《A World Made of Apple Cider》


 My Dear Betsie

    "Betsie rang", the very artificial haired woman, stuck her head in through the lone rusty window in the room.


    A few heads rose to look at her. A few hands dropped their brushes and lipsticks and turned towards the window.


    "Oh, she did? She just wrote to me last week. She must miss us a lot", a raspy voice from the center of the room averted all the attention to her.


    "She did?", another one sat on the edge of her chair, "God, she didn''t write to me. What did she say? Hey, Leslie, what''d she say?"


    Leslie had already gone back to skimming through her fashion magazine. Her blonde hair were perfect today and her slender legs were sprawled on the couch before her, oh so nobly. Her bathrobe did nothing to take her charm away from her.


    "This and that. I can never make sense of that girl", she answered carelessly.


    "What''d she have to say Rache?", another girl asked the lady in the window.


    "Oh poor Betsie!", Rache, short for Rachel, started with a sigh, "She''s so bitter."


    All attention returned to Rachel, except Leslie''s.


    "Why, what''d she say?"


    "God, she was just about at the end of her rope. Hey Les, you don''t think she''ll come back here, do you?", Rachel kept the mystery going.


    Leslie had started working on a cigarette by the time the girlsturned back to her.


    "Oh, dear Rae, I wish you''d stop worrying your pretty little head over little Betsie. She''ll be just fine, I assure you. And by all means, rest assured she won''t come back here", Leslie didn''t raise her head from the magazine.


    "You think?"


    "Yes, dear Rae. I believe so", Leslie answered.


    "What''d she say anyway?", one of the girls intruded.


    "This and that, for god''s sake. Leave the kid alone. She''s just fussing about going to a big city. What''s new? She''ll fit right in, just give her time", Leslie was beginning to get annoyed but her answer closed the case for the time being.


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    The girls went back to powdering their noses. For the next half hour, there was nothing but rouge passing from one dressing table to the other and a parade of colors finding their way to the spotless faces of the young girls. All through that, Leslie sat with the magazine and her unlimited supply of Marlboros, as if all of it had nothing to do with her.


    When the hubbub was over, it was just Leslie and the remains of makeup in a brightly lit room with the pinkest furniture in the world. Her smoke didn''t go well with the theme of the room but she couldn''t care less. She tossed the magazine on the wooden coffee table and let her head fall back.


    "For goodness sake, dear Rae, could you not lurk around?"


    Rachel appeared in the rusty window again.


    "What did Betsie write to you, Les?"


    "Oh God, it''s Betsie again. Could you leave the child alone? And don''t scare the other girls, for goodness sake, Rae."


    "Just tell me what she wrote, Les", Rachel knew her habit of discretion all too well.


    With Leslie, everything was a secret, highly classified information that needed to be kept under as many wraps as would constitute an onion.


    "You know Betsie, she''s always been a little in over her head", Leslie sighed.


    "She didn''t sound alright, Les. Poor kid''s really havin'' it rough out there", Rachel leaned back at the window sill.


    "Let me read it to you, Rae", Leslie suddenly got out of her comfortable seat and went over to a table that was separate from all others.


    She produced the letter that still looked fresh.


    Rachel waited until Leslie had found her way back to the comfort of her seat again. It took a while before Leslie could find a snug spot in the cushions for her legs.


    She then sat back and lighted a new cigarette, before unfolding the letter.


    "Girls at the college sleep with at least six mena week and that''s more than anyone does in the House. I wonder why they still call us the ''bad women''. It makes no sense to me, I wish I could drown myself."


    Leslie read the one part of the letter that seemed to have carried the most weight to her.


    Rachel turned around and looked at Leslie, concerned.


    "Is that girl going to come back or what?"


    "Oh, dear Rae, I''m telling you she won''t. She''s just now seeing the reality of things, but the kid''s got a smart head. She won''t come back to this slum, trust me."


    "That''s what scares me, Les", Rachel was visibly worried, "That she really won''t come back here."


    "You know how smart she is. You do know, dear Rae, don''t you? If that kid can''t handle the world, she isn''t woman enough. Leave her be. As for me, I don''t intend to answer her", Leslie tossed the letter to the same place she''d tossed the magazine.


    "You don''t have to be so insensitive, Les", Rachel said, before disappearing from the window.


    Her heart was a little at rest at least.


    Leslie looked at the window and stared at it for a good 30 minutes. After having confirmed that Rachel really had gone, she picked up the letter and folded it neatly before securing it in the top drawer of her dressing table.


    That night she wrote on a flimsy paper a small passage. And the top of it read: "My dear Betsie".

 Mori

    "So, I should say to her that I know she thinks I''m a bad woman. But if I say it, she''ll obviously deny it, won''t she? She will. She''ll say she doesn''t think so at all when she really does. And so if I say it-- Say, I do, then I''ll be a bad woman with all the bad thoughts in my head. So either way, if I say it or not, I''m a bad woman. And she gets away without saying it and really snaring me into saying it. And you see how she gets away? She gets away by being a good woman that way. And now she has all the reason to avoid me. She already does but now she has a reason. Do you see where it''s going? That''s why I won''t say anything. It''s all already understood, really. It''s very clear, believe me", she ranted on and on while Macey opened the window to let the smoke out.


    "I think you''re exaggerating, Betsie. You''re overthinking it all. You sound crazed up when you do it", Macey replied, opening a can of beans with all the effort it takes to open a can of beans.


    "I''m not. I really am not. You''ve got to see it", Betsie was on edge, working her way through her fiftieth cigarette of the day.


    "Look now, Betsie, I do see it. I do see how she avoids you. But that''s because she''s on this righteous high horse of hers. And that''s where she stays while looking down on all of us. It''s not about you. It''s not that personal", Macey couldn''t get the can to open.


    She moved to a counter and started looking for a screw driver.


    "Have you seen her attitude? Have you seen how she talks to me? It''s different from how she talks to all the other girls. She clearly has it in her head against me", Betsie pushed the stray strands of her chocolate hair behind her ear.


    The open window was now rattling. It was quite a windy day. And the high rise apartment seemed to be catching such nice sun and wind.


    "Look, Betsie, you''re letting her get to your head too much. What''s she matter anyway? Just forget about her", Macey couldn''t find the screw driver anywhere.


    "Now that''s just sweeping it all under a carpet. And I hate carpets, Macey. I can''t stand her look. The way she rolls her eyes and all that. God! That damned bitch!"


    "Language, Betsie", Macey said, struggling with the can like her life depended on it.


    Betsie let out a puff of smoke. She couldn''t stand how upright Macey could be.


    "I''m telling you, Macey, one of these days, I''m really going to do her in. And I won''t have a regret about it whatsoever", Betsie put out the last of her cigarette on the ashtray.


    "Oh my god, this can", Macey couldn''t see why the can was so impossible to open.


    "Oh, for gods sake, pull the pin!", Betsie yelled, getting up and walking over to Macey, "You''re holding it upside down, you dumb woman. Pull the goddamned pin, for gods sake!"


    Having discovered her ignorance, Macey was all eyes. She couldn''t have imagined this profound turn of events.


    "Did you know what she did last week? At dinner? At Homer''s patio", Betsie swung the screw driver around, checking if it was a worthy murder weapon.


    "At dinner? Oh goodness, I was so drunk!", Macey barely avoided the screw driver.


    She ducked her way out of Betsie''s lethal swings and went over to the coffee table with her open can of beans and a spoon. She''d almost lost her appetite.


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    "You were, weren''t you? Well, she started on about women being this way and that. Tan skin, fair face, long hair, ideal, pure women. And I just sat their gaping at her dumb face. She''s so damn proud of herself. She was clearly just shitting on all of us."


    "She says that once in a while. I think she does", Macey''s attention was now dedicated to her rambling.


    "Well, I wish she wouldn''t. One of these days, I''m telling you, Macey. One of these days, I really am going to do her in", Betsie was pissed and the furniture was now in danger from her screw driver.


    "You shouldn''t let her get under your skin. Just never hear her when she opens her mouth", Macey busied herself with the beans.


    "You know, Macey, it''s not that I have to hear her or see her looking at me. I don''t know. That''s not what brings out the worst in me. It''s that I''m on her point. She puts me on a pedestal when really, all everyone is thinking is the same as what I''m saying. No really, you and Homer, and everyone else in that room had the same bull to say",


    Betsie was getting riled up again.


    "I don''t know about that Betsie. I was very drunk, I''m telling you. I don''t really know what I was thinking", Macey answered, relishing the beans as if they''d descended from heaven.


    "That''s the problem with you lot. You''re always so damn drunk to think anything", Betsie put down the screw driver and began searching for the smoke.


    All this rambling was beginning to get to her.


    "Well, tell you what, Betsie, maybe you should try drinking a little when everyone else is drunk. God, that reminds me. Did you see Homer''s wine cellar. God, he''s like a rich person, isn''t he?", Macey reflected, still mostly occupied by the beans.


    "That''s because he is", Betsie answered shortly.


    She finally found a pack of cigarette. It was crumpled beyond recovery. And she discovered one cigarette in it. She found it depressing but lit it anyway.


    "You know, I got a letter from back home. Leslie wrote. And she never writes", Betsie began to wonder where she''d put the letter.


    She''d quite obviously lost it.


    "And Rachel called me up just the other day wondering if I was gonna be visiting anytime soon. I said I will. I mean what else could I say? I said I will", Betsie was half lost in thought.


    "Wonderful, isn''t it?", Macey had no clue who Leslie or Rachel were.


    "It is. It certainly is", Betsie took a deep drag of the cigarette, "You know what the problem is, Macey? It''s that I''m the only one freaking out when there''s quite clearly a problem. You and Homer and that damned bitch and everyone else loves to live in their perfect little fishbowl. God, you''re all so dumb, I could almost puke."


    Betsie''s tone changed so suddenly Macey was lost for words. She kept eating her beans ever so slowly.


    "And if someone points out to you how terribly dumb you are, you know what you call that person? You know, Macey? A bad woman!", Betsie began laughing, throwing her head back and all.


    She didn''t let the cigarette go out.


    Macey lifted her head to catch a peek of Betsie''s situation. She thought Betsie was beyond saving. It''s hard to like people like Betsie.


    "You''re so goddamned dumb that you haven''t got half an inch of a brain in there. You all think you''re so hip. Oh good Lord! If only you were that hip! You''re just idiots. Idiots doing normal stupid things. And you know why you''re never going to grow out of it? Because that''s perfection. In this stupid world where people as shallow as you, Macey, and that dumb blonde bitch, and Homer, exist. In this world of stupid wine cellars and drunk idiots who can''t think, you know what I think, Macey? In this world, normal is perfection. That''s why you''ll never grow out of it. You''re just that damn normal."


    "Goodness, Betsie, did you know that was my last can of beans?", Macey stood up having wiped the can clean.


    "Oh, you don''t say?", Betsie walked over to check, quickly changing gears.


    "Oh, hell! I haven''t even got food for tonight. Say, Betsie, why don''t we go out? To eat, tonight. I''m so out of food. Do you think that''s silly? I think that''s silly", Macey began rummaging through the cupboards of the open kitchen.


    "Oh, I sure do. I think it''s silly. Beyond silly, really. It''s quite a huge joke, all of it", Betsie answered, her cigarette was on it''s last legs.


    "Right?! Who runs out of beans? I should call someone, don''t you think?", Macey was fitting herself into every cabinet to get a thorough look at the pantry.


    "Oh? Who''ll you call?", Betsie asked carelessly, putting the cigarette out on the window sill, feeling the wind.


    "Homer, maybe. D''you think he''ll mind? I don''t want to call him for beans, for goodness sake. D''you think he''ll mind, Betsie?", but Macey didn''t get an answer.


    She lifted her head out of the cabinets and searched through the room.


    It was all at rest, except the window that stood ajar and the butt of a cigarette left on the sill as a memento mori.

 All the Roads Untraveled

    "Do you believe in zombies, Willie?", Penny stood on the tip of her toes like a ballerina, except, in her current pose, she was too close for comfort for him.


    "I''d like to put my faith in vampires, instead", Willie answered, manner of factly, as if only one of the two could be believed in at one time.


    Penny heard his answer and breathed in an audible gush of air. The two stood side by side, at the foot of the bed in the master bedroom. Even as a kid, Penny always thought the bed was too huge for even two, let alone one person. Why her mother insisted on not getting rid of it, she couldn''t understand.


    "Mr. Lynch?", a voice broke in through the wooden door behind them. The room was dimly lit, solely by the distant rays of sun on a cloudy day.


    It was exquisitely furnished. And though it was dusty and looked like everything had just been thrown together, no one could deny the intrinsic value every article in that room carried, even at first glance.


    The least valued item, perhaps, was what lay in the left side of the huge bed. Hidden among the layers and the black hangings, the figure was almost indiscernible.


    "Mr. Lynch?", the soft, feminine voice called again.


    "Yes", Willie answered finally.


    He turned around to find a small-faced woman calling him outside. Penny hated the idea of being alone in that haunting room with the lifeless figure but she didn''t show it. It was perhaps the first time in her life, that she''d been afraid of her mother.


    It was fitting for her to have died in secret, Penny thought, like all the secrets she wore every day before leaving that riddled room.


    Locked doors, dark curtains barring every window, coverings for every single piece of furniture, no matter how big or small, piles upon piles of books in every room, ash trays filled with the remains of unopened letters, little chests in her drawers, keys, keys, and keys...


    That was all that constituted her mother.


    Willie entered the room again and closed the door behind him, joining Penny where she was standing.


    "It wouldn''t surprise me if Judith began walking again", he said after a grim pause.


    "That''d be like her, indeed. You''re right. Judy would be a vampire", Penny answered, resting her heels on the ground and standing straight now.


    "Ms. Lynch", the small-face woman called for her this time.


    "What does she want anyway?", Penny asked Willie.


    "Our names."


    "Well, couldn''t you give mine?", Penny didn''t want to leave that room anymore.


    "I couldn''t remember it for the life of me. Just go, Penny, for god''s sake. And close the door", Willie answered.


    Penny spared a look at her mother''s face, hidden behind the hangings, covered by a linen sheet.


    She trotted outside and closed the door behind her with a low bang.


    The small-faced woman walked towards her. Dressed in all black, she looked like she might be the one whose mother had died.


    "Ms. Lynch. I realize how hard it must be for you. I am really sorry for your loss. But we must all do our best for the sake of the one that''s gone", the woman spoke in a soft voice.


    "Oh, no. You don''t have to do your best for Judy. She wouldn''t care", Penny answered, finding the woman a tad bit annoying.


    Confused, the woman went on.


    "Could I get your name? Your Christian name, please."


    "Penelope Mary Lynch", Penny answered and the woman began scribbling in her little notebook with a black leather cover.


    "Actually, scratch that. It''s not Penelope Mary Lynch. It''s Penelope M. Lynch, but I don''t know what the M. stands for. I just fancy it''s Mary. But Judy never did tell me", Penny interrupted.


    ''William Albert Lynch'', she managed to peek on the notebook and noticed the letters scratched and replaced with ''William A. Lynch''. The siblings were much more alike than they liked to admit.


    The woman, looked at her face, suspiciously. Perhaps she thought the siblings had a scheme against her. Regardless she scratched the ''ary'' of Mary and hurriedly went back to her companions on the other side of the hall who were waiting with their saxophones and all sorts of huge musical equipment.


    The house was too huge, Penny thought, they would need a whole orchestra to make an effect for this funeral.


    As Penny stood there wondering if she could go back in, the woman walked back to her with a brand new fountain pen.


    "Pardon me, could I get the deceased''s name?", the woman said in a low, sorrowful voice.


    "Judith Lynch. And something in the middle."


    "Oh, your brother said, it might have been a G", the woman said.


    "Well, don''t you trust him then?", Penny was on her case.


    The woman was baffled, almost scared, "Well, I...I thought I might confirm. I realize you wouldn''t want to have the wrong name on the-"


    "Oh, you wanna know something better?", Penny cut her half way, "We''re not Christian at all. I mean, I''m sure we were at some point. I mean Judy might have been. But us, me and Willie? God lost us along the way. I''m not Christian for sure. And Willie likes to say he is, for Judy''s sake, but I tell you he''s not. Yes, he most certainly isn''t."


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    Penny must have been loud enough for Willie to have heard her inside the room. He sighed. But he didn''t want to leave the dead out of his sight, perhaps, in hopes that she might come back to life and he might miss the miracle. Deep down, Willie was convinced that Judy''s faith wasn''t bringing her back or anyone else, for that matter. Penny might have been right. None of the three were Christians.


    The woman''s face grew even smaller, she looked at Penny''s face, perplexed. Penny was quite a towering girl for the small-statured woman. She felt like a rabbit, talking to a wolf.


    "Uh, pardon me, Ms. Lynch. I''ll be right back", the woman slipped back to her companions who were dressed in their Christian robes.


    Penny thought, they could start a band with everything they seemed to be carrying.


    She was a lover of music and knew in her heart that should the band in their church robes decide to run away with their tails between their legs, she wouldn''t have second thoughts about playing every single one of their instruments. With some, she might even be good.


    The thought of Willie waiting for her hit her almost too suddenly and she bolted back inside to recover her previous position at his side.


    "You didn''t have to go that far", Willie could have been smirking.


    "I could say the same thing", Penny had forgotten all about the small-faced woman.


    Willie knew that immediately.


    "Why''d you leave, Willie?", Penny asked after a long pause.


    Although, it didn''t look it, the two hadn''t seen each other in 7 years. No amount of age or time had made it hard for them to recognize each other the moment they laid eyes on each other. Not even Penny''s bubblegum dyed hair got in the way. Then again, the Lynches never relied solely on their eyes to see things.


    "I was sick of the world", Willie answered, honestly but briefly.


    "Did you ever find a cure?", Penny asked.


    "Not yet."


    Not yet, thought Penny, so then he was still holding on to a hope. That wasn''t like Willie. So then, he must have been lying.


    The Lynches never had to doubt that the other might change over time. Change was a thing alien to them.


    "Where''ve you been?", asked Willie after a pause.


    "Following you. But I never caught up. So I figured you didn''t want to be found. And then I settled in a remote village in Pennsylvania. With the Amish."


    The air didn''t stir anything. There was no sound. That''s just how everyone who had lived in that house, breathed.


    "Maybe we shouldn''t have left", Penny almost took the words out of his mouth, her eyes glued to the bed.


    "We chose the world over Judith."


    "Even though we were sick of it."


    And both wondered why the Lynches had to be like that. In the end, all they managed to do was justify the resentment of the world against their little family of three.


    "I reckon it''s something Russian. Not Mary at all. Marfa, perhaps. Or something of the sort", Willie said after a dreadful silence.


    The middle name suddenly sounded like the right thing to talk about.


    "Russian? Why would it be?", Penny asked.


    "Poor Judith never did get to name us, Penny", Willie broke to her.


    "She didn''t get to? Why, she had all the time in the world, didn''t she?", Penny''s voice was a tad higher than Willie''s but not quiet noticeable.


    "That''s all, Penny. She didn''t get what she didn''t get. That''s just it, isn''t it?", Willie knew his mother better than to opt for a logical road.


    "I suppose", Penny agreed, seeing that Willie was so bent on it. He was never wrong.


    The father they''d never met or seen had been a Russian that decided what they''d be named before he disappeared. Had he disappeared just a little earlier, the two might have had much freer English names.


    "Judy must have wanted to name us", Penny said after a break.


    "Some very orthodox English names then. You might have had a better name, Penny", Willie said.


    How Judith settled for such American names, neither knew.


    "Maybe we should talk about Judy instead", Penny said after a long pause.


    "We are talking about her, aren''t we?"


    "Oh, are we?"


    "Aren''t we?"


    "Alright, then."


    Silence ensued. Both perhaps thought of the one and only pink lemonade their mother made for them that one hot summer. Judith was a terrible cook. Her taste buds had gone bad when she was very young and she lost all taste, so despite having cooked all her life, being self-learnt, and unafraid to try new things, she was about as bland a cook as they come. The pink lemonade that she only made once in her life for her children one hot, lonely summer was the only tasty food she ever whipped up, if it could even be called food.


    She decided that day that there was nothing special about a lemonade being pink if it was as tasteless as water and never made it again. It was also the first time in their lives that the kids knew the happiness that comes with delicious food and drinks.


    It was a long time ago. Back when summer used to visit the Lynch mansion. It had been fall for a long time now.


    Lynch was Judith''s maiden name. Any hint of their father, if such a person did indeed exist, had been removed from their lives.


    "What''d you find out there, Willie?", Penny asked, soon forgetting what she''d proposed some moments ago.


    "Nothing."


    Penny knew he was lying.


    He just hates admitting that he''s disappointed, she thought.


    And indeed, Willie was a walking talking contradiction. He said everything that would swerve from the Lynch way but his actions always spoke otherwise.


    Penny didn''t need to say that she found nothing either. She''d followed his footsteps, after all. Both stood before their lifeless mother with the same feeling of disappointment in their heart. The world they chose over her was terribly bleak.


    They stood just like they used to, when they were getting yelled at. But Penny, always being restless, would start fidgeting before long and grab Willie''s sleeve who''d stay standing like he was made of stone. And as soon as their mother was finished, Willie would turn and walk out of the door without making a sound or lifting his head. Penny would soon follow.


    "Where are we going to bury her?", Penny asked, beginning to get restless.


    Willie stayed silent for a moment.


    "How about here?"


    "Here?", Penny looked at his face that hadn''t changed at all.


    The Lynches were known for their mysterious, scary looks but Willie took the cake. What with his thin, towering posture and a perfectly balanced face that was almost too handsome but too scary at the same time-- Penny was the only one that had never been intimidated by him.


    "Yes. I''ve been thinking, it would be what Judith wanted. After all, where else is there to go", he said, with unshifting emotions.


    Penny agreed.


    "Then let''s bury her with Old Barb", Penny proposed.


    "It might rain there, Penny", Willie replied.


    Old Barb was the willow where they played as kids. Their once best friend and the venue where they''d drank the pink lemonade. Also the place where Judith buried all her ravens.


    "But it rains everywhere", Penny calmed down and shifted her eyes back to the bed.


    "Perhaps."


    There was a tap on the door.


    Willie went outside and Penny kept thinking of a better place to bury her mother. Old Barb sounded like the best place. As a child, she used to think that when she died, that''s where Judith would bury her too, right alongside her ravens.


    People feared the Lynches but the birds didn''t. When the birds got old or were at the verge of dying, they''d fly to her mother. Ravens were a favorite. And it was always sad to see them go. Willie and Penny always waited on their mother as she dug a grave. Penny cried. Willie clutched her hand. Always.


    There was a thud outside. The little faced woman might have passed out, Penny thought. Willie was often mistaken for a vampire.


    Many people thought their mother was a witch. Penny and Willie were little monsters no school wanted to take in. They were taught by the seemingly infinite library in the estate. The one thing that library couldn''t teach them was what face to make when meeting people.


    Soon Willie walked in and stood back in his place.


    "What was that about, Willie?"


    "I''ve sent them away."


    "Well, who''s going to bury her now?"


    "I know where to bury her, Penny", Willie answered.


    "Some place it won''t rain?"


    "Some place it won''t rain. We''ll hold a funeral", Willie replied.


    "Do you know how to hold a funeral, Willie?", Penny asked.


    "Of course", he answered, before reaching out to a vase on a dresser.


    He took out the lone dried Helenium* and went over to the bedside. He lifted the curtain as Penny watched him intently. His face shifted as he got a closer look at the lifeless, weakened composition buried under the layers. But he held back and placed the flowers on the chest of her mother.


    He then walked back towards Penny.


    "We don''t need to call out to a god, do we Penny? We aren''t Catholics."


    "Well, Judy might have been."


    "No, she wasn''t", Willie answered, confidently but in a low voice.


    "Would it save her?"


    "No, Penny. God has never played his role for a Lynch. We''re the ones that save our soul. Judith doesn''t need his saving."


    Willie sounded rebellious and angry but Penny knew that he wasn''t lying anymore.


    "So, what next, Willie? Where will we bury her?", she asked.


    "Right here. Inside. Where it won''t rain", Willie answered.


    "In here?!", Penny looked at her brother, puzzled.


    "Yes, Penny. She''s right where she needs to be. Right where she felt safe, with all her secrets, and coverings. And we''ll lock the door too. She''ll always just be asleep here. And when we''re done with the world, we can come back and keep her company. You in the tree house, me in the library."


    Penny stared at him for a while, her shock had dissipated. Willie had chosen their resting places and there was no arguing over it. She wouldn''t go against anything he said anyway. After all, Willie always knew better.


    "Well, do you know how to hold a funeral, Willie?", she asked again after a long pause.


    "Of course", Willie returned her gaze and almost smiled coyly, looking her straight in the eye.


    Penny looked at him, taken aback, before he took her hand and clutched it.


    He turned back towards the bed and so did Penny. And what she beheld wasn''t the dimly lit room with her mother''s dead body lost somewhere in the gloomy layers of the bed but Old Barb.


    She stared with her eyes wide open as her mother dug a grave under the shade of Old Barb where all the other little graves were. And she watched her back, just as she used to do back when she was a child, with Willie clutching her hand.


    She''d become a child once more. As the wind passed between them and the grey sky hung low, all the while Judith''s voice rose over it to get to the kids. Her singing voice.


    And Penny remembered that it was her mother''s singing that always made her cry. And it wasn''t that she was a great singer but it''s because Penny understood what she said that made her cry.


    "~Weep not for roads untraveled


    Weep not for paths left alone


    ''Cause beyond every bend is a long blinding end


    It''s the worst kind of pain I''ve known


    Give up your heart, left broken


    And let that mistake pass on


    ''Cause the love that you lost wasn''t worth what it cost


    And in time, you''ll be glad it''s gone


    Weep not for roads untraveled


    Weep not for sights unseen


    May your love never end, and if you need a friend


    There''s a seat here alongside me~"


    Willie clutched her hand, tighter than ever. Penny was crying.

 The Butterfly Effect I

    "Regardless of what we do, where we go, in the end, we all must return to the same place. It is not a matter of choice. We live such long, excruciating lives, only to realize we''ve always just been looking for home. And hence, we must return. We trace our footsteps back to where we started. But by the time we reach there, we realize that we''re standing on the brink of the end."


    "What a sad story",  she answered in her head to the story some corner of her own mind had played out before her like it was a TV show.


    Once again, she was heading to the high-rise apartment. A few bones were out of place, her head was half open, and she was flailing about like a ragdoll. Indeed, the world was just a swirl, pulling everything into the sinkhole.


    The red sky above and the distant sounds of children saying goodbye to their friends in the playground made her realize that she was close now.


    The red brick high-rise building with overgrown plants here and there soon came into view.


    "A bubble."


    She floated deliriously to the building and to her apartment on the 17th floor. She flung the door open and looked around in the cramped apartment. The sun was still bright enough to light up the room.


    A man sitting in front of the window, with a laptop on a shoddy wooden table, binoculars, and all sorts of electronic equipment, turned his head around in her welcome. With his cigarette pursed between his lips, he barely spared her much attention.


    She quickly swung herself into the adjacent bathroom. She leaned on the sink.


    "God."


    She muttered unfeelingly before collapsing on the ground.


    She gasped for some breath and then lifted herself up again, holding onto the blue porcelain sink.


    She coughed blood, fell on her knees, barely kept her head up, and after a noisy session of 30 minutes, appeared outside the bathroom.


    The man, who was wearing headphones, lifted his gaze from the laptop again and spared her a quick glance before she picked up her shoes that she''d washed in the bathroom and disappeared out the front door.


    The man immediately got up and went to the bathroom.


    Blue was now red. The shower, curtains, walls, the mirror, the toilet, the pool of blood in the sink...He turned straight back instead of going about his business and looked at the front door she''d left through.


    Would he follow her?


    Nope. Yulia would be back eventually. More importantly, he was late.


    He looked back at the laptop screen that was still on. He went over to the window and picked up the binoculars from the table. He looked straight ahead.


    A woman on the high rise right across the complex was hanging her laundry. Quite likely, her undergarments at this hour. Her balcony was full of flower pots, none of which were flowering at the moment.


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    He watched her hang her laundry. And when she was done, she slipped behind the curtain and went inside.


    The man opened up the Chinese wardrobe at the back and took out a suit. He had to get dressed. The bloody bathroom wasn''t an option. He could just change in the room. Yulia wasn''t going to be back.


    Fitted into the bluish black business suit, he began putting his hair back. His pale blue Russian eyes did his well-defined Chinese features much too good. He could look almost too desirable when he wanted to. And that''s exactly what he needed right now. But time was ticking away.


    He spared a last glance at the watch on his wrist and hurried out the front door.


    **************************


    Yulia''s flaxen hair no longer glistened white. The sun had gone down. She danced her way across the road and under the bridge, all the way to the wharf, where some idiot was pumping opium into his bloodstream.


    She danced under a street lamp while he cooked it up and filled the injection. He checked the syringe once or twice, and when everything was ready, he rolled up his sleeves. He put the needle on his arm, and SHAKK!!!


    The syringe fell from his hand. His eyes popped wide in surprise. Something was sticking in his back. But he couldn''t move his head.


    A cold feeling ran through him almost too suddenly. He was light-headed and numb as a warm pool of blood formed at his feet.


    A grinning face appeared on his side, and he barely moved his head to catch a glimpse of it. He thought it was some yellow-haired demon.


    In her half-crazed passion, she twisted the knife in his back, and the junkie felt the life leaving him. He dropped headfirst into the pool of his blood.


    Yulia stabbed him 29 times, all the while hollering in a fit of excitement and delirium. She would have gone on stabbing him and raising fountains of his blood, had she not, in her crazed state, seen that figure she always, always caught at the end of the day.


    Such a distant figure, reflected like the glare of traffic lights in the still water of the wharf. She was frozen in her place. Her mouth curled in a smile. Her eyes filled with a sad longing. Sleepiness overcame her.


    That man, in the halo of some strange yet very familiar light, whose face she couldn''t see, was the last link to her old life. Someone she held dear¡ªsomeone who was still hanging around.


    ******************


    Niko stood leaning against the desk, awaiting something, a cigarette pursed between his lips, fixing his bluish black suit for the hundredth time. The office building was mostly evacuated. They were having a party in the hall. No one would come inside. He took another chance at the cigarette and then put it out on the desk.


    The room was lit up only by the light of the moon, furnishing that room with its silvery rays.


    He heard the door open and the sound of footsteps in the dark. He stood poker-faced, unmoving.


    The approaching footsteps revealed a dark man with clear, void-like dark eyes and a moon reflected in his clear skin.


    Niko pretended that he had neither been waiting nor expecting him. He stood frozen in his place.


    The man slowly walked over to him, stopping short and bowing his head.


    "You aren''t supposed to be here, Zhang", Niko said, walking over to him.


    The visitor looked down. Perhaps he wasn''t so happy being there. Niko grabbed his wrist and pulled him in, all with an unassuming face. Regardless of whatever that moonlit night brought on, none of it mattered to him.


    Zhang didn''t make any effort to free himself from his embrace. Niko''s eyes were as lifeless as ever, as if this was just a formality, a chore he had to get through.


    On the contrary, with a flicker in his deep black eyes, a devilish smile played out on Zhang''s face, in the midst of all that pleasure.


    **********************


    Yulia crashed through the door like usual. It was dark inside that tiny, one-room apartment. She leaned against a wall to hold herself up and then went over to the table. The lights were out in the apartment straight ahead, across the complex. It was past midnight, so that was obvious.


    Niko was clearly not coming home tonight. Seeing the opportunity, Yulia flung her wet boots off. She''d had to dump a body in the river, and the water splashed onto her.


    She dropped into the single bed in the corner of the room. The crumpled sheets smelled like tobacco. And they stuck to her half-wet clothes. It was hot, but she slept, dreaming of some past life.


    ********************


    Sweat had swathed his hair by the time he walked all the way back to the apartment. He wanted to wash his hands very badly.


    He opened the door, which had never once been locked in their entire time in that apartment. The keys were lost by now. He stepped inside quietly and went over to the window, picking up the binoculars.


    The curtains were drawn, and the lights were out. Very natural course of action for 3 in the morning. He looked through the binoculars, trying to see the opposite balcony in the dark. Not much good could be drawn from it; he soon put them down.


    He turned his head towards the corner where the sound of light breathing was coming from. Yulia was asleep in the lone bed. He wasn''t supposed to come home for the night. But he''d had a sudden urge to run away from Zhang, whose smell was still clinging onto his handsome suit.


    Now he couldn''t wait to get out of those clothes, but Yulia had likely not cleaned the bathroom. He went over to the Chinese wardrobe and opened it with a creak. He didn''t care about keeping it down, though he had no intention of waking her.


    He quickly removed his clothes and flung them to the side carelessly. Taking out an old shirt, he dressed for the night and lit a cigarette. The moon was all the way to the right now. Sadly, the apartment complex wouldn''t let him see it going down.


    After a swig or two, he put down the cigarette on the window sill and sprawled on the lone divan at the other end of the room, beside the Chinese wardrobe. His eyes were heavy, and the tickle of Zhang''s hair still lingered on his neck.

 The Butterfly Effect II

    "Well, where do we go from here, Niko?"


    She turned around under the light of the sole flickering streetlamp on the long dark road.


    "What are you asking me now? I was following you, you know?"


    Yulia grinned ear to ear, biting her lip, her eyes half-closed, as if in a state of delirium. She was too innocent when she wasn''t lost in a world of her own.


    Niko woke up. Yulia''s grinning face floated before his eyes for a brief moment but then he forgot what he was dreaming about. He stayed put in his place for a long time, thinking back on last night.


    Perhaps he won''t see Zhang anymore. That''s what he always thought, but he always went to him again and Zhang always came to him. There was no two ways about it.


    He looked up. The light was already beaming into the room passionately. Niko looked for a cigarette but none were to be found. He spared a glance at the only corner of the room that wasn''t directly exposed to light. Yulia was still asleep in the bed, exactly in the same position.


    Niko got up and walked over to the desk. He grabbed the binoculars and looked across the complex. The curtains were still closed.


    Why?


    He looked at the table, where a table calendar was resting among a lot of other things. So it was Sunday.


    Niko found a cigarette on the table as well and lit it up, placing it between his lips. He set down the binoculars and began undoing the only three buttons of his shirt. He''d hop into the shower, he thought.


    Opening the door of the bathroom, he found the bloody mess from yesterday. He sighed, but continued to tip toe his way into the shower. He made it as quick as possible.


    "Get up, Yulia", he nudged her as soon as he got out, drying his hair with a towel.


    Yulia didn''t move. He picked up the binoculars again and scouted the woman. The curtains weren''t drawn anymore. So she was awake. Niko hurriedly moved to the laptop and began setting things up at the table.


    "Yulia", he noticed she hadn''t moved.


    He went over to her and shook her with his foot.


    "Get up", he repeated, before heading back to the Chinese wardrobe.


    Yulia sat up, her hair were a mess.


    "How many''d you get, yesterday?", Yulia asked.


    This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it


    "Just the one", Niko answered, "You?"


    "Just one, too."


    That was a rare answer for her. Both perhaps thought the other was up to the same thing as them. Then again, it wasn''t so different what they were both doing.


    Yulia got up from the bed. Her loose clothes seemed even more crumpled as if she wasn''t made for them.


    Niko observed the other side of the complex while a loading screen floated on his laptop.


    Yulia walked to the middle of the room and sat down with her legs crossed, staring out the window at the apartment across the complex.


    Niko took out a new suit from the wardrobe, still holding on to the binoculars. He briefly examined if the suit was good enough for the night, then looked himself up in the small shard of mirror on the table and decided the suit was indeed good enough. He carefully placed it back in the wardrobe.


    Yulia hadn''t moved an inch. She was staring at the opposite apartment like a statue. Niko thought it odd that she hadn''t set out on her daily errands already.


    Seeing as she was pretty messed up from her recent scuffle that he knew nothing about, he went to the main door, fetching a bag that had been placed there this morning. He took out a cup of noodles and two mooncakes from it.


    Placing the food in front of her, he rummaged for the bottle of green tea somewhere on the table. It took a while before he found it. It was half empty. But he placed that before her too and uncapped it. Then he set down in the chair and began typing away at the laptop, occasionally picking up the binoculars to make his observations.


    The woman in the opposite apartment was watering her plants. They would bloom in a week. She then cleaned her windows and aired her bedding. Yulia and Niko could recite her routine of the week by heart.


    Since Yulia was watching, Niko could focus on the laptop screen.


    An unusual interruption. His phone rang.


    He looked at the little screen.


    Zhang.


    Niko took a deep breath and gathered his cold composure. Perhaps he regretted running away last night.


    He picked it up.


    The other side spoke without formality. Niko didn''t utter a word. It took 13 seconds. And the call was over.


    Niko shot up, taking out his suit from the wardrobe. He looked at Yulia who was intently watching the apartment. So then, there was nothing to worry about.


    He hurried into the bathroom but quickly turned around. The room would have to do, the bloody bathroom was no place for his fancy clothes. He quickly got dressed behind Yulia''s back and began setting his hair. It took him a while before he''d ensured he was missing nothing.


    He rummaged for a cigarette in that messy room and managed to find two. Luck was shining upon him that day.


    He looked at his watch, then at Yulia, then at the other apartment with the binoculars and when he''d made sure all affairs were in order, he headed out.


    **********************


    The sun was suddenly masked by the grey clouds. That''s not what he expected, when he left the apartment that morning.


    Niko put out the cigarette on the arm of the bench. It had been an exhausting day. Zhang always sucked all his energy away like a vampire.


    The bus stop was luckily completely vacated. It was about to rain. It was sad that he couldn''t see the sun this afternoon.


    He didn''t like the bitter taste of smoke in his mouth. He always felt this way when all was said and done. He''d run away from Zhang the first chance he got, but jump at the next invitation anyway. As such, they''d never gone all the way.


    Niko took out another cigarette without thinking about it. His clothes were unbuttoned and rumpled, his hair a mess, and exhaustion masked his face.


    He let out a puff of smoke that rested on his face instead of floating away. He wasn''t waiting for the bus. He rested his head on the back of the bench and closed his eyes for a brief moment.


    "Let''s wait for something beautiful to happen."


    Yulia''s old words came to him and in an instant, he got up and started running back towards the apartment.


    It had started raining.


    ****************************


    He stormed inside, soaking wet by now. Yulia was sitting in the same position he''d left her this morning.


    He cursed under his breath, before quickly moving over to her.


    "Yulia!", he shook her frail, cold body rather violently.


    Her eyes were fixed on the opposite apartment.


    He slapped her face, once, twice, thrice. And when she couldn''t be shaken out of her delirious state, he pushed her down and began choking her. Her face had an unbreakable smile planted on it.


    ************************


    They were lying on the ground, staring at the ceiling with half-open eyes. It was dark. They were both wet with sweat.


    "We''re out of time", she murmured.


    "How long?"


    "Perhaps a day...or...a year?"


    A solemn look arose on Niko''s face.


    "How far have we come? How much is left?"


    "She went to sleep at the same time today. She carried her laundry inside before the rain started. She placed the plants outside to water them with rain. She forgot to close the balcony door. Her curtain was soaked. She mopped the water that came inside. Then, she watched TV."


    "The same as usual", Niko said, sounding utterly crushed.


    A dead silence floated in the room.


    Niko saw an empty ceiling. Yulia saw the face of that person...that person who existed like the light in her world. Someone who was long gone now.

 The Butterfly Effect III

    "When will it rain next, Niko?", she asked, staring emptily at the ceiling, her bleeding head resting in Niko''s lap.


    Niko looked at the window. The sky was grey.


    "I don''t know, Yulia", he answered, solemnly.


    The cigarettes were on the table, too far from his reach and he didn''t want to move Yulia.


    "I dreamed about a very very big bird yesterday", she went on deliriously, her mouth curved into a fading smile, "It flew above my head with such...HUGE wings. Every time the bird flapped his wings, it sent waves and waves of storms all around it. I must have gotten swept away, that''s why I woke up."


    Niko sat silently staring at her forehead. His thigh was soaked with her blood.


    "Niko?"


    "Yes, Yulia?"


    "When will...this end?"


    "I don''t know, Yulia."


    "Why did he die like that?", she murmured.


    Niko pursed his lips. His face shifted into some form of loneliness, some indescribable sadness. He wished he had an answer.


    "Why does nothing change? Why won''t something happen?", she went on muttering.


    They''d spent their entire lives waiting for something to happen. But it was always the mundane, the pointless happenings that could easily blend in with their suffocating lives. Like that man who they couldn''t save. They needed a canvas that hadn''t been drenched by so many strokes.


    Stolen story; please report.


    "It was a butterfly", Niko spoke after a long pause, staring out the window at the apartment on the other side of the complex. He couldn''t see clearly, he''d lost his glasses.


    "What?", for one, Yulia''s attention was all on him.


    "That you dreamed of. It wasn''t any huge bird, Yulia. You dreamed of a butterfly. When a butterfly flaps its wings in one corner of the world, it sends a tornado to the other corner. That''s how the world works."


    "Is that true?", her eyes opened in surprise.


    Niko looked down at her.


    "Yes", he nodded.


    "Then let''s...", Yulia began as Niko lifted his head to look outside the window, noticing a figure moving in the opposite balcony, "Let''s do that!"


    "Do what?", he looked back at her.


    "Let''s find a butterfly. Then we can make a change. Then, I''m sure...something will happen", Yulia was excited for the first time in her life.


    Niko stared at her face, wide-eyed. The numbing feeling in his leg and the blood soaked trousers eluded him for a minute. He looked back up at the figure in the opposite apartment, going about its business, unaware of their existence.


    That day they decided that when their actions in the world made a difference for that woman who lived in the opposite apartment, that''s when they''d have succeeded in making something happen.


    ***************************


    The sun woke them up that late morning. For once, the woman in the opposite apartment had awoken before either of them. Niko''s rumpled clothes that had been soaked in rain the day prior were beginning to give off an unbearable odor. They''d both gone to sleep, staring at the ceiling.


    Niko pulled himself up and stretched his neck. Noticing the light in the room, he hurried up and grabbed the binoculars.


    "She''s up already", he murmured.


    Yulia smiled coyly. He looked her way. Both had an unsaid understanding between them. They were out of time.


    Niko dragged himself to the door. The bag of food awaited him like everyday. He picked it up and brought it inside.


    It was a meat bun and some garlic bread today. He served it up on some cardboard plates and put it before Yulia.


    He then darted into the bathroom.


    Yulia emptily stared at the food. She looked up, a butterfly was circling her head. She stared at it for a while before reaching out to grab it. But the butterfly slipped through her hands like a phantom. She tried to catch it several times before giving up. It wasn''t hurting her, after all.


    Niko got out, cleaned up and changed. He threw the laundry into one corner of the room and picked up the binoculars, while the laptop booted.


    He looked at his phone. No message. He picked up a cigarette, lighted it, placed it between Yulia''s lips, took another one out and lit it up for himself.


    The two smoked in silence for a while, until the smoke ran out.


    A buzz caught Niko''s attention. It was a message from Zhang.


    "Still running away? What are you afraid of? Haven''t you done enough?"


    Niko read it once, twice, over and over. It was as if Zhang''s scornful smirk was staring him in the face out of that 2.4 inch screen.


    Yulia stared at him silently, perfectly aware of the butterfly above her head.


    Niko took out the last of his fancy suits from the Chinese wardrobe. His eyes met Yulia''s. She was awaiting an answer.


    "I''ll try. One more time", he murmured, before he went towards the bathroom.


    He didn''t mind the blood now that it was all dried up.


    Yulia began to nibble at the food slowly, looking at the butterfly above her head. Niko couldn''t see it.

 The Butterfly Effect IV

    "I have been thinking, Niko", she thought to herself about the day she came to that high rise apartment with Niko and that person.


    She had Niko''s attention while that person just lurked somewhere in the background, checking out the place. The two stood in the doorway, but her eyes were fixed on that person, fluttering from one corner to the other of the small one room apartment.


    "Could it be that we were born in the wrong time?", she asked.


    "Wrong time, wrong place, and to wrong people", Niko thought but said nothing. He silently smoked away.


    The brief thought passed Yulia''s mind as she scrubbed away at the bloodied walls of the bathroom. Niko would probably still have nothing to say to that question.


    She scrubbed the walls with all her might. For once, she was conscious, although only for a brief while.


    *************************


    Zhang took one look at his face and broke into a laughter. Niko stood stone cold, expressionless, with a cigarette lightly tucked between his lips.


    He let Zhang take his time.


    "You...you''re really too childish!", Zhang tried to muffle his laughter but one look at Niko''s face made him break.


    Niko really felt nothing standing there. The smoke rising from the cigarette was blurring his vision of Zhang, just like it was supposed to. He''d never really taken a good look at Zhang''s face. All he knew was his devilish smile.


    Who was it, really, that was holding the other prisoner? At times like this, the answer was really clear.


    Niko didn''t have a good feeling in his gut but he had no plan to leave, for Yulia''s sake too.


    "Well? Since you''re here...", Zhang walked up to him.


    Despite looks, that lavish chairman''s room belonged to Niko, although he barely ever stepped in there. No one even knew when he was in the office. There was perfect silence in the room and the hallway outside, just as usual.


    Only Zhang''s muffled laughter broke the tension but it wouldn''t have registered. They would be undisturbed,


    The sun was peaking in through the glass wall, but the chairman''s table was just beyond the sun''s reach.


    "You like to keep up appearances but you''re only going to run yourself ragged like this. The meaning you''re searching for is nowhere, Chairman. You should learn to lose yourself. Don''t you think, it''s about time?", Zhang pulled him in with his tie.


    Stolen novel; please report.


    Niko''s face didn''t change. The cigarette freed itself and fell down from his lips. For the first time, Niko got a good look at Zhang''s face.


    "So those are the eyes of the man who smiles like a devil", he thought to himself, before Zhang pressed his lips against his.


    **************************


    That blue porcelain bathroom had never been so pristine. Yulia showered, changed into one of Niko''s night shirts, the only spare clothes she had, tossed her half torn tank top aside with the pile of Niko''s dirty clothes and combed her hair.


    She then looked herself up in the mirror for a good long while.


    The butterfly that had been above her head was gone. She wondered what happened to it. That''s when she felt a warm feeling on the back of her neck. She stood looking in the mirror.


    A hand.


    It moved to the front of her neck and all the way up to her face, caressing her cheek. Before she knew it, that person was standing right behind her, hugging her with one arm, caressing her cheek. Her eyes opened wide for a brief moment. But then a delirious state brought her calm.


    "Beautiful as the day I saw you", that figure, engulfed in a fading light, whispered into her ear.


    She couldn''t see his face very clearly. But it was him, alright.


    She opened her mouth to say something, but he cut her off.


    "Yulia", the gentlest voice she''d ever known, echoed in that small one room apartment.


    She almost lost herself in the melody of it. She kept staring at the figure in the mirror. It smiled, brought his face closer beside hers.


    And that''s when she could see it, the face she''d forgotten. Those honey colored eyes, gently piercing the soul, obliterating the rest of the world around it.


    Yulia closed her eyes slowly and opened them again. The butterfly fluttering over her head, with its honey colored wings, seemed to leave a melody every time it fluttered.


    Yulia was happy. She tried to dance like that butterfly. She went round and round in the room, laughing and floating with the butterfly until tears formed in the corners of her eyes.


    That''s when she caught the glimpse of the woman in the opposite balcony, hanging her laundry. For the first time, the woman noticed her too.


    Yulia stood frozen for a second, but then a grin appeared on her face.


    "We did it, Niko!", she opened her arms wide, looking above her head at the butterfly, "We made a change!"


    She danced all the way outside her apartment. Grinning ear to ear, as if she''d found the perfect ecstasy, the answer they''d been looking for.


    She was headed across the complex to the place they''d been looking at like it was heaven.


    ********************************


    Niko couldn''t help but think something huge was over. He tossed his head about on his way home, trying to get Zhang''s smirking face and penetrating gaze out of his head.


    It was hopeless, after all. It won''t make a difference anywhere in the world. As much as he hated to admit it, Zhang was right. He could run himself ragged but nothing would change. He was chasing some phantom, only because of Yulia''s whim.


    Yulia.


    He hastened his pace when her face crossed his mind. Were they really out of time? It seemed so.


    "~Let me fly away~", some distant song played, but he paid it no mind.


    Clouds were forming above, it would certainly rain soon. He didn''t want to be soaked today. Taking a leap of a step, he hurried back to the apartment, so focused on getting back that he didn''t even notice the commotion in the complex.


    "~I''m not here to stay~"


    The elevator was out of commission as usual. He took the stairs all the way to the 17th floor.


    "~Take me far away~"


    Sweat dripped from his ruffled hair and made its way towards his rumpled clothes. He smelled a mix of cigarettes and Zhang. He thought he''d clean the bathroom finally and take a nice long bath.


    "~Away away away~"


    He opened the door to the apartment so effortlessly that he wondered if it wasn''t about to come off. Yulia wasn''t there and the window they always kept close was wide open.


    Unusual though it was, he went towards the bathroom first and foremost. Finding it spotless gave him reason for suspicion. He got back to the wooden table.


    The laptop seemed to be on as well. He went over and closed the lid, looking out the window as he lighted a cigarette.


    No. Something wasn''t right.


    He picked up the binoculars from the table and looked across.


    The door to the balcony was wide open, curtains parted so that he could even see the open door of the opposite apartment and the many blue dressed men in the room, jotting things down, while some men, wearing gloves and masks, examined something in the balcony, the rail of which was broken and a red smear ran across the floor and the glass door to the balcony.


    The women was dead, her laundry all but flown away.


    Niko held the binoculars down. His lips loosened the grip on the cigarette. The air seemed stiff, he didn''t have to close the window.


    He looked below the opposite apartment in the complex. Some blue suited people were down there as well. His hands trembled as he brought the binoculars to his eyes.


    "~Let me fly away~"


    A butterfly lay there. Her wings¡ªbroken.

 To the End of the World

    Today, I briefly exist for the sake of this paper. Its a strange world that goes around and around and brings us all back to the very beginning.


    Despite all my practices to smile and cry like a normal person, I''m brought this reality that in fact, I feel nothing. Why must I overcome that barrier? Well, for my own sake, of course.


    "Do you think people are inherently good?", he asked me in the driveway while we waited for our order, that I wasn''t remotely interested in.


    "No", I answered briefly, simply to avoid a conversation.


    In a world that is ending and serves only bland food for the sake of survival, conversations hold no meaning.


    "Will you say it today?", he asked, like usual.


    "No."


    "But it''s a nice day."


    "It''s not."


    "Are you sure?"


    His question had originally been a plea to say "I love you."  Why would those words hold so much meaning? Why, indeed. I didn''t even love my parents, the people responsible for bringing me into this world, the first people I knew. So my claim to love anyone else would be a complete lie.


    Don''t get me wrong, I''m sure I loved them once, just like any other child. But my childhood didn''t last long. I could choose to keep up the pretense, but in the end, why should one betray themselves for the sake of a mundane lie?


    I simply couldn''t look at them, because I was ashamed of not being able to love them. Still, I preferred to feel this guilt all on my own instead of them giving me a reason to not love them anymore. But they continued on their rigid paths, breaking every bone in my body.


    I simply couldn''t satisfy their fantasy. I couldn''t be what they wanted me to be. Hence, there was never any acceptance. I tried my darndest to get somewhere with them, but the futility of my struggle laughed in my face with every bruise. So, I gave up.


    "Will you say it if I say it first?", he asked, a naive fool as he was.


    Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.


    He was younger than me and a total pushover. In truth, I knew how much he worshipped me. But love isn''t someone human efforts can instill in someone''s heart. If that was possible, I should have been able to love him by now.


    Why? Because he was a mutt that had become obsessed with my stone cold emptiness. Unfortunately, I had nothing to offer him. I was overtaken by the end of the world while he didn''t seem to care.


    His eyes shone as if his world was just beginning. Nothing seemed to be wrong in his world. I could barely stand the look he gave me.


    In the end, I hated his big blue eyes that were blindingly bright yet seemed to see nothing real. It wasn''t his fault though, but I hate all things hopeful.


    Hate is a strong word. I didn''t hate my parents.


    We hate things we wish didn''t exist. It''s not so different from fear. And I was neither afraid nor drowning in any hatred for them. I simply lacked any and all feelings towards them. I had no home. I''d given up entirely. I wished that they would too, so that we could peacefully part our ways but they were people who had to have their own way in everything.


    I was the same. In the end, conflict was inevitable. I rebelled and rebelled and raged with all my might, when really all I wished was for them to accept me. They didn''t have to understand or agree, they just had to accept that I wasn''t one of them and no matter what they did, I wasn''t going to be.


    It was impossible for them. The first people I knew in this world were not on my side anymore. I was alone, finally. It made no sense to pursue them anymore.


    Logic falls apart the stronger you hold onto it. In the end, you''re cursed to live within the strange realm of irrationality that offers no escape to its favorites.


    Disconnection spans far and wide and no change in seasons bridges the ever growing gap. One simply floats across time without any direction, until...well, until they find a bright blue-eyed shining star.


    "Well, do you think you''ll say it tomorrow?", he asked on the way back.


    "Why are you so hung up on this?", I could barely stand his persistence.


    He pouted sadly. The world spun infinitely slower around him, such so that I didn''t even realize I had been caught in the whirlwind.


    Unfortunately, despite all my reservations, I am heavily prone to fallacies. And therefore, surprising as it may, this is undoubtedly a love story, albeit one that ends very soon with the world.


    "Will you ever say it?", he asked, unrelenting as he was.


    "When it''s the last day of the world", I answered mechanically, sincerely hoping either of us would be dead before then, even though the chances looked slim. It was a simple lie.


    "Then, I''ll know it''s ending", he answered after a pause, a rare moment of him thinking.


    "What?"


    "When you say it, I''ll know that the world is ending."


    "Why, is there no other way for you tell?", I asked, a little taken aback, though knowing he wasn''t one to look out his window.


    "Nope!"


    This has all been done before more times than one can imagine. There is no unique, original, trendsetter. All things are mundane, repeated again and again...


    Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and over again, hoping for things to change.


    Isn''t that just life? Someone ought to have realized it much sooner. Why do we still go on then?


    The irrational is the only place where life can thrive. It''s the irrational, the inconvenient that gives birth, that has the capability to survive. The truly logical exists in absolutes. All the most important things in the universe are absolutes. Unfortunately, we''re not residents of that world.


    Three years later, we stood in a place we never expected to get to. I held his hand tightly and looked into the distance, while his eyes were fixed on me. In the end, he lived in a small world of just two. His world was eternal. Mine wasn''t.


    "I love you. Madly and blindly. And there''s no limit to that", I said, keeping my promise from years ago, watching the end coming near.


    He smiled, satisfied after all. And here I thought I could never make anyone happy.


    In the end, the mind fights against itself. Its an exhausting, drawn out battle that comes to a conclusion far too late, decimating everything in between mercilessly, never leaving a trace. Perhaps, one ought to be grateful that it ends.


    That day, hands held together, we made it to the end of the world.

 How are you?

    "I hate it when someone asks that question", she disgustingly slammed the glass on the counter, "How are you?"


    Miranda turned around from the wine cabinet, and looked at her hopelessly, continuing to rinse the glasses.


    "Oi, that''s gonna cost you, ya know, if it breaks", she said in a low, reserved, and relaxed voice.


    "Really, now?! What the hell am I supposed to say to that?", the other party who was clearly far too agitated and drunk to hold a conversation, completely ignored Miranda''s kind warning.


    "Don''t spill, Kino, you''re stinkin'' up the whole place. What are you, an old man?", Miranda, noticed the spill on the counter and grabbed a swab.


    "You know what he should have said, instead? Ya know?!"


    "Please not so loud, Barry and I had a hangover last night. Although I''m still working", Miranda retained her calm composure, despite the complain.


    "Wha...?! Who the candy crane''s Barry?", Kino burst, slamming her hands on the bar, and getting up in frustration.


    "Calm it, miss", Miranda backed off for a bit, "Barry''s my man."


    "You pig of a liar, you!", Kino pointed right into her face, "It was Jim Bo last week, wann''it?"


    Kino''s speech was apparently becoming slurry because of the drink. Yet, she firmly held on to the champagne bottle like her life depended on it. Miranda knew it was a sign to put her to sleep, otherwise the whole pub would be in ruins.


    "Who''s Jim Bo? Funny name for a real person", Miranda brushed her off easily, and went on wiping the counter.


    "You little yap! You told me that yourself! I knew it was a sin of a name. T''was you gettin'' on my case about bein'' judgy o'' names! You sick little...!"


    "Kino, please hand over the bottle. It''s bar property until you pay for it", Miranda reached over the counter to grab the bottle.


    "No, you dirty...!", Kino backed off, "Not until you tell me the truth! Dammit! How am I still all lonely and shit?"


    Miranda sighed. In fact, all 53 of Miranda''s boyfriends and husbands over the past month, were short lived, lasting barely a week. Once the week was out, they were wiped from reality and went back to being non-existent. Kino bought it every time. And Miranda couldn''t help but test how far she could go.


    Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.


    This once she''d thought she''d really be caught with Jim Bo. But apparently, Kino was buying Barry as well. So the trifle continues, thought Miranda. In fact, her real name wasn''t Miranda at all.


    "Alright, Kino, I''ll hear you talk. You don''t like people asking "How are you?", was it? Well that''s a perfectly sane sentiment to have, just not something one''d expect from you", Miranda tried to make her drop her guard.


    "Huh?! Why not?", Kino closed in.


    She was far too easy.


    "You''re not very sane, Kino", Miranda replied casually, "Not that it''s your fault. You are just never really sober is all."


    "Huh?! You cun-"


    "Whoa now, not so loud, Kino. Armand and I had one too many shots last night", Miranda interrupted her, calm as a summer day.


    "Armand? Who the duckling paw''s that?", Kino broke again.


    "Barry''s step-brother from his third mother. He''s rather something, I tell ya. Just hopin'' Barry doesn''t figure it out. Well, he''s a bit slow upstairs so...", Miranda dropped, as if it was the most casual thing to say.


    Meanwhile, Kino had been closing in without realizing.


    "Oi, you aren''t for real, are ya? You''re doin'' ''em both, are ya? Brothers and all?", Kino''s eyes were open as wide as a dead drunk''s eyes could possibly open.


    "Hmm? Anyways, Kino", Miranda leaned in and quickly snatched the bottle from Kino''s hand, "You''ve had enough. Pay up."


    "Oi!!!!", Kino could barely do anything in her condition, "You foxy!"


    Miranda let her be and turned back towards the cabinet she was cleaning before. It was past closing time, Kino was the only one who came in at that hour.


    Kino grabbed a stool and basically slammed her head onto the marble counter, before breaking into sobs.


    "Why''s it a''ways happens t'' me?! I don''t get it! How''ve you made it?! You of all...!", and her sobs only grew louder, painting the perfect picture of a hopeless drunk.


    Miranda watched her, without caring a whole lot, leaning back on the other end of the counter. She''d lit up a cigarette. The sound of rain outside made her feel drunk herself. She hadn''t touched a drop for seven years. She never planned to. But an alcoholic that she was, she could get drunk on all those distance melancholies, like the rain, or the birds trying to take flight but falling down to some impending doom before even getting started.


    Kino''s sobs, as loud as they were, didn''t drown out the sound of rain. Miranda listened close, the pitter patter made her feel full.


    "Oi, Kino", she spoke after a while realizing the sobs weren''t going to calm themselves, "Ya know, I figure why you hate that question is because you don''t got the answer, do ya?"


    "Eh?", Kino lifted her tear stained face from the counter and looked at Miranda, questioningly.


    "It''d be something if you could figure it out, eh? I''m awesome and you? How''s your day?...Or something like that, huh? Honestly, if someone asked me that question, I wouldn''t know the answer either. It''s never really registered as a question I want to lie to. You catch my wind?", Miranda took a deep drag of her cigarette.


    "Heh...?", Kino was clearly too fuse blown to understand.


    "All I''m sayin'' is, Kino, ya don''t gotta hate it if you don''t know it. Though, I''d likely hate the question too, as much as ya, if I were ever asked", Miranda mused on, looking at the mahogany carpet that she''d kept remarkably clean over the years.


    "Eh, what? Ya ne''er been asked that? How are you? Ya nev'' been asked that, Miranda?", Kino straightened up, though still muffled in her head.


    Miranda let out a puff of smoke, thinking it might be time to drop that trifle of an act that had effortlessly amused her.


    "You wanna know my real name, Kino?", Miranda asked, reaching the end of her cigarette.


    "Yer real...? Ain''t it Miranda?", Kino felt a heavy head, and 18 hours of blackout approaching her.


    Miranda shook her head. Kino stared at her blankly, a bit shocked for a moment, but then let her head drop on the counter with a little bang.


    "No, don''t tell me. Miranda''s fine. I can''t ''emember anythin'' anyway", Kino said.


    "You think? But names hold meaning, Kino. I ain''t tellin'' ya just for the kicks. It''s important."


    "Ya think?", Kino raised her head, looking straight at the cabinet, "You know what my name means?"


    In fact, Miranda had known for a while what it meant.


    "It''s German for a movie theater. That''s all my folk could think of, can ya imagine? Musta had balls for brains there, donccha think? I been ruined since day one!", Kino looked like she might start sobbing again.


    Miranda let out a final puff of smoke. The cigarette had gone out. She ashed it cruelly in a crystal ashtray and made her way towards Kino.


    "Right. Names have meanings. But we''re never supposed to understand such things", she said, before lifting Kino''s chin up with the tips of her cold fingers, liberating a warm kiss on her lips.

 Homecoming

    To think the end has a face...


    She could never have imagined it would be so clear when it came. She thought she would only be able to see it in hindsight.


    Was it the bleakness of it? Or the clear conscience that nothing else could be done anymore?


    She held his cold hand in her left and a burning cigarette in her right. Staring into the distance, trying to discern something in the gray sky, she came to the conclusion that this was her last attempt at redemption. She would now give up on life. It was utter disappointment right till the end.


    "Leave me", he whimpered.


    "No."


    She didn''t even look at his bloodied self. She didn''t intend to remove the silver knife lodged in his chest.


    "I don''t believe in sad endings. So I decided long ago I''ll never kill anyone in my stories. But I always end up murdering someone. The knife they drive into their chest seems as if... I''m the hand that thrusts it into their flesh", she mused, burning the cigarette to her lips.


    "Do you think you''re the one who''s killed me too?", he asked, merely a whisper.


    She took a deep drag, watching the distant trees flutter under the grey clouds. The smoke floated up dancing right before her eyes, almost teasingly.


    "I don''t suppose anyone would ever kill me. Do you reckon I''ll be able to do it myself?", she asked, tilting her head to the side, staring blankly into space.


    "No."


    This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    "Right?", she smirked, "I don''t think I could do it either. But really what am I supposed to do now?"


    For a while he was silent and she wondered if she''d never get the answer to her question.


    "You don''t start new things. You can hear the wind whistling through that gaping hole in your heart, that''s how empty you are. But you fear the end more than anything¡ªthe nostalgia that will drive you mad, drowning you in deeper despair. So you never start anything at all. In the end... all that''s left is this endless void."


    "Tch...", she stubbed out the cigarette on the ground, annoyed by his sudden talkative urge.


    She rummaged through her pocket for a fresh cigarette but only found a crumpled one. Her irritation doubled as she straightened it out and lit it, taking a long, steady drag.


    "That''s not true at all, in fact", she finally decide on a retort, "I believe life is a deeply tragic matter with mere episodes of distractions in between."


    As if the weight of her statement dawned upon her only in the aftermath, her brow twitched and she sat back, almost disgusted by the realization. How meaningless it had all been. And how pointlessly she''d scrambled through to keep her head above water.


    "What''ll you do from now on?", he asked, his voice as weak as ever, growing lower by the minute.


    "No more. I''m done."


    "Is that a thing to be saying to a dying man?"


    She finally looked at him, with pitying eyes, staring in silence. That face she couldn''t forget always made her nostalgic. She closed her eyes, resting her head back.


    When she opened them again, she was in the car, gripping the steering wheel with some struggle. Her palms hurt. The empty road stretched on. The street lights that illuminated the road as if it were day, didn''t pierce through into the darkness of the car.


    "Is there someplace I can get off?", his voice rose from the backseat.


    "..."


    She pensively looked straight ahead, straining her eyes to stay focused on the road.


    "No? I didn''t think so", he smirked, looking at the roof, "How many years have we been driving? Five? I don''t think we''re getting anywhere."


    "Just shut up, we''re almost there", she was frustrated, gripping the steering wheel as tightly as she could.


    "There''s no hospital in sight. I don''t think we''re anywhere, really", he chuckled, "But tell me the truth. Where are you going?"


    She pursed her lips, struggling to keep her open. The hospital never came into view, indeed.


    "Home", she whispered.


    A pause ensued, broken by his very brief laughter. A passing flash of light fell upon the backseat, where he lay, blood flowing out of his chest, the knife still there.


    "Who are you kidding? Your home is lying dead in the backseat of your car. You''re never getting home."


    The road wouldn''t end. The car wouldn''t go any faster. The sound of blood dripping wouldn''t stop. She bit her lips and looked on. The night was eternal.


    Indeed, the fatigue of driving on and on was beginning to show. She couldn''t deny that it felt like every bone in her body was breaking, every shred of muscle was stretched thin to its limit.


    She rested her head on the steering wheel and slammed the accelerator to the floor. Closing her eyes once more, she tried to breath but a deafening shrill scream engulfed her and a sharp pain sliced through her throat.


    She tried to shut it out, keeping her eyes tightly shut, clenching the steering wheel. It took a moment before she opened her eyes, stunned at the painful realization that the scream filling the air was her own.

 Kids on the Slope

    <div>


    <div>


    With every creaking step I took towards the stairs, I felt the floorboards just about ready to cave in beneath me. That haunted house only let the wind rustle its way in. By the looks of it, I couldn¡¯t tell the last time a human had been here.


    I¡¯d already lost my camera in the forest on the way here. There was a bit of a climb before the house came into view. It was by no means small but it was very well hidden within the thick brush that surrounded it.


    Inside, it smelled of ash and winter. Seeing the countless cobwebs that adorned the interior, I reckoned the place was full of foodstuffs for the spiders. Luckily, I didn¡¯t encounter any of them. Even so, I dreaded going into the kitchen. It was an open kitchen with a large dining table, attached to the TV lounge¡ªa space more like a hall than a room¡ªlit by windows with tattered, odd-colored curtains that hung in strips like dirty cloth.


    I wondered briefly if the lounge was the best place to put down what little luggage I had. The floorboards were dark, almost black, with traces of ash all over. I thought the place might come down when I walked.


    I was supposed to stay longer, but without my camera, there was little meaning in looking for angles. The story I was supposed to pen down would have to rely on my own eyes. I figured someone else might be willing to venture in here with a camera and take some shots that could help me.


    I undid the top two buttons of my overcoat and decided to check out the upper floor where all the rooms were.


    It was a three-story house. I carefully made my way up the stairs. The countless handprints over the history of this house were still imprinted on the railing. Even in the dark, they seemed to be sneering at me.


    I was careful. This was a sacred place. Most of the windows were covered, though the covering might have seen better days. Still, it didn¡¯t help that the light barely got in. I didn¡¯t have a torch on me since I didn¡¯t expect such a cloudy day. Somehow, I managed to grope my way through the dark.


    As I approached the second floor, feeling relieved to have gotten through the stairs unscathed, I looked at the corridor in front of me that stretched towards a dark end.


    There were seven rooms: six on either side and the seventh at the corridor¡¯s end.


    Room 101, Room 102, Room 103¡­


    The rooms were oddly numbered. Somebody had forgotten to add the rest of the hundred rooms in the house. Either that, or those hundred rooms had become a victim to whatever phantom lurked in that house.


    Without pondering whether the former was more plausible than the latter, I made my way towards the first room.


    Standing in front of Room 101, I placed my hand on the cold handle and took a deep breath. There was an odd feeling, I knew something had been lurking inside for a long time. I turned the handle slowly, and the door opened without any resistance.


    Clothes.


    That¡¯s all I saw before closing the door right back, standing frozen, my hand clutching the handle tightly as I pursed my lips.


    The rooms were all like that. I looked up at the dark corridor, feeling the weight of the air draped over every gap between the floorboards, seeping in from somewhere unknown.


    I decided to explore a little longer before entering any of the rooms. I walked down the corridor towards the end.


    Room 213. That was the number on the seventh room.


    That was the number on the seventh room.


    He wrote to me, ¡°Elisa, I know I¡¯ll be alright now. I wish you were here. Someday, I¡¯ll get you out of that place, too. Wait for me.¡±


    I still kept his note in the locket around my neck, almost like a curse. It was the last I heard from him.


    My brother was 16 when he ran away. Maybe I was too young to understand why he didn¡¯t take me with him. I was 10. I waited. He never came back.


    When our mother was arrested, I felt a strange relief and thought he might finally come home. But there was no word from him. I didn¡¯t know where to find him. Instead of signing his name or initial, he¡¯d written, ¡°From Room 213.¡±


    Of course, I knew it was him from his handwriting¡ªand because no one else in the world called me Elisa.


    I lingered in front of the room, clutching the locket around my neck, unsure of whatever lay beyond the door. Was there really a need to unravel this mystery?


    I reached for the handle but then turned and hurried back toward the stairs. Whatever was in there had to wait.


    Stolen story; please report.


    On the third floor were six rooms from 201 to 206. A large window at the far end of the corridor brightened the space. I opened all the doors, one by one. Each room looked the same.


    The first thing that¡¯d come to notice was clothes.


    Colorful, various-sized clothes, all for boys. They were the final trace of their inhabitants, lying forgotten on the floor. I wondered what had happened to their bones.


    It was getting chilly and I thought about lighting a cigarette but the place was already filled with ash. I didn¡¯t feel like adding any more to it. So, I tucked my hands inside my coat pockets and walked up to the window at the end.


    There was a patch of green directly below the window. It might have been a garden once but now it was just overgrown weed. I imagined the place might have been beautiful once. The window latch was too rusty to open so I didn¡¯t try opening it. Besides, I thought any forceful action against this house might bring it crashing down on its foundations.


    I didn¡¯t dare desecrate any of the rooms, so I didn¡¯t step in. Standing in the doorways, I took in the artifacts those young inhabitants had left behind: books, posters, broken toys, sticks, even rocks¡ªjust the kind of things boys liked.


    Of course, anything that looked valuable must have been scavenged from the trash. They hadn¡¯t had any money. Most of the items were broken anyway.


    The kids who ran away from home found shelter in that house. All those little souls with no home¡­ that¡¯s probably why there were no bones to be found.


    It was impossible to tell from what was left behind, what could have driven those kids away. Every one of those items seemed like an attempt to find heaven. Children are like that, always looking for heaven. In the end, I can¡¯t say if they found it.


    I slowly made my way back, figuring it was time to pay my final respects. I slowly and carefully descended the stairs.


    The second floor was much darker compared to the top one, so I had to wait for a while, listening to the sound of the house while my vision adjusted. Unlike the third floor, which smelled like the sun, the second floor smelled like dead leaves. Like a very heavy autumn sweeping through it.


    My brother, Autumn¡­ he loved the season. He loved the colors of the leaves. I remembered he had a book filled with leaves in every shade and shape. He collected them and would show me when he found a new species. It was like a treasure hunt. Those dead leaves were his gold coins.


    So I supposed this floor suited him. I decided to open each door; they¡¯d been closed for 17 years. Those kids who¡¯d been waiting so long for someone to come were owed at least this much.


    One by one, I opened all the doors, stopping briefly to take in whatever story the remains had to tell. In a way, it was lucky there wasn¡¯t so much light. Sometimes, you can¡¯t help wanting to close your eyes to some things. But I couldn¡¯t look away, not anymore. Those kids deserved to be seen.


    Room 103 was what froze me in my place. It had a twin pair of frilly dresses lying together on the floor, with a one eyed doll tucked between. By the bunk bed were three small red shoes, one missing its pair. On the table was a small chipped tea set with most of its articles missing. The heaven those kids were looking for, it was simply home, wasn¡¯t it?


    For a long while, I stared at the story the room told me. I felt the house was giggling, a sweet innocent giggle that the world had missed out on. And I thought I saw a 10 year old me sitting on the top bunk, swinging her legs, blankly staring into space, singing something, perhaps even¡­ smiling.


    Dust fell on my shoulder, bringing me back to the present, interrupting the illusion that room cast on me. Brushing it off, I moved toward Room 213 once more.


    I placed my hand on the darkened wood, perhaps seeking some presence. I held my breath, placing my forehead against the door. Was someone listening to me too?


    Reaching for the handle, I steeled my nerves as I slowly pushed the door open. And I froze.


    There was no trace of him. No clothes, not his book of leaves, no paper or pen for writing me notes. Nothing was there.


    I felt a little lost, as if I¡¯d come uninvited or at a bad time. I paused at the doorstep, taking in the interior before I took a step in. And that¡¯s when I noticed.


    I could smell my brother in the air. Even after all these years, I couldn¡¯t have been mistaken about it. I knew that instant that it was indeed his room. The last place he¡¯d been. The last place where he was 16. And he¡¯d been 16 since then.


    Meanwhile, I kept growing and became older than him. The brother that looked so much taller and stronger than me back then was now a mere boy. His scent and his image of walking around that room lingered before me like a ghost.


    I noticed his window was wide open, as it always had been. Rain and snow had left traces on the table in front of it. He¡¯d left the window open. There were leaves all around the room and something was growing on the side of the wooden table. I suppose my brother decided to let the forest devour him.


    By now, I thought, he might have turned into an Autumn leaf.


    I traced the rough surface of the wooden table, caked with dust and seasons. Looking around as I breathed in the final traces of my brother¡¯s scent, I took off the locket I¡¯d worn for 17 years and placed it on his table. I had no drink to share, but I couldn¡¯t leave his grave without a gift.


    After all, I was never going to see him again.


    With my business finished, I left the room and closed just his door, since he¡¯d always had the window open for himself.


    I descended the stairs, casting a final glance at all the rooms, each reciting its story to me.


    From the lounge, I picked my luggage and waited a moment in silence to hear the sound of that house. It had been awfully quiet all this time. But as I neared the exit, I thought it smiled at me.


    Outside, the clouds had darkened. A storm was just around the corner and that wasn¡¯t very lucky. I hadn¡¯t prepared for such weather and being stuck on the hill in that state wasn¡¯t my idea of fun. It was imperative that I hurried down to find shelter for the night, but for some reason, I didn¡¯t feel like running away from that house


    I slowly paced along, staring at the sky, watching the clouds form a devious plan, as the wind grew tumultuous every passing second.


    Those kids had been erased from history. There was no record or memory of them left, except for that forgotten house which was now but a mausoleum. A place no one visited, where no spring came, where no flowers bloomed.


    Whatever turbulence drove them to run away from life couldn¡¯t have been strong enough to deny them their entire existence, could it? Even if life drove them downhill, how could they have disappeared so easily?


    I stopped to wonder midway down the slope that led to the house. And as I stood on the slope unperturbed by the wind building around me, I turned around to look at the house. But it was completely hidden from view. I couldn¡¯t see a hint of it.


    And that¡¯s when it came to me¡­ the reason why they had never been found.

 Raison Detre

    <div>


    <div>


    "Why?"


    I was asked at the gate of eternity because I refused to be reincarnated.


    The veiled being before me clearly didn''t understand life. This gigantic existence that had never had time to wait and wonder about the reason for being, couldn''t possibly comprehend what the end looks like.


    Is it a pity when a human dies?


    Only when it''s at the dawn of something big.


    I''m compelled to agree with that logic, though I cannot help but nurture my doubts. The veiled being only demanded answers, but I stood speechless before it.


    Why is it that some lives are able to find meaning while others cannot? If people truly get reincarnated, then why do they sometimes fail to see meaning in life? Is it not because some lives are created without any reason? And if so, why should one wish to be reincarnated?


    The white-veiled being could not, of course, answer such questions.


    Without meaning, one only wanders¡ªa hollow existence, a life without any essence. Existence tires itself out and constantly tries to extinguish itself, but the sickle is not held by the hand of life. And try as one might, we are not given the choice to cut ourselves loose.


    Why, then, was such a circle created to begin with?


    "Would you prefer it if I were reincarnated, sir?", I asked, not wanting to displease the veiled being, as ignorant as it may have been.


    "That would certainly save a lot of paperwork", he answered very candidly.


    I paused to think it over for a few seconds and he was patient enough to keep his books open and not deliver a verdict immediately.


    "If you can help me, then I will help you and choose reincarnation", I said.


    He looked at me suspiciously, though I couldn''t be sure because he was completely veiled.


    "Let me hear it", he answered cautiously.


    "Tell me the reason for my next life", I said boldly.


    He paused for a short while.


    "I''m not at liberty to say it, though I''m not bound not to say it either", he nodded to himself, "Very well, I shall tell you what I can. In truth, all lives have the same reason."


    "What is that reason?", I asked.


    "To find a reason for being."


    I''m sure he thought he''d outsmarted me so very tremendously that I could only roll over and cry the bitter tears that are the fate of all humans in existence. But I wasn''t even remotely impressed. I only glared at him, unamused.


    "If it is a cycle with no answer, I do not wish to get reincarnated", I said, having no problem turning him down altogether.


    The being sat silently on his golden throne, behind the giant ticket box.


    ¡°You little life, realize where you stand. This is the very last frontier. That golden gate you see in the distance has not been opened in billions of years. All life returns to the world it came from, metamorphosed into a completely new existence. But the universe is created in preservation. You cannot end a life. Should you choose not to be reincarnated, what do you think will happen?¡±


    A critical question that the being had asked, and I was to answer it carefully. I knew that the right answer made all the difference in that moment.


    "I don''t believe there is anything beyond that door", I pointed towards the said gate of eternity.


    The being turned around to look at it briefly and then turned back to me, with an almost grim silence.


    "You believe nothing is beyond that? Do you think this is all there is?", he looked about him as if he thought the place was very small.


    "Yes", I answered without a smidgen of doubt.


    "And what makes you say so?"


    "Because you''re all I see, and likely anyone that''s ever been here. If you always reincarnate them, then it must be because nothing is beyond that door."


    Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    The logic itself was sound, but it wasn''t something that couldn''t be refuted. The being silently stared at me as if wondering where to go from here.


    "Did you make us?", I asked finally.


    "What do you think?"


    "I don''t", I shook my head.


    "I didn''t create you, little human. I am but a mere watchman, you see. The law has only been passed to me in this book I have here. And I do nothing but follow the decrees as they are stated", he pointed towards the very thick book before him.


    "Why were we made in a cycle?", I asked.


    "I only know that which I''m told."


    I glared at the being. Now that it was taking such a tone with me, I knew the answer meant nothing anymore. In fact, I was out of time. The decision needed to be made right away.


    "Will you repeat your question?", I asked after a moment of silence.


    "Little human, do you wish to be reincarnated or cast into oblivion?"


    I stared at him blankly.


    "That is not what you asked earlier", I pouted.


    "This is what I ask now", the being answered coolly.


    ¡°I will have to reconsider everything again,¡± I replied, realizing it could take a long time before any final decision could be made.


    And yet, I stood on clouds that stretched endlessly around and above me, beneath a blue sky extending infinitely toward another great beyond. Other than the golden gate of eternity just a few paces away and the ticket box where the being resided, nothing else captured my attention.


    The being sat patiently, waiting for my answer as he flitted through the pages of his giant book. Perhaps he was searching for the exact protocol to be carried out in this condition.


    "What is oblivion like?", I asked.


    "Like nothing at all. You will not feel it."


    "Then I will choose oblivion."


    "Why?"


    I sighed, "If I were to choose reincarnation, would you ask me why?"


    "No", the being answered honestly.


    I frowned, glaring at him, but he didn¡¯t seem bothered by it.


    "You''re very biased for a watchman", I said, pouting still.


    "The choice is ultimately yours. I only lend compassion while I can", he replied, still much too absorbed in his book.


    Compassion, as he called it, was his idea of giving humans more chances at life so they could finally find their reason for being. No such thing, I surmised, truly existed, considering he gave them unlimited chances to choose things one way or the other.


    Then again, how could such a being, who sat on a golden throne and only spoke from the decrees handed down to him, know anything about the human condition? He didn''t even create humans; he really must be clueless.


    Why had I died, for instance? Not how, but why. Surely, if he were such a benevolent existence, he would spare the ignorant little humans from dying altogether. Why dabble in such a meaningless cycle of give and take? No, the being wouldn''t answer any of my questions even if I were to ask.


    Was there really no way for me to find an answer? After having lived for so many years, quite possibly many times, I had finally reached this point, the highest among all the points so far. And if such a place could not give me the answer, then indeed, I decided I would stand here until I was cast into oblivion.


    "Can you simplify a matter for me? Surely, your book would have something regarding that", I asked.


    He gazed at me questioningly, though I couldn''t tell through his veil.


    "Is life created to find this reason? Or is it the reason for being that eventually begets life?", I asked after a slight pause.


    I suppose the question made an impression on him. For a while, he forgot all about his book and stared emptily at me, thinking about the right answer to my question.


    I didn''t realize the intensity with which the being was tackling this dilemma. He sat with his legs crossed, and I caught a glimpse of his suit. It was undoubtedly a black office suit. What a diplomat this one! I thought to myself.


    The veil, more a blanket that covered him from head to toe like a ghost with no eyes, obstructed most of his expressions. But from the sound of it, I could tell that he was really considering my question. I suppose he didn''t want to give the wrong answer to this one.


    I stood blank, waiting for the answer for quite a while before he pulled a crystal ashtray closer, clicked his tongue in frustration, and began lighting up a cigarette.


    ¡°What in damnation,¡± I thought. Even heaven has these lousy bureaucrats; no wonder we¡¯re doomed.


    He smoked through the veil. Any and all smoke was trapped inside it, or perhaps it simply didn¡¯t exist. He went on and smoked three more before slapping his knee and leaning into the window.


    "It has to be life, doesn''t it? You live, and then you look for a reason. And if you''re lucky, you''ll find it", he answered, and I thought he wasn''t very smart.


    Why would he need to be? After all, the book had all the answers. He''d never had to think about anything so far.


    "Luck has nothing to do with it, does it? If you keep reincarnating people, they''ll find it one way or the other. Or rather, they''ll realize it. The only reason you should be reincarnating people is because they haven''t fulfilled the purpose that they were given that life for. If they do find it and fulfill it, why would you go on reincarnating them? From then on, wouldn''t their life really be meaningless?", I was irritated by his answer after having waited so long.


    "You make a good point. That''s a nice theory indeed, little human."


    I stomped my feet, "Well, what now?!"


    He stared at me, "Must you be so impatient? Realize, little life, that you''re one of the billions of little ones I have to deal with today. And today never ends here. So I can go on for all eternity. You''re welcome to join me inside this box if you don''t want to be reincarnated. Perhaps, seeing your fellow little humans jumping at the chance of being reborn will change your mind."


    "That''s what I''m asking! Why are you so bent on the idea of reincarnation? Why can you not cast me into oblivion?", I had lost my touch of patience.


    "Why, you ask, little one. But tell me this¡ªhave you found your reason for being? Why did you live? Do you think you''ve been reincarnated before?"


    I fell silent.


    "Four thousand three hundred and seventeen times, little one", he read from the book.


    My eyes widened, and I stood still.


    "And not once, in all those lives, have you come across your reason for being. Shall I cast you into oblivion, for you are such a meaningless existence? Is there any life that is meaningless? That is the task I have been assigned to find out. And in hopes that this task of mine shall never see completion, I continue to reincarnate beings like you. In all your lives¡ªas a human, a bird, a whale, a cloud¡ªI have waited for you to find it."


    "Wh...what are you...?", I stood numb, my finger tips cold, my eyes burning.


    "Little life, no life is without a reason. That is what I profess, and I shall continue to profess it till the end of all life. That is the compassion I lend, but only while I can", he spoke gently.


    "But...why?", I asked, lost.


    Why had this benevolent being not given up on me in those 4000 lives? Even if one doesn''t find the reason of being, isn''t living a happy life good enough? Had I never, in all those lives, been truly happy?


    He sifted through the pages, pausing at one, and leaned closer to read it aloud.


    "It is December, 26th.


    You died two years ago.


    After Christmas dinner, you promised your mother you''ll stop cutting your hair. Your mother hugged you and kissed your face. You smiled at her. She told you she was happy to hear it.


    That night, you decided you won''t cut yourself anymore.


    You hung yourself to the bathroom door with an old belt from your middle school. Your music player played Moonlit Sonata on repeat. Only one of your ear plugs worked.


    You were discovered in the morning by your sister, who screamed at the sight of you.


    The next one to see you was your father and he carried your sister away. You hung there alone until your father explained everything to your family.


    Your mother trembled as she walked up the stairs towards your room. She only took a peek into the room before collapsing.


    Your father and brother carried you to your bed. You lay in your bed alone with the window open for an hour before the police arrived.


    You didn''t leave a note behind.


    Your death was ruled a suicide. Your body was taken to the morgue.


    You were put in a freezer, in wait for the spring when the ground is soft and a grave can be dug.


    Your father visited every day for a week. You never saw your mother again.


    Your journal was discovered on March 19th, your 17th birthday.


    You wrote: "I''m starting this journal because I fear I might kill myself. In truth, not one good thing has happened to me in all my life."


    You wrote that you were homeless. You never belonged anywhere. No one ever understood you. Your intentions were always misinterpreted. You felt alone. You hated yourself. You hated life. You failed to take your life twice before the time you died.


    Your brother cried after reading your journal. You left letters to your friends. But your brother burned everything.


    You were buried in spring. Your father attended your funeral.


    You lost your way towards heaven. You sat on your gravestone until winter. A messenger delivered you your train ticket on December 3rd. No one visited your grave in that time.


    You left the world on December 26th.


    Welcome to your final station. The waiting''s room just over to the left. The train''ll be here soon."

 An Unusual Marriage

    "Well, here we are again", he sighed, lighting his cigarette.


    She was lying on his bed, her overcoat still buttoned, long boots still on.


    This is how all their conversations started, right before one of us them was heading out.


    "You know I feel, it''s about time we stopped tip toeing around the elephant in the room", she lay sprawled on the bed, staring at the ceiling.


    "You say that every time", he sighed, making himself comfortable on the sofa, glaring at her.


    "Well, I''m hoping you''ll get serious eventually", she replied, not moving an inch from her place.


    It was cold outside but he never closed the windows. His sparsely furnished bedroom was always chilly.


    "There''s nothing to get serious about. It''s because this is all we''ve got", he answered, calmly, smoking away, not shifting his eyes for even a second.


    "All you''ve got, maybe, but not me. I have better prospects in life," she wrapped some strands of stray hair around her finger.


    Her long dark hair lay sprawled on the bed, flowing whenever the cold wind blew past.


    "As a matter of fact, I meant exclusively you", he leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees, "Should we go our separate ways, or one of us dies, it''s easy to see what would happen. If you leave, I''ll simply go on and live alone for the rest of my days without changing a thing. You, on the other hand, will kill yourself if I''m gone. I''m in fact the last stop on your journey. If you don''t choose to stay here, your journey''s over. You see?"


    She didn''t know he''d figured it out. Then again, she''d never made any efforts to hide it anyway.


    She paused a while before answering, "So then, you agree that it''s convenient for both of us to simply stay as we are. But don''t you feel the stagnation in all this? This back and forth has lasted longer than it should have. And yet, with every confrontation, it only becomes harder to control these emotions."


    Her answer was almost a whisper, but it presented no problem in reaching him.


    "How about...", he took a deep drag of the cigarette, "...we get married?"


    "Huh?", she broke into a chuckle, "Is that your solution? Isn''t it really just your way of snagging the victory? Quiet an underhanded way to get the upper hand. And that''s all you thought of? How terrible!"


    "Say what you will, but I''ve given it a lot of thought. In fact, one should only marry the people they hope to kill down the lane someday."


    "Oh?", she was surprised enough to push herself up and examine his face, finding it painted utterly serious, "Well said. Very well said, in fact. It might just convince me."


    She was certainly impressed.


    "If I''d known you were a fan of such cocky two-bit behavior, I''d have murdered you sooner", he grinned playfully.


    "Might, I said", she returned the grin, "But I suppose I''ll take that back altogether."


    "Still, if I was keeping you as a trophy, it should have served my purpose by now, having lived with you for three years, don''t you think?", he ashed the cigarette on the sole of his boot.


    Living with you, he said, but it was hardly that. For days, they''d barely see each other. For weeks, they wouldn''t have said a word. And when they finally did get the time or reason to talk, it was always accompanied by the anticipation of running away.


    The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.


    "Perhaps so. But a girlfriend is a girlfriend. No matter how perfect we look to the world, it''s a fact that all this is meaningless. I don''t love you. It must be a first for you to not have someone fall for you, even after three years. Doesn''t it hurt your pride?", she rolled on her stomach, and cupped her face, looking directly at him.


    He sniggered.


    "Even so, I''ve never doubted you for a second. You''re cursed by the one you gave your heart to. I was never hoping for you to fall for me at all. That''s part of your charm, ya know. You think my time''s so paltry, debasing myself for someone that''d be head over heels for me? You understand there''s a reason I don''t mind you so. Perhaps, that''s why we''ve lasted this long", he answered, smirking.


    All his life, he''d had no trouble with people. Anyone he gave his remotest attention to became a slave to him for life. She was the only exception. That''s what irked him. But he knew he would never find anyone like that ever again. In the end, all else would be far too mundane if he were to let her go.


    "I wish you wouldn''t bring up that person so easily. I never gave him my heart, that''s the problem. You wouldn''t get it. And what do you mean, debase yourself?", her expression changed swiftly.


    She leaned over and grabbed the cigarette he was lighting for himself. She then went back to lying flat on the bed, the cigarette pressed warmly between her lips as she watched the smoke float away. She tried to grab it, but it slipped through her fingers, straight into oblivion.


    "I''m not bringing it up so easily as you think. Hell, I can''t put my finger on it at all. You being so damn tightlipped about it is no help", he answered, going for another cigarette only to realize the pack was empty. He sighed.


    "That''s enough. It''s because you don''t know anything about it. Don''t go on, please. I''d rather leave now", she wanted to avoid the subject.


    "Oh? And what was that about tiptoeing around the elephant in the room?", he wasn''t willing to let her go today.


    In fact, he''d decided he would delay her so that she wouldn''t leave at all. If it came to it, he would have tied her up with the very bed she was sprawled on.


    "You know what''s wrong here?", she sighed.


    "Hmm?"


    "It''s the fact that we''re stuck here. Long as we stay like this, neither of us will ever really get a move on. So then, what you really want to tell me is to forget that person and love you because, for all your arrogance, you''ve fallen for me. But at the same time, you also realize that something that mundane will eventually end before the month is over, and that''ll be it. So our only chance to be ''something'' is by being this way, where I''m stuck in the past and you''re disgusted by me. Don''t you see the paradox here? We lose something to gain something, but what we gain loses all meaning if we do get it."


    "What-"


    She broke him off.


    "You''re absolutely right about the fact that if we were to leave here and run away from this stalemate, you''ll be in a limbo and I''ll most certainly end my life. There''s no doubt in my mind that that is true. It''s worth holding on because you''re my anchor, but you must realize that we just let it pile up. We never reach an agreement. And the longer we go on, the crazier we get. Perhaps the answer at the end is to really truly lose ourselves and become something... despicable. Maybe then, all these reservations won''t mean anything anymore", she finally concluded, bringing the already burnt cigarette to her lips, her gaze still fixed at the ceiling.


    She felt nothing. He listened in utter silence, resting his head in his hand, wearing a completely detached, monotonous face as if saying, he didn''t need to be told all that.


    "You''ve got that ugly habit of running away. The smallest things overwhelm you. Dump the baggage somewhere, maybe?", he gave her a skeptical look.


    "What ''smallest'' things are you referring to?", she returned the sarcasm.


    "You talk about this paradox as if it''s the wrongest thing to happen. The only truth here is that we''re lonely people. Out in the world on our we''ll only get lost. Our extremities are just so, aren''t they? We believe in killing our lovers. The world can''t understand that. This is why, the moment we walk away from the paradox, our extremities would be too much for life to handle. Whether you end it yourself or let it whither, the simple fact remains that no survival is possible", he leaned forward, paying full attention to all her smallest movements as she lay still.


    "What''s all that matter? Even if that''s the state of life we''re stuck with, where''s our own will in any of that?", she asked, disgruntled.


    "Our will?", he was surprised to hear of such things from her, "Is there something you want?"


    "..."


    He chuckled, "We''re slave to the extremes, aren''t we?"


    "What do you want, then?", she was a bit annoyed.


    "Just what I proposed."


    "That''s impossible. Besides, you aren''t talking about me at all. Half of me is made of ''that'' person. Isn''t that unbearable for you?", she smirked.


    He looked at her in silence.


    "Well, I guess I''m in love with that person, then."


    "DON''T EVEN GO THERE."


    He chuckled, "What does it matter anyway?"


    "It matters because I haven''t got any will in there anywhere."


    "You''re too concerned about that. You know, we''re bound to part ways sooner or later. And it''s all towards the same conclusion. Besides, you make it sound like I forced you into this. When in reality, it''s a choice we both made. With our OWN will. The vows were taken a long time ago."


    She pondered silently, unable to deny the truth. It was getting late, and she realized she couldn''t go out anymore. She had dressed up for nothing.


    "Well, then lets make a deal", he proposed after a while, seeing as she''d run out of arguments.


    "A deal?"


    "In order to ensure both our interests are well met in this way of living."


    "If you say marriage again...", she frowned.


    "Simply a deal. See it as whatever you will", he grinned.


    "Let''s hear it then."


    "The two of us will never part ways. And when the time comes...only we can kill each other."


    With that, he brought her possibilities down to one. That was to be expected. A man like him always acted in his own interest. It was his win. She hated letting him have his way. It all sounded so hopeless to her.


    "Whatever the hell? Sounds just like marriage to me", she murmured.


    "Then let''s seal the deal", he said, getting up from his seat.


    "I haven''t exactly agreed yet", she replied, but went completely ignored.


    The wind blew in like a freezing sharp knife, cutting through the threads of tension that had lingered in that almost empty bedroom for years.


    He sat on the bed near her head and leaned right down into her vision. Before she knew it, he imparted a kiss, the warmth of which lingered for a while before the wind swept it away.


    Indeed, it was something like marriage, after all.

 Edge of the World

    "How could I forget?"


    She wondered, standing on the precipice.


    "I''ve been here before."


    She knew that feeling in her heart. It was a tumultuous uprising in her chest, like a knife turning inside her. The suffocation made her want to puke. Her vision was blurry, her head heavy, and the rest of her numb.


    "She''s got neither shame, nor fear, nor any common sense to be let out. She''s a danger to the world."


    Those words were always in the back of her head. She wished she hadn''t heard them. Back then, she put on her headphones and turned the volume up. She wanted to shut every other voice out.


    That''s right. She wasn''t made for this world.


    "If only I hadn''t been born into this family...in this house," she muttered to herself before closing her eyes.


    This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.


    What is it that makes one a danger to the world? Their capability to bring harm to others?  In all her years, she''d learned that it was the ability to hurt oneself without batting an eye that made one dangerous to the world.


    Impulse? No, she always put a lot of thought into what she did. She just wanted to be free.


    "But I''m not," she said to herself, standing on the edge of the precipice.


    A whole new world spans before you with infinite horizons and a blue you could never have imagined in the darkness of your void. And yet, just flapping your wings away isn''t enough to make you fly towards that freedom that awaits before your eyes.


    In all rationality, you are perfectly aware that any leap you make from here on out will just be a fall into the deepest abyss. You stand there with your arms extended, hoping to catch some sort of meaning, some reason, some satisfaction from having lived. But all you find is a cold wind unwilling to accept you.


    So do you just continue to stand there? And yet, you must have realized by now that there is no turning back. After all, where could you even go? You have no place to call home. No one is waiting for you. And the world is better off without you.


    And anyway, is the abyss so bad? You do not have to struggle anymore. You do not need to find a place. You do not need to belong. You are free now to let it all end. After all, the world ceases to exist when you die. There''s no meaning in all those trivialities when you''re standing on the precipice.


    Don''t forget that it''s only a matter of time. You can stall the ultimate outcome all you want, but it all comes down to the same thing. The abyss awaits. The endless horizons sneer at you. You haven''t grown any wings in 100 million years. Life forgot about you.


    So then, do you still choose to make it wait? Do you stall any further? What for? Isn''t that precipice the most suffocating of all? Just one step and you''ll be free.


    Why don''t you jump? Whatever heavens you''re holding on to have abandoned you. God won''t save you. And that''s because you cannot be saved. The abyss is the only thing that can salvage your remains.


    Give in. Isn''t it enough yet?


    The echo spread around and returned to her.


    "It is," she muttered before letting the wind sweep her down into the gorge.

 Pupa

    Tuesday the 13th, Morning, 10 o''clock (I think)


    Dear Diary,


    Today I found something wonderful in the yard. You won''t believe it. It''s the most unlikely thing to find in the yard. It was a girl, just standing there. That''s right. That''s how I found her, just standing there. I didn''t know what she was doing there or how she''d gotten there. But that''s how I found her. I''ll tell you her name¡ªI asked her. I saw her standing there, and I asked her name. And she told me. Her name''s...


    Hold on, my momma is calling me for dinner. I''ll be right back.


    Friday the 23rd, Evening, 5:54


    Dear Diary,


    I''m back. I forgot that my momma has been dead a long time. She couldn''t have been calling me from downstairs. It''s just a ghost of her that lives there. I''ll tell you about her. See, the ghost or not, momma is still momma. But anyway, she made food and she was calling me for dinner. Dinner was good. It''s always good. I don''t like it. Dinner''s always good. Sometimes I want to eat something not so good, just so I can draw a comparison, and then I''ll know how good a good dinner really is.


    But ghost momma doesn''t understand that, of course. She thinks I''m ungrateful and very unhelpful. But my room is upstairs, so I can''t possibly help her in the kitchen, can I? She doesn''t like anything I do. But my momma was the same, so it''s not ghost momma that''s wrong.


    But did you know I keep finding hair in the food lately? Hair in everything. In the bread, in the chicken, in the jam, everywhere I find hair.


    So I told her about the hair. I told her it''s everywhere.


    "Well, it must be yours, inni'' like?"


    She said that very surely, but I was shocked.


    "How could it be mine, mama?"


    I asked her very calmly because she''d get started if I said anything more.


    "My hair''s not that fair though, is it?"


    "And mine''s not so long, mama."


    But she wouldn''t get it. She kept saying it was my hair in the food. But how could it be mine? She says it flies everywhere. And now she finds hair in her food too. And every day she finds hair and scolds me for it.


    What do you say? Should I cut my hair off? All of it? I don''t like hair. But momma says girls are supposed to have long hair.


    I forgot to brush my teeth. I can''t sleep if I don''t brush my teeth. I''ll be right back.


    P.S. I hate Artie. He''s my brother. I''ll tell you about him later.


    Monday the 26th, Morning, 8:43


    Dear Diary,


    I''m going to call you Diane. It''s the name I gave you last summer. I''ll call you Diane again.


    Dear Diane,


    Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.


    Do you like your name? I like your name. I wish I had a name like that. It reminds me of fur coats. I would like a fur coat, Diane. I''ve never had a fur coat. I''ve never seen one either. But I read about it in a book. I can''t find my book, Diane. I lost it in the tree house. And momma doesn''t let me go out into the yard anymore.


    Do you think it''s because of that girl? Oh, I haven''t told you about that girl yet, Diane. I found her in the yard. But momma doesn''t know about the girl. So I don''t think it''s about her, Diane.


    I meant to tell you about my brother as well.


    I hate Artie. I think it''s unfair that he got to leave while I''m still locked up here. But it''s been a long time since he left, so I don''t hate him anymore. I try not to think of Artie.


    Artie never came back. I thought he would, but he never did. And he never wrote a letter either. Momma was waiting for him. Not ghost momma¡ªthe real momma. She was waiting for him before she died.


    Artie said he''d build another floor for the tree house. But then he left. The tree house doesn''t have another floor. Don''t you think it''s unfair to want him to come back to this lock up?


    You''re right, Diane. I don''t hate him for leaving. I don''t hate him for not coming back. But when Artie left, momma built the walls high up. So even from my window, I can''t see much beyond the wall, even though my window is so high up. And she had a tree planted right in front of my window so I couldn''t look out. Now it''s grown all in front, so I can''t see anything.


    And then momma died.


    And I was telling you about Pupa. She''s the girl I met in the yard. I''ll tell you about her tomorrow, Diane.


    Tuesday the 27th, Morning, 9:01


    Dearest Diane,


    As promised, I''m here on time today to tell you about Pupa.


    If this is the way the world has decided to be, then fine, suit yourself.


    I read that somewhere in a book. That book is probably lost now. I can never find a book I''ve read once. It''s still probably out there somewhere, so it''s not that lost.


    But here I am going on about something else again. I was going to tell you about Pupa. I''m sure by now you must be really curious, Diane. Well, you should be. Pupa is amazing.


    But before I tell you about her, I should tell you about her progress from the other day. Well, I must say, it''s been over a week, and Pupa''s just been standing there. I''m no longer allowed to go out into the yard anymore, but I caught a glimpse of her from my window. If I lean very far, I can see her in the yard.


    And she''s still there. Pupa doesn''t say a thing. It wasn''t that she told me her name, but I knew it anyway. I know her name''s Pupa. You have to believe me, Diane.


    Anyway, the other day see, when I could still go into the yard, I asked her a lot of things and told her about myself. I was digging for worms, and I told her she could join me. But she didn''t. That''s okay, I wasn''t mad. She was happy just standing there.


    And she just watched me doing it. She didn''t stop me like momma does. She just watched me without saying anything. It looks like she''s waiting for something. But why in our yard? I like her. I''m glad she''s in our yard.


    Why do I like her, you say, Diane? Well, she doesn''t talk, but I know she understands everything.


    P.S. I found a bucket full of worms that day¡ªa record to show Artie.


    Thursday the 29th, Afternoon, 4:56


    Dear Diane,


    It''s a rain day today. Every other day is a rain day. Rain makes all the worms come out. But I have to wait for the sun day to catch worms. I''m not allowed in the yard still, so I don''t care about the rain day.


    Only, I hope Pupa is alright. She''s been standing there ever since. I lean very far out of my window, and if it isn''t windy, and the tree isn''t moving so much, I can see her. But I''ll fall right down into the yard if I lean so far out for too long.


    But I can''t be in the yard, so I can''t watch Pupa for too long.


    Why do I like her, you ask, Diane?


    Well, she''s the prettiest in the whole wide world.


    Though I''ve not seen the whole wide world, I''ve only ever seen Momma and Artie, and they''re both pretty. But Pupa is the prettiest in the whole wide world. You''ve got to believe me, Diane.


    Of course, I think you''re pretty too. But I wasn''t counting you there for a second, Diane. I wasn''t counting me either. We''re talking, so we don''t need to count ourselves, do we, Diane?


    And here I was telling you why she''s the prettiest in the whole wide world.


    I''ll tell you why that is.


    Pupa is endless.


    Pupa is an army of camellias on a green hedge wall.


    Pupa is silent.


    Pupa is golden Damask on a red wall.


    Pupa is a Russian matryoshka doll without a face.


    Pupa is doors. Infinite doors. All in succession.


    Pupa is eyes. Blue eyes. And red eyes. Blinking. Grey eyes. Red eyes.


    And it is Pupa that is the flickering light in those eyes.


    Pupa is the child that just woke up.


    Pupa is sleepy. No, she''s sleep itself.


    Pupa is roots. Infinite roots. All the way up into the sky.


    Pupa is a river flowing into the flaming sky.


    Pupa is the red fox on a bridge.


    Pupa is the last frontier of all mankind.


    Pupa is the flowing sliver hair of the moon.


    Pupa is blue. A better blue than all the skies.


    Pupa is a rainbow of all the people. All the people with their eyes set on her.


    Pupa is bewilderment.


    Pupa is the red lips.


    Pupa is the wide-eyed stare.


    Pupa is the half-opened mouth.


    Pupa is the mole on milk-white skin.


    Pupa is the infinite depth of the eyes.


    Pupa is the wind that flows.


    Pupa is the voice that is calling. Always.


    Pupa is the one that returns.


    Pupa is the last smile.


    Pupa is the glowing butterfly in the night sky.


    Pupa is the sound of a silent farewell.

 To Your Beautiful

    She looked down as a ball of fur stroked her leg. A momentary jolt of surprise seized her as the little thing circled her legs, rubbing against them affectionately. She was alarmed by the warmth of it. Stooping down, she petted the cat. It purred under her touch.


    A Norwegian Forest cat. A friendly animal. She looked to see whether the window in the kitchen had been left open, but it was fastened securely. She¡¯d have noticed if it weren¡¯t¡ªthe bitter cold outside would¡¯ve made it obvious.


    The Wegie, after having its fill of love, left her standing alone and cozied up on a pillow near the fireplace. She stood and watched it as it curled up into a furball.


    Her mother''s house hadn''t changed a bit. Still the posh hangings, that overwhelming parlor, the paintings, that hideous Greek bust, and an inexhaustible list of foreign curios in the study. Only the kitchen was as plain as a blank notebook, perhaps because it had been redone only a few years ago and whoever took it upon himself to do it didn''t care much for the antiquity of it.


    In her prime, her mother was an ardent follower of the trends. And yet, at some point, she seemed to have gotten stuck in some time.


    She poked the fire to warm the room up for the cat. On the mantlepiece was that ancient snow globe her mother always brought out on Christmas. It was a wedding gift, a man and woman dancing in their bridal attire.


    Her mother used to say it would bring good luck to the children when it was their time to marry and keep her own marriage a happy one. This Christmas, it was quite pointless to bring it out. Her father had died an year ago. And she was the only one among the children to show up. The rest were all married, while she never planned to.


    In the corner of the room stood a tiny, richly adorned Christmas tree. She had always hated it, even as a child. It was too extravagant. She preferred it without all the lavish ornamentation. But her mother was adamant on making a bride out of it.


    The cat purred softly, wrapping its tail ever so close to itself. She watched it sleeping for a while, before deciding to check on her mother finally.


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    Her mother¡¯s bedroom door was ajar, as usual. She sat by the bed, its plain white sheets giving the room a stark, almost clinical feel, as if her mother was dying. She sat there in a sort of silent mourning, fiddling with her thumbs. Long ago, she''d lost the courage to look her mother in the eye.


    "Erin...the water", her mother muttered, stirring.


    She quickly fetched a glass, then sat back down. The room fell silent again, save for the faint sound of her nails etching into each other.


    "Is that... your cat?", Erin asked, hesitantly, a nervous drop of sweat formed on her forehead.


    Her mother nodded with a coy smile. It pricked Erin.


    She found herself drifting back to that rainy day when she stood under the maple tree in the yard with an umbrella as the downpour overwhelmed the world.


    And before her lay the carcass of the kitten, helplessly sprawled with its head a little bloody but getting washed away in the merciless cold rain.


    In the lifeless eyes of that kitten, she saw her own reflection and she felt that it was her, lying there, helpless.


    "Why?", she asked her mother after a pause.


    "Why?", her mother repeated, perplexed.


    "I thought you didn''t like cats."


    "Well, she is beautiful, isn''t she?. So sweet and lovely", her mother chuckled, thinking of her dear Wegie that lay asleep in the parlor.


    Erin bit her lip. That was it, wasn''t it?


    That morning, atop the tree, when Erin had fed a sickly little kitten, she felt she''d never been kind before. This was her first act of goodness in the world. And a tiny flicker of hope, a desire to give back had emerged within her. As the little kitten dragged itself to the bowl of milk and slowly lapped it up, she smiled with a warmth she had not yet known inside herself.


    "Why do you care so much?", her mother had asked, disapprovingly.


    "It''ll go away when it''s eaten", Erin had replied, her eyes lowered, her hands clasped behind her back.


    Even though Erin never met her eyes, she still remembered the scowl on her face that morning.


    "That ugly thing!", her mother had snarled, slamming the door.


    The "ugly thing" was thrown off the tree branch with a hoe that evening. Its head split open on impact. It was far too weak to recover from the fall.


    No one mourned it, of course. The clouds perhaps? Because they didn''t stop pouring the whole next day.


    There were no questions to be asked, no atonements to be made, no apologies, no anger, no outbursts of frustration, no exchange of bitter words. For, after all, it was a mere "ugly thing".


    "I''m moving to Milan next month. I don''t think I''ll be here for next Christmas, Mother", Erin said quietly, her voice drained of life.


    "Eh? Well, when will you be back?", her mother asked, stirring slightly.


    Erin pursed her lips, still staring at her hands, fiddling in her lap.


    "I can''t say", in truth, she never intended to return, "I''ll go to Paris and then Auvers... perhaps."


    "Why? What for?", her mother started up.


    "For Van Gogh", she whispered, hesitantly, almost choking up.


    "Who?"


    "Van Gogh. The painter?", she spoke nervously, visibly agitated.


    "Vincent van Gogh, you mean? Are you... out of your mind? For some dead man?!", her mother blasted, forgetting all about her earlier weakness.


    "Well...", she tilted her head, smiling bitterly, digging her nails into her palms, "He''s beautiful, isn''t he?"

 Disorderly Houses

    My mother died before I was born.


    I was cut out from her belly and for the whole ordeal, they called her ''a bad woman''.


    At first, I mistakenly thought she had been called cruel for giving life. As it turns out, it was cruelty to have taken life. And an even bigger one to have attempted to take one.


    You see, she killed herself.


    No one knew who my father was. The ladies at the house took it upon themselves to raise me. Luckily, I was a girl. Had I been a boy, they couldn''t have kept me in that place. And then perhaps, in the cold winter of ''40, I would have died in some dark lonely alley where strays and orphans were left for cats and dogs.


    Because the world waged war endlessly, you could always hear someone calling another a bad person. So when they called my mother a cruel woman, I thought it was merely because she had taken life.


    But as I grew older, I realized that the other women in the house, whom I considered my big sisters, were also bad women.


    How could they be bad? They dressed so beautifully every day. Everyone who came to the house to see them was always happy. They were always laughing. Even as the world burned outside our door, the men who visited were happy because of the women of the house. They drank, laughed, and slept soundly, always looking content when they left in the morning.


    I wanted to be like them. Like all my big sisters who raised me. They were always kind.


    If I could be as kind, beautiful, and happy as them... if I could make all the people happy too... if only...


    Some nights, as I lay awake, staring at the ceiling, I wonder why they called her a cruel woman. Even though I never met her, sometimes, I miss my mother.


    I would tell her she was right. I would tell her she was far too kind. I would tell her she wasn''t a bad woman.


    Most of the girls were sold to the house, and those who weren¡¯t had no other place to go. With the men off to war, killing each other, women and children were left to fend for themselves. When the war ended, so many homes were left empty.


    At first, they would cry. I thought they felt betrayed. But in truth, they cried because they had nowhere left to go, because they were forced by the only thing they had left: they were women.


    Natalie was 16, four years older than me, when her crippled, drunken brother sold her to that place. She was the first girl close to my age that I ever met, and so we became fast friends. She was the one who kept me away from this business for as long as she could.


    She had red hair and a spirit just as fiery. Despite everything, she never wavered. She taught me everything about the world I had never seen and was never going to see. Most of it sounded like a fantasy. Even among all my big sisters, she seemed so different to me. There was a genuineness unique to her that I never could forget.


    She died when I was 16. She fell in love. That was a stupid mistake. I could never imagine someone as smart as her would fall victim to such a malady. And yet, she never looked like she regretted any bit of it. Not even when he told her he could never be with a ''bad woman'' like her.


    Natalie told me that night, that all it took to be a bad woman was a man. A woman on her own couldn''t do a thing that was bad. But men would always find a way to make her a bad woman.


    I didn''t understand. The next morning, I failed at trying to wake her up.


    Her grave wasn''t marked because no one was ever going to visit her. I learned how fleeting it all was. Everything that was sublime was inevitably transient.


    Because I was born there, the route my life was to take had already been set in stone. I wasn''t sent to school. The women at the house couldn''t afford it. No one wanted to give a decent job to anyone who hailed from a disorderly house.


    It wasn''t hard to see. Some of my big sisters often sighed.


    "You''re born into this... this cesspit. You poor angel", they''d say.


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    I helped around the house chores and if that was all my life amounted to, I wouldn''t have cared. I was much too caught up in the lives of my big sisters. I was busy, watching. But a girl''s gotta grow up, don''t she?


    And when she grows up, it''s not a woman that dictates her life. It''s always men.


    When I was 20, I thought of Natalie. Soon, I was going to leave her behind. I hadn''t even fallen in love like her. And I knew it was too late. I had stopped feeling things. When I looked in the mirror, a stranger stared back. How suddenly a girl becomes a woman, it''s unforgivable.


    No woman at the house lived a full age. Some died of diseases, some killed themselves over failed loves, some were simply driven mad by the possibility of getting old.


    I dreamed I was a child again, lying in the greenest lawn of a house on a street lined with an endless array of similar homes, all brightly painted and full of life. My cat slept on my stomach, curled into a ball. The sun shone on my face, and we were at peace. Then we heard a roadkill, and we rushed to the now-empty road. My cat mourned it, for it was her kitten. I mourned too, and flowers bloomed from the carcass. While we stood there on the road, I realized that what had been killed wasn¡¯t the kitten, but my cat. And I was all alone. Yet still, I mourned. And still, the flowers bloomed.


    At 23, I gave up on trying to be a good woman. The best thing was to simply forget. I couldn¡¯t bear calling fate cruel. It seemed like a simple escape, a balm for the soul, something that might have soothed some of the suffering. But I wasn¡¯t willing to give up even a grain of my pain for a placebo. After all, it was the only thing left in the world that truly belonged to me. I wouldn¡¯t have parted with that emptiness, even if my life depended on it.


    Then I met Alfie. He was a sailor. He spoke of the sea and everything he had seen in the world. He was younger than me and more innocent than the others. I took a liking to him because he spoke of his world, not mine. He showed me a dream¡ªthe first I had ever known in my life. It was a dream of freedom, a beautiful illusion of a wide sky above and an infinite ocean stretching before me.


    For a while, I forgot what Natalie had told me. I foolishly grew wings, not realizing how fragile they were. I asked him if I could go with him.


    "It''s hard work, a ship. And you''re... you''re just a girl."


    Well, I thought, even if just for a short while, perhaps I had been an ordinary girl, like Natalie. Just for a while, I had dreamed. And that had been enough. I understood why she hadn''t had any regrets. So was I going to end up the same way as her? No, I wasn''t going to let life have the last laugh. Regardless, whatever hope there once was had now extinguished.


    Alfie sailed away that winter and it was the last I saw of him. I turned 24 with the first snow that year.


    And like every year, I thought of my mother. But this year, for the first time, I also wondered about my father.


    I was now curious. Not because I expected anything from it, but simply because I wondered why my mother hadn¡¯t gotten rid of me sooner. Why did she only think of killing me when it was too late?


    Most of my big sisters were now gone. Perhaps, I should have asked the question earlier. I soon realized the only one who could answer that question was the madam of the house.


    She was a tough woman, and I always had a sense that she disliked me. So, I had always avoided her as best I could. It took courage to face her.


    "Those of us who don''t die young become madams. There''s barely any that make it to old age like me. In a way, I think it''s good. Hopeful as I''d like to sound, the truth is bitter for us. We must not hope. We must not feel. That sort of luxury isn''t for us. You get out of this life as soon as you can. The ones that die are lucky", she was smoking her long jade pipe as usual when I found her in her office.


    I stood before her perfectly still.


    "You know, your mother was cruel."


    "I think what she did was nothing but kindness. Of all the people, I thought you''d understand", I answered, bitterly but somewhat monotonously.


    She sniggered, "She wasn''t cruel because she tried to take your life with her own. She was cruel because she gave birth to a girl."


    In that house, regardless of what you were born as, a boy or a girl, your life went to the dogs, in the end. The only thing that made one life worth more than the other was how long you got to live it. And in this case, the shorter, the better.


    There was nothing left to say. I clenched my fist, gritted my teeth, dug my nails into my palms, and yet I could not escape the truth in her words.


    She told me who my father was. Contrary to what I had expected, he was a general in the army. Not a mere drunk, but a respectable man. He was already married when he met my mother.


    He quickly grew fond of her and visited her regularly. Perhaps, when he was posted to the border, my mother chose to wait for him.


    In November of 1940, he went missing during the air raids that claimed hundreds of lives. I suppose my mother was certain he would never return. So she hastened to join him. After all, a "bad" woman couldn''t expect to raise a child alone in a world so bent on destroying itself. And after giving birth, her career in the house was already over. She had nowhere left to go... once again.


    The madam showed me his photo in a newspaper. It was a coverage of his daughter''s wedding. He looked happy. His daughter, too.


    I looked at the madam, bitter and mortified. And I bet she could read it written all over my face: ''It could have been me.''


    I could have planted myself before him and demanded my right as his daughter. I could have asked him for everything a child ought to ask their parent. I could have leveraged my mother''s love for him and demanded a good life for myself.


    But I didn''t. Of course, I didn''t. That was a different world. If I parted with the filth that had become of me, would I have remained myself? If I were happy, would I even be me?


    The house fell on hard times briefly. But nothing changes in this business. People simply find new ways.


    Beneath those layers of pretty, smiling faces, my big sisters had all been suffering in the same way. But they never once complained, so defeated were they. I never saw them cry. Come to think of it, I never cried either.


    Every morning, as I woke up to an empty bed beside me and some crumpled notes on the side table, I could feel myself slipping away. Now more than ever, I thought of my mother.


    I knew I''d never get to be as old as her. She was 32 when she died. But I wasn''t going to throw myself off the roof like her. The idea of letting some passing wind swoop me down seemed too much.


    But I knew when the end loomed in front of me, I''d let myself be taken without any resistance. The only thing I feared was getting a disease. It rots the body. Those women suffer till the end and they don''t even get a burial. They get shovelled into some dark cranny where they die like a dog.


    The house burnt down when I was 27.


    Most of the girls, myself included, didn''t even leave our rooms. There was no point. This was the finish line for our lives anyway. Even if we''d run to safety, there was nothing left anymore. This was our last frontier.


    I tried to get a young one out but she clung to her bed so fiercely that I could feel my own resolve slipping away. I sat down beside her. The fire didn''t burn us. We''d gotten used to hell a long time ago.


    I gave up, even though I hated the smell of burning flesh. I sat in my own smoke, smiling and laughing in the face of the last embers of life. I had won. I had the last laugh.


    Needless to say, you needn''t mourn us. This is not a story that should be told. Just know that I missed the house, the green lawn, the sun, and the warmth of my cat¡ªthings I never had. Yet, I missed them all the same.


    My mother wasn''t cruel.


    My big sisters weren''t bad women.


    No one chose this.


    And me? Well, what else could I do? I was just a girl, after all.

 Take Care

    "Self-care is currency."


    The ticker rolls on, followed by similar brand slogans that sound like piss dripping into your ear. Those skyscrapers they built in the middle of this slum are only there to jeer in our haggard, anemic faces, to show us the difference between us and... them. Those self-care wretched bastards!


    Ever since the machines took over the job market, you had to be a genius to land a job. And if you filled the position in, you could live in the lap of luxury until you turned 60 or died. That meant, the position only opened twice or thrice a century. You can only imagine where that would have landed the rest of the people.


    So the government started this hogwash.


    "Self-care is currency."


    God, I could puke just thinking about it. Of course, at first everyone jumped at the idea. You''d get paid simply by sitting in front of a mirror and pruning yourself like a goddamned houseplant.


    What humanity didn''t know was how addicted it was to hurting itself. Sleeping in, or not sleeping enough, drinking, smoking, having a bad posture, forgetting to cut your nails, forgetting to comb, wearing an old unwashed shirt, eating pizza from last night, piercing your nose, getting a tattoo, wearing socks to bed.


    The list goes on. As you can tell, it''s filled to the brim with bullcrap. Most people couldn''t keep up. They tumbled and tumbled and tumbled down like children. One stupid mistake could whirl their minds so bad, they''d obsessively start hurting themselves.


    You know how it goes, it''s all or nothing.


    It wasn''t long before we ended up where we are now: a kilometer-wide radius occupied by skyscrapers and ten kilometers of utterly putrid slums.


    We sit in out dark dinghy apartments with ceilings ready to cave in, waiting for Sunday. The day of God''s blessings, when rations are given out.


    Most of the nutcases in the slums smoke away any and all cents they make. That includes me, of course. Reasons may vary, but I''d be lying if I said I wasn''t the bottom of the rung in the slum.


    I was sure, this morning too, as I dressed up to get my measly share, that it was going to be the same as last week. That same old overcoat that stunk of smoke, booze, and ashes; I dusted it as much as I could before putting it on.


    As I locked the door of my worthless abode, I could hear the little girl from downstairs, getting ready for rations. Perhaps she thinks she''s doing a mighty good job. Anything she earns is wasted away by her old man on cheap liquor. Somehow, she''s excited every damn week.


    I decided to wait until she''d left with her mother, but the fifty three locks they had on their door, took a long time to fasten.


    "Ave!", the little cretin leapt up as soon as she caught sight of me descending the steps.


    "Well, hello Julia", I sounded as disinterested as was possible, "Mirian."


    I even tipped my hat to the mother who was working on the locks. I always figured they kept a treasure map inside. Mirian looked weaker than last week; I knew her tuberculosis was acting up. She wasn''t one for sticking around. I couldn''t sympathize with Julia. That was every other person in that hellhole, losing a parent who couldn''t care for themselves. In the end, self-care was only for lonely people.


    "How many do you think you''ll get this time?", Julia sounded very confident with her numbers, as she swung on my arm.


    "Well, I don''t know, kiddo. Maybe two packs... three, if I''m lucky. That''s the most I can manage", I answered candidly.


    "I''m saving up, Ave!", she announced, "Then I can go to the Sunside!"


    Sunside. That''s what they called that place with skyscrapers. Because only those people got to live in the sun. All the rest of us were ghosts in dark places.


    "Whaddaya know? That''s what I saved up for too", I swung her around once before putting her down, "Now, run on, kiddo."


    I searched inside my coat pocket for a chance of a forgotten cigarette. But it was a disappointment. I had lost one to the rain two nights ago, hence I was empty this morning.


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    I spared Mirian a glance who was having a bout of coughing while Julia frolicked around in the puddles from two nights ago. I decided it was best to make myself scarce.


    Right as I left the complex, the two cleaning machines rolled in.


    "For glory!", they would yell in a robotic voice, when they found a piece of trash that could be eliminated.


    They were about as high as a trash can and roamed around all over the slums, cleaning the endless flood of refuse. Some days, they even prevented the people from acting like rodents. Like the fellow last week that had to part from his Johnny for peeing in a bush. You can''t blame a drunk. But the cleaning machines can. These machines are called Souji, whatever that means.


    I passed down the little alley and made my way towards the rationing tent. Instead of taking the road, where chances of running into fellow slum folk were high, I took the narrow passages. On Sunday, everyone avoided each other. Because on Sunday, you couldn''t excuse yourself for having nothing. Most wise ones, like myself, bought the cigarettes for the entire week on Sunday. That way, you didn''t have to worry about lendin'' money.


    It was great that it had rained earlier, so most folk didn''t want to go into the puddles of the narrow ways, and I was able to make it to the tent, undisturbed.


    "Mr. Bon Avery, please refrain from stepping over the line, and remove your hand from the window."


    "Oh, am I dirtying your window? Don''t be a stick in the mud, Dandelion. Don''t we go back a ways", I sniggered.


    "Mr. Bon Avery, please step behind the line, so I can clear your dues", she was more a robot than those clunky things.


    "C''mon Dandelion, hon'', do you gotta be so cold?", I could pull out that depravity when it meant I could benefit from it.


    "Mr. Bon Avery, please step behind the line."


    But boy, was she persistent.


    "You know, my dear, this is why I dumped you. You''re as cold as ice", indeed, I had been her beau until around a month ago, "Do they keep you warm up in their towers?"


    Some miracle had landed her a job and she''d flown off like the Dandelion she was.


    "Here''s your ration for the week, Mr. Avery", she slid a coin down the counter.


    One coin. A quarter pack of cigarettes.


    I stared at the coin, turned it over, weighed it in my hand. No matter how I examined it, it looked like an absolute bloody joke.


    "And where''s the rest of it, Dandy?", I tried to keep my composure.


    "That''ll be all, Mr. Avery. Please move on to your left."


    "Hey, Dandy, I''m not done. I asked a question", I leaned against the window, sticking my head inside her little cabin.


    "Mr. Bon Avery, please stay behind the white line and keep moving to the left", she repeated.


    "Don''t mess with me, you goddamned metalhead whore! You think you''re hot shit sitting up there? Your head''s the same filth as this slum, Dandy! The same bloody filth!", and as I was hauled away by a robot guard, I made sure to tell her, "And you''ll never escape that, ya hear?! NEVER!"


    I shook off the guards and darted off into the filth to hide somewhere or drown. Although it may have seemed like an outburst, it was all according to design.


    I knew Dandy. She had low esteem, a fragile ego. She was so easy to hurt, a child could have done it. And once you put something in her head, it kept spinning in there until it drove her crazy. In short, she was a classic nutcase.


    She''d jumped off the roof of my apartment once, but the Souji prevented it. She never hit the ground. The landing would have made quite the splash, a mess to clean, so the machines took action.


    If not for her unquestionable ''genius'', she wouldn''t have left the slum. I knew when she landed that job, that it wasn''t a wisecrack they wanted up at Sunside. They wanted people like her. Weak people.


    I knew my outburst would mess her mind. Once the mind is messed, the body follows. I couldn''t wait to see her defeated look when she was thrown back into the slum. Then I''d tell her she should have given me my two packs. And I knew, this time she''d definitely go down with a splash.


    I loitered around town, having got my quarter pack of cigarettes and went to the bar, only to sit and watch the defeated faces of people.


    "Ave Bon Avery, sire", the barkeep was a jolly guy, "How goes it, milord?"


    "Quarter pack, Tony", I showed him, sitting down at the bar.


    "Oh, that''s a new low, Avery boy!", he laughed, "A fine day for Chateau Margaux."


    He pulled out the expensive looking wine bottle and set it on the table. The Sunside didn''t drink. The slums couldn''t pay. All that fancy alcohol was a treasure to be claimed. And people like Tony had ways of obtaining them.


    "They''ll all be here sooner or later", he giggled, "Sunday''s the day for good ol'' Tony."


    Tony was the only guy in the slums with any mass over him. He was quite big, in fact, with a protruding front and all. Who knows where he ate, while we fed on roaches.


    You must wonder why we lived at all, if such was life, so terribly meek. It would have been easy enough for us all to throw ourselves off our roofs like Dandy. There''s only so many of us that the Souji can save. But no one here wants to die.


    Maybe its because we''ve all been living as dead people. And if people really want that which they don''t have, then by all means, for us, it''s life. That''s what we''re lacking.


    I saw a woman from Sunside once. She was weak. Frailer than anyone in the slums. And she was as pale as the snow. She had forgotten how to speak. It hurt her if she touched anything. So she lived inside a bubble. She couldn''t really see my face from behind the screen. But I could see her. And I wondered what she would think if she could see me too. I think, that woman would have wanted to die.


    After chewing the cud with Tony for a while, I made myself absent as soon as the crowd started pouring in the bar.


    Every Sunday, I went around after the distribution to see who had made it. Most days, the results were the same. I couldn''t understand why the folk took it so hard, though. Perhaps because most of them had families.


    "There he is!", they''d point at me when I passed by, "That''s our sonny boy! Nothing gets Ave!"


    I would just grin and go on while they cheered for me. Indeed, I didn''t care what Sunside or the government or their gods or whoever else thought of me. I was going to smoke like a chimney and destroy myself in the process.


    Without hurting oneself, you can''t live. You can''t call yourself human at all. Like that woman from Sunside. I often thought of her on Sundays. It was as if she was the reason I continued to stay awake in that filthy corner of the world.


    It was around sunset when I got back to the complex.


    "Don''t look, Julia", a man was sitting on the ground, cradling something in his bony arms, "Don''t look."


    Julia stood petrified just a little ways off. On closer inspection, I realized it was her father. And what he was cradling was Mirian. I had an urge to just stay back and watch but the look on Julia''s face made me reveal myself. I walked up to the father and stooped down to look at Mirian. The sun was setting, we were in the dark.


    Mirian was motionless, a trail of blood followed down the side of her face.


    "What''re you waiting for?", I asked the man.


    "Souji", he answered.


    I''d never seen him sober. He was quite hideous, all bones and a thin transparent skin.


    "Ave...", Julia''s voice broke from behind me.


    Perhaps she was hoping I could bring her mother back to life somehow.


    "Why don''t you take her away?", I murmured to the father whose name I didn''t know.


    He probably couldn''t carry her.


    "Ave...", Julia was sobbing.


    I straightened up, standing between her and Mirian, so as to restrict her view with my great old coat.


    "Ave...", she kept on sobbing, "Did you make it to Sunside?"


    I stood speechless for a minute, while she wept, waiting for an answer. Unearthing the pack of cigarettes from my pocket, I lit one up and took a deep drag, my first one that Sunday.


    "Aye, kiddo", I walked up to her and ruffled her hair, "I did."


    She broke into tears and clung to me, burying her head.

 Once, Betrayal

    Time moves slower for things that move at a greater speed.


    It seemed true to her as she sat in the white lobby that smelled of nothing but alcohol and old people. She fixed the hem of her rusty skirt for the umpteenth time. It had never occurred to her that the world was a terribly slow place.


    There were no clocks in the lobby, but the glass window gave a full view of the sun. Before she realized it, whole seasons had passed. For a long time, it felt as though she hadn''t moved at all.


    "Ms. Belice," a nurse in a baby-pink uniform appeared in the doorway. "He''ll see you now."


    She nodded as the nurse hurried away. Taking three deep breaths, she felt nothing. Feeling encumbered, she left her tote bag on the sofa chairs in the lobby and followed the nurse.


    "And how are you today, Ms. Belice?" the doctor with an exceptionally pointy nose asked.


    She wondered why Jews had pointy noses. She¡¯d seen it in movies, but apparently, real Jews were the same. She wondered if the body knew it belonged to a Jew.


    He¡¯d moved her appointment up this month because of Yom Kippur, which she knew nothing about except that it was a religious holiday. Though she didn¡¯t care much for these appointments, the change in schedule had messed up her plans.


    Today, she was supposed to go to a bathhouse. Her landlady had told her that certain bath salts at a certain inn atop a certain mountain would be good for her condition. Of course, the lady knew nothing about her condition, but she was at that age where women start to feel they¡¯ve seen enough of the world to make a judgment about anything and everything. Not that it bothered her, of course¡ªshe knew the landlady meant well. And besides, the lady had brought her an apple pie last week, which she¡¯d never had in her life.


    The appointment always went the same way. She¡¯d lose the doctor after precisely the first question¡ªwhich was always, "And how are you today, Ms. Belice?"¡ªand then he¡¯d proceed to explain all sorts of worldly and otherworldly things that she knew nothing about.


    When it was over, he would expressly get up and shake her hand vigorously for a long time, nodding his head and saying what sounded like gibberish, words she was too lethargic to make sense of. Then, he would fix his glasses and bow his sparkling shaved head¡ªa sight she always had a full view of while standing because she easily towered over him, though not because she was particularly gigantic.


    The gist of all these arduous and customary explanations, she assumed, was a breakdown of her life expectancy. She wouldn¡¯t have cared if the doctor came out and told her she had eighteen months left of her brief, unfulfilling life instead of ranting about everything she couldn¡¯t even begin to grasp. But since he was so enthusiastic, she reckoned he looked forward to these appointments, so she made it a point to show up every time. It would have made no difference to her if he had just stared at her face the whole time.


    The hospital had never been so vacant before. There wasn¡¯t a sound in the corridor as she paced toward the lobby, passing by the lone nurse at the reception counter. They nodded to each other, and she moved on.


    The reddening sun peeked through the window as she walked into the lobby. Her tote bag sat solemnly in the same place she had left it. The warmth of the day wafted up from the earth outside. She noticed a few plastic hand fans near the window¡ªprobably there for the old folk.


    She picked up her tote bag, which she had meant to take to the bathhouse. Feeling the weight of the scarce items on her shoulder, she decided that night was as good a time as any to visit the bathhouse atop a certain mountain.


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    Perhaps it was the time of day, or maybe nobody wanted to be out¡ªthe roads were all empty. It almost looked like a ghost town. She could feel the touch of time as it passed her by. The sun slowly set, the street lamps flickered on, and moths started to buzz around them.


    She didn¡¯t hasten toward her destination. After all, she was going to get there one way or another.


    She had never once thought about the appointments after leaving the hospital threshold, but today was different. For some reason, she couldn¡¯t get the nurse¡¯s lush blonde hair or the doctor¡¯s pointy nose out of her head. The handshake had felt longer, and the warmth of it still lingered on her palm. She had a feeling that it had been her last appointment.


    Her mind wandered, fluttering over the crooked wooden bench on the side of the road, to the annoyingly asymmetrical tiles on the path, and dancing all over the place in the dim lights as she silently floated through the night.


    She had imagined the mountain trek would be a struggle, but she hadn¡¯t needed to take a single breather. Before she knew it, the wondrous mysteries of the night were behind her, and she stood at the mouth of the bathhouse. A curtain hung low, adorned with Chinese characters that probably read Bathhouse.


    The place was all lit up, despite the late hour. It must have been around midnight.


    She nodded to the old lady at the reception, who didn¡¯t return her greeting. The woman was smoking a pipe, and for a minute, it was hard to tell whether she was even awake.


    "If you¡¯ve been drinking, you¡¯re not welcome," the old woman stopped her with her staff as she was about to step inside. "No puking in the water."


    "I haven¡¯t had a sip," she smiled coyly, making no hurry to get past her.


    The woman scrutinized her before returning to her meditation. She assumed that meant she was good to go.


    The bathhouse was nearly empty. A few tired maids¡ªold women who probably worked in the villas at the top¡ªlingered about. She was relieved; it was practically like being alone. It truly was her day.


    She took short baths. The longer she rinsed her skin and bones, the more apparent her weight loss became. She imagined she must look hideous to an onlooker.


    Soaking in the hot water, she let herself spread out, melting away in the heat.


    "Fancy seein¡¯ yer face here," a familiar voice scooted closer.


    She opened her eyes. Her solitude had been breached.


    "Whacchu doin'' all the way out ''ere in the boonies?", the cheery looking girl asked.


    Her dark hair put the night to shame, and there was something penetrating about her gaze. She hated scary people like her. And yet, that intimidating face glowed even in the dead silent place like the bath house. Perhaps, she wasn''t all that scary.


    "My landlady said it''s a place with bath salts. I haven''t seen any yet, though. You, Ysobell?", she asked, minding her manners.


    "It''s the wrong season for bath salts. They only do that in the winters, when business is good. Ya know, premium service and such", Ysobell grinned, happy to educate, "I come down ''ere when my folk are down ''n all. It''s a nice place fer a smoke."


    "I don''t think the owner would appreciate it", she mentioned in passing, resting her head back, staring emptily at the rising vapor.


    "Where ya been, today?", Ysobell asked, sensing that today was no conventional day for her.


    "All over the place. I couldn''t sit still", she answered candidly, "I lost a friend today."


    "Oh, aye? And how''s that?", Ysobell relaxed back.


    "He lied. I didn''t care. But he called me a liar. I''ve... never lied to him, you know. But I know he lies. He lies all the time", she kept her gaze at the ceiling.


    She didn''t realize until then, that what she''d been feeling all day was called ''hurt''.


    "Ya sure that''s all?"


    "It is enough, isn''t it?"


    "For endin'' a friendship?"


    "I called him a brother."


    "It ain''t ''nough."


    "What do you suppose then, Ysobell?", she demanded, lifting her head, looking at Ysobell.


    "My old man says its impossible to get along with anyone on this Earth. You know what that makes him?"


    She sat clueless.


    "It makes ''im a bad businessman. An'' true enough, he ain''t ever done no good business in his life. He''s disappointed... hopelessly disappointed, and he''s all alone. Or anyway, he would be, if I didn''t hand his ass back to him every time he spouted such nonsense", Ysobell yawned, "What''s that tell ya, then?"


    She still had no clue, so she paused for a while and pondered.


    "Don''t you gotta talk to ''im and set things straight? What''s with nickin'' it all and that?", Ysobell grinned her usual teasing grin which, as far as she was concerned, could mean anything.


    "I could. But he''s never been wrong, you know. He''ll tell me all that and I''ll begin to think he''s right and that I was wrong, after all. And that does nothing good for anybody. Come to think of it, I''ve never heard a word of apology come out of his mouth. I don''t know if he can say such a thing. He''s like that, you know, that brother of mine."


    "And ya still hang with ''im?", Ysobell questioned.


    She sighed, saying nothing and staring emptily at the hot water.


    "You know, I''m not locked in. I''m not here, but I''m not elsewhere either. I''m actually everywhere. I''m always wandering. I''m very free. I didn''t tell you the truth last time. Maybe I lie too", she paused, "But I don''t suppose your father has ever been betrayed. I''d like to think that''s a life worth living."


    Ysobell stayed silent for a while, listlessly watching the waves in the water.


    "Aye, he''s not. And aye, it is! It''s a wonderful life, isn''t it?"


    She smiled, almost to herself.


    "Aye, it is!", Ysobell exclaimed, suddenly hurrying out of the tub, "Well, if ya need a smoke, I''ll be outside. Don''t stay in the hot too long now, ye hear?"


    She nodded, smiling still.


    The night walked on, slowly pacing, and yet it felt as if time had stopped. For once, after running all her life, she had come to a halt.


    And yet, time didn¡¯t move.


    It stood still.

 Say Something

    "Say something I''d like," she says.


    She, the light of my life¡ªthe stars, the sun, the moon, the expanse, the wildlife, the chirp of birds, the beached whale, the scent of morning glories¡ªmy beginning and end. The laughter of children, the flickering of street lamps, the petrichor, the sunlight filtering through leaves, the blooming of spring, the departure of birds, the melting of snow, the candles on a birthday cake. The beginning, the end, the life, the death, the happiness, the misery, the silence, the scream... and sleep. Most importantly, sleep.


    She looks into my eyes and asks this simple thing of me. And I stare back, utterly unable to find such a thing. So I say nothing. My language is silence.


    She looks hopeless. But I hold her hands and gaze into her eyes, reassuring her that any moment now, I will speak, and I will say something truly marvelous, something she would like. But I cannot open my mouth. She waits, with only a speck of blazing excitement, but mostly just disappointment and cold sighs.


    Over and over again, I disappoint her. She is crushed by my silence.


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    The absence of words is due to the abundance of them. But I can never tell what she''ll like. I, who have known her all my life, am unable to comprehend her.


    She is simple, however. Even a stranger could tell a joke good enough to make her laugh. But I, who have known her only my whole life, cannot, for the life of me, say anything remotely agreeable.


    "It is impossible to get along with anyone in this world," I told myself years ago. And I was right. So I decided to say nothing beyond the most likable thing in the universe. And I say this to the only person in the world who wishes to hear me.


    But in fact, I don''t say anything. I cannot find anything to say to her.


    Why is that? I keep wondering. Surely, she hears many likable things from people every day. In fact, she probably hears more likable things than otherwise. And yet somehow, none of them¡ªnot a single one¡ªhas come from me. In all these years, in all these lives, not a single word that would please her.


    Do I even know her?


    She insists, time and time again, that I say it to her. I don''t know why she never gives up. By now, one would think I couldn¡¯t speak. And yet, she stays. She waits and builds up hope, only for it to tumble down again.


    I cannot say what drives her. She says things that I like. And yet, I am unable to reciprocate her words.


    So then, I must assume she wills it this way.


    Perhaps this silence... yes, this silence. She clings to the very hopelessness, the absence of words. For if I were to say something truly likable, would it not become unlikable the moment it escaped my lips? As long as it stays hidden, it remains the likable idea she wishes to hear.


    It follows, then, that it is the echo of what is missing that compels her. Things left unsaid are always likable. And everything else¡ªeverything that crosses the threshold of my lips¡ªbecomes hideous and repulsive.


    So I stay silent, giving her false hope, holding onto her warm hands with my rough fingers, just so I can gaze into her eyes a little longer.

 Beached Wolves

    "Have you heard about the beached wolf?"


    "Beached wolf?"


    "It''s the wolf that doesn¡¯t howl at the moon at night. Instead, it sits cross-legged on the beach, just beside the crashing waves, and stares into the sunset."


    I stared blankly at her face. Most of what she said that day didn¡¯t make sense. At least, not in the moment. In hindsight, I could almost make out her story.


    "And what does this beached wolf do there?" I asked, waiting for a refill.


    Business was on the decline. The bar was usually empty. I was her only regular left. I always felt she was letting it die down on purpose. If I asked, she¡¯d laugh in my face. But now that I think about it, I must have been right. She was letting it all sink, slowly, slowly floating toward the inevitable end.


    "That¡¯s the end of the story, Mill," she said, serving me a cocktail. "No questions accepted."


    I sighed, watching her mix the drink with a vacant stare. I knew she wasn¡¯t going to answer anything I asked that day, but I couldn¡¯t help being full of questions.


    "How¡¯d it go, Cynthia?" I dared. "At court today?"


    I¡¯ve always had this horrible habit of being inconsiderate at the worst times.


    "Why don¡¯t you just drink, Mill?" She tried to force a smile.


    "Well, it¡¯s not like you¡¯ve got anyone else to entertain," I muttered, never holding back my snide remarks.


    And I knew she hated that word¡ªentertain. It made her sound like a showgirl. She wasn¡¯t. She was just a bar mama.


    "And I¡¯m not obligated to answer you either, Mill."


    She was furious. I could tell. I figured court hadn¡¯t gone well. She¡¯d divorced and lost custody of her child. I knew she did it on purpose, so I couldn¡¯t see what was there to be so stressed about. She felt she couldn¡¯t give her daughter a good life. But I think, more than anything, she was afraid of what people had to say about her. Having her daughter hear it must have been the last thing she wanted.


    "Look, I¡¯m sorry, Mama. Why don¡¯t you sit and have a drink with me? I know you¡¯re mad, but let¡¯s just talk, okay?" I smiled, trying to loosen her up.


    Despite everything, I didn¡¯t believe in anything. I was new in town, and she¡¯d been nothing but good to me. At first, I couldn¡¯t understand all the crass comments about her, but then I remembered¡ªshe was a woman.


    In her youth, which wasn¡¯t more than a couple of years gone, she had worked as an escort. She never told me when I asked, but I gathered she was a runaway. Her parents lived in the country. Clearly, she wasn¡¯t happy with them.


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    At some point, she got married and settled down¡ªuntil her separation about two years ago. After that, she opened this bar and moved to this small part of town. Six months ago, when I arrived here after being appointed lead investigator in a case, business was still fairly good for her. I wondered what changed.


    "He¡¯s not wrong about anything," she muttered, smoking as she sat next to me. "He¡¯s always been right. I knew that."


    "Did you get a lawyer?"


    "No," she exhaled. "I figured it¡¯s better this way."


    "Why?"


    "You don¡¯t get it, Mill. It¡¯s just this life. You¡¯ve heard it all, haven¡¯t you?" She hung her head.


    "Cynthia, I mean... really, why? You know you can just leave," I pressed her shoulder.


    She remained motionless, just smoking away until the cigarette burned down to the end.


    "You know... I was working in a host club somewhere in Kowloon. I was young then, I suppose. But I was broke. And a total bumpkin. I knew nothing. So I did the one thing anybody could do. I talked. That¡¯s all I did all day. I talked to people, I laughed at their jokes, I poured their drinks... I guess I was fine with that." She chuckled weakly. "The club was right at the edge of the red-light district. We didn¡¯t offer that service, but... there was a place right in front of us. When I was done working, I would just stare at it from the dressing room window upstairs."


    She paused. I sipped my drink.


    "I¡¯d see these women... you know the type... most days, they¡¯d just come out for a smoke or something. Disheveled sometimes, but always made up. I knew the kind of business they were in, of course. And I thought about how miserable they looked. Always." She lifted her head, staring at the wine cabinet behind the counter. "And I would wonder why they wouldn¡¯t just leave. You know, if they just crossed the road, they could be on my side¡ªthe cleaner side. How hard could it be, right?"


    My glass was empty. She noticed but didn¡¯t feel like getting up. I didn¡¯t mind.


    "They would just smoke there and breathe what little air the Earth left for them, and then they¡¯d disappear behind the neon lights of that shabby little place. I couldn¡¯t understand. But I think... I do now."


    "Cynthia..." I paused for a good long while. "It might have been true for them, but it¡¯s not for you. You¡¯re still on the clean side."


    "Some days, I¡¯m not so sure. I don¡¯t feel it. I try to think, and I can¡¯t remember if there was a road running between those two places or if I¡¯m just imagining it. Maybe we were on the same side all that time. Maybe I was looking in the mirror."


    I watched the ice melt in my empty glass. She lit another cigarette, pressing it between her lips, hurriedly sucking in the smoke, as if trying to burn her insides.


    "You know that¡¯s not true," I said.


    She seemed as lost as always.


    "It doesn¡¯t matter, Mill," she smirked. "You know the holy church doesn¡¯t hold funerals for our kind."


    "You aren¡¯t Christian, are you?" I furrowed my brows.


    "I can buy God, Mill, but I can¡¯t buy religion." She shifted her focus. "Besides, you know what we¡¯re made of."


    "I wish you¡¯d have a little more faith, at least," I smirked, asking for a refill.


    She was already behind the counter, fixing something up for me.


    "Right? Now there¡¯s an itch you just can¡¯t scratch, can you?" She grinned.


    Of course, I refused to believe it was a suicide. The evidence was there, sure, but I couldn¡¯t accept it. If someone had sucked the ocean dry and I¡¯d walked the entire seabed and seen for myself everything that it hid, then perhaps I could be convinced.


    As it stood, I was in complete denial.


    She''d left her bar that night after her court hearing. I waited for a few days but she didn''t show up. The bar remained close. I''d just stand outside of it, waiting for her, perhaps. Even though I was well aware she wasn''t coming back.


    I think I knew it when she talked about those girls in the red light district. I know I was the one that proposed it to her, but I should have been able to tell that she didn''t want anything in her life more than leaving.


    Escape is bittersweet. What we can¡¯t stand the idea of is someone missing us so much, they wait outside our bars for hours, every evening.


    "What¡¯s the problem then, Mill? All her stuff¡¯s on the beach. It¡¯s that famous suicide spot. And she set her shoes aside, all neat and tidy. Clearly a¡ª"


    "It sounds like a load of bullshit to me, is what the problem is, Hick", my fellow investigator insisted I close the case, but I wanted every inch of the water laid out before me.


    "You''re not sending the divers in again, are you?", he was probably just sick of the weather.


    "I am. If there''s no body, there''s no suicide. We won''t issue a death certification. No one''s dead", I smoked the cigarettes that I''d snatched from her that night at the bar.


    "Well, she''s been missing for a few days, now. This all adds up. I don''t know why you''re obstructing police work, I mean, c''mon, you gotta understand", he patted down his thin wisp of hair that had been left at the mercy of the winds.


    "This one time, Hick", I patted his shoulder, getting quite sick of him, "I''m not giving this up."


    He shook his head, staring at me blankly, mumbling whatnot, and then making his way down towards the diving team. They were going in one more time. I suppose you could say, I wanted to see them return empty handed. I wanted to know I was right.


    I saw the storm brewing at the horizon. One more dive was all we were gonna get. I couldn''t stand the idea of letting her get away with this. I wasn''t gonna stand for a beached wolf.


    Her image rolled every which way inside my head as I kept trying to figure it out. Then I remembered what she''d said to me that night and froze, my shoulders slumped, listlessly waiting for the storm to come and swallow me.


    "Right? Now there¡¯s an itch you just can¡¯t scratch, can you?"