vii.
the corridor is the midpoint. it announces itself by being longer than anything before. the procession passes through it without needing your attention; you only have to keep walking, and the walking will do the rest.
this is the part of the building where your name becomes optional. you brought it in with you, neatly folded, the way a visitor brings a hat. you have not been needing it. the corridor is the place where you notice you have not been needing it. it does not ask you to leave it behind. it merely makes room for the possibility.
the carpet has been worn into a track by feet that no longer exist. you join the track without effort. the building does not require its visitors to be unique. it requires only that they pass through, and that they do so without insisting.
at the far end of the corridor there is a point of light. it is the kind of light that is not closer than when you began, and not farther. the building uses it as a heading without ever offering it as a destination. you walk toward it because it is the direction the building has provided. that is enough.
you become, for a stretch of paragraphs, only the sound of your own steps. this is not loss. this is the corridor doing what it is for. identity is a costume you can put back on at the next door, if the next door asks for it. so far no door has.
at the place where the corridor would turn, it does not turn yet. it has decided to continue a little longer, in deference to your pace. you accept the continuation without comment. you have become, briefly, the kind of person who can walk a long way without needing to arrive.