the last book I ever read (Domenico Starnone's Trick, excerpt four)

from Trick by Domenico Starnone (Translated from the Italian by Jhumpa Lahiri):

I was sleepy, without even the slightest energy to work. I made sure I was the only possible ghost wandering through the house, that there were no thieves motivated by poverty, or murderous thugs from the camorra. I shut off the gas, I secured the dead bolt, two turns. I have to keep it shut all day tomorrow, I told myself, the knob is high up and even if he got up on a chair, Mario, a miniature homo faber, could reach it with his hands, open up, and go off to his pretend friend on the first floor. I backtracked, turning off one light after another behind me. As I finally got into bed, careful not to trip over any toys, I thought I could relax. All the ghosts were in the old house of my adolescence. That house—now as I was drifting off I realized it—formed a big frame around the one Mario and I were in. I saw then and I would draw them, soon, but from a space where I felt safe.