At the end of Lantern Lane there was a house that everyone walked past quickly.
It had a crooked chimney, a gate that sang eee-aww whenever the wind leaned on it, and one small window at the top that glowed the colour of warm butter — even though nobody lived there at all.
"Haunted," said the baker, and floured his hands.
"Haunted," said the postman, who posted his letters from as far away as his arm could reach.
Everyone hurried. Everyone except Rena, who was five and three quarters, and her cat Pouli, who had never once in her life been afraid of the dark.
One evening the moon came up round and low, the way it does in autumn, and the gate sang eee-aww — but sadder than usual. Twice.
"That is not a scary noise," said Rena. "That is a lonely noise."
Pouli's tail went up like a question mark, which is cat for: let's go and see.
The path was covered in leaves. They went crunch.
"Crunch is only leaves," said Rena. And it was.
At the door, something tapped. Tap. Tap-tap.
"Tap is only the plum tree," said Rena, "knocking to be let in." And it was: a thin branch, bare and polite, knocking at the glass.
Inside, the stairs said creeeak, one step at a time, as if somebody were climbing just ahead of them.
"Creak is only the stairs," said Rena, "saying good evening in their old wooden voices." And it was.
And then, from the very top of the house, came a sound that was not leaves, or plum trees, or stairs.
Somebody was humming.
Pouli's ears turned round like two little dishes. Rena held the banister with both hands and climbed up, and up, and up, until she reached the small window with the butter-coloured light.
Sitting in it, knees pulled up and toes hanging over the sill, was the moon.
"Oh," said the moon. "Company."
Close up, it was not big at all. It was about the size of a sleeping cat, and it glowed the way a lamp glows behind a curtain.
"Every night I go all the way round the sky," the moon said, "and every night, at the end of it, I come here to rest. This is the quietest house on the lane." It looked at its toes. "It is also the emptiest."
"Is that why the gate cries?" asked Rena.
"The gate isn't crying," said the moon. "It's hoping."
So Rena sat down on the floorboards, and Pouli sat down on the windowsill — exactly where a cat would choose to sit — and the three of them watched the lane fall asleep, one lit window at a time.
And when Rena went home, she left the gate a little bit open.
Now, if you walk down Lantern Lane in the evening, you will still hear it singing. But listen properly.
Eee-aww, it goes, twice. And that is not a scary noise, and it is not a lonely noise either.
That is a noise that means: come in.
