The turn in the stairs

An original narrative about an invented house move.

When the owner pointed to the wardrobe, I allowed half an hour for getting it into the van. It looked narrow against the empty bedroom wall, and there was only one staircase between us and the front door.

The first six steps encouraged me. With one person above and one below, the wardrobe slid down on its blanket as obediently as a sledge. Then we reached the turn. Its polished top struck the ceiling just as its base pressed against the banister. It stopped.

We lifted, lowered and twisted. Each time, the staircase seemed to tighten around it. We removed the doors, the shelf and the brass knobs. Every piece made the wardrobe lighter, but none made the corner wider. Soon, the landing was covered with screws and pieces of wood while the largest part remained exactly where it had jammed.

A neighbour arrived with a tape measure. There were three centimetres to spare if we held the wardrobe almost upright, but the low ceiling made that angle impossible. Our half-hour task had become a puzzle with no space for its answer.

Eventually, we carried the wardrobe back into the bedroom. Behind it, hidden beneath wooden caps, were four pegs that allowed the frame to separate into panels. The final panel passed easily around the turn. By then, the rectangle of unfaded wallpaper where the wardrobe had stood was brighter than the evening sky outside.

How does the writer show the unexpected difficulty of moving the wardrobe?