The dark, drafty old house was lopsided and decrepit, leaning in on itself, the way an aging possum carrying a very heavy, overcooked drumstick in his mouth might list to one side if he were also favoring a torn Achilles tendon, assuming possums have them.

I pondered this on the narrow, leaf-strewn path up to said dark and drafty old house. They were capable of walking on two legs, so they must have tendons analogous to our Achilles – yet, they had radically different bone structure, and might not need it.

There was a cast-iron, trellised gate with a complex, almost fractal pattern in its obscure weavings, as if a metalworker had been possessed of a dedication to detail bordering on the obsessive and had to release it into his work. I, however, simply pushed it open and moved on into a courtyard filled with a palette of autumnal colours, all flitting around in the slight breeze as if I had stirred some aetherial spirit with my intrusion.

That was how it felt. I was an intruder – unwelcome, unwanted.