echoes in stairwells—that linger long after they’re gone.

VI. The Garden Within

Not all of the house is enclosed.

At its heart lies a courtyard, wild and untamed, where vines crawl freely across stone and flowers bloom stubbornly through cracks. This is where I keep my resilience. Where roots reach deeper than I know, and blossoms arrive even after winters that felt endless.

Here, I plant pieces of myself I hope to grow: patience, tenderness, courage. Some seeds sprout quickly; others lie dormant for years, waiting for the right season.

When storms shake the roof and the walls tremble, it is this garden that saves me. Because no matter how fragile the beams above, the soil inside me remembers how to bloom.

VII. The Heart of the House

At the center of it all is a hearth.

Not made of wood or flame, but of blood and pulse.

It glows steadily, stubbornly, even when every room feels abandoned. Even when the roof leaks, the floors creak, the paint peels.

The hearth is the reason the house endures.

It tells me: you may be cracked, but you are not unlivable. You may be crooked, but you are still standing.

Epilogue

So if you ask me who I am, I will not hand you a name or list achievements like portraits in a hallway.

I will open the door, if I trust you, and whisper:

“Here. This is the house that lives in my chest. Its walls bear scars, its staircases creak, its rooms are uneven. But it is alive. It is mine. And if you wish—you may step inside.”