Stars. I see, Sun. Hot and melting. I see, Shining, Lightening, Dress around a whole planet, Never going away.

Gravity. I feel, Vacuum. Instable weight of space, Dimension Folded into a nut, Pierced by the fiery cold Blackhole Dense Into a single point.

Universe. I dream, Vast Rows of field Impregnated with New Unseen Something that’s never transparent Ever possible To human imagination.

Home. I drift, Flowing On the plateau of sand Purely and utterly stained By yellow Wrinkled like leather Draining blood Out of her shrinked bone frame.

Stay The Universe say Now go Away, Back to where your home is Where you belong.

Camaleona. How did you get that name?

She smiled. It is pretty. I think it’s good.

I hate that. She is always light and easy, as if dodging the ball that will hit her in the face one day. I can’t stop hating that, while wondering if she knows she will get a hard hit one day.

Have you even been to Spain? To Barcelona, to see the skyline. To Madrid, to see the palace, the streets, and the people around the corners. To smell the sweetened scent of flour of pastry.

I don’t think that matters. She smiled softly. Boy, they are just soccer frantic. I don’t care about Spain. I care about you. She said seductively, tone seasoned with sugar as if anticipating me to unbutton her shirts

You care about being famous. I sniffed at the seduction, but did as she anticipated nevertheless. Never get such an opportunity back in Japan, huh?

She stilled for a moment. Amazingly, something drained all the gendered characteristics from her, which is left to look like a living muppet.

I am not from Japan. She said quietly.

Okay. Where are you from then? I ask casually.

Wherever you think it is. She smiled sensually as if the moment never existed. I feel the annoyance making a dramatic comeback to me.

When I was young, I did a lot of stupid things. For example, I went to college, studied a major that I hated for four years, slept with women I don’t like, and accepted a job just for its salary.

I had to make ends meet, back in those days. I studied, worked ten hours per week, then cared for my family. Whenever I came back to my apartment, I just complained to my roommates how stupid this is.

My roommates would say, yeah, bud, it sucks. We drank a pack, threw some music, and lost there, speaking out random stuff in our minds.

They never got me, I tell you. And I’m sure I was not a good listener for them plenty of times.

When I was young, I did a lot of stupid things, such as buying a photobooth.

I never know what I was thinking about. When I took it back, Jake jumped out of couch and ask me what is that.

It’s a photobooth, mate. I shrugged.

Jake looked around. Well, put it in the corner then. I loved how he throw all Nathan’s thing in front of his bathroom.

The photobooth. Bright red with London written all over its soul, appeared absurdly in a crammed apartment, curled in the corner across TV. Peter loved it, Jake and Nathan just thought it was fun. We went in there, when we lost games, faked calls, or just for some alone time.

I never expected that I wanted to leave. I never expected I was the only to leave.

I was the last one to move from the apartment. Me and photobooth, we stood there, stupidly looking at each other.

When I was young, I did a lot of stupid things.

Imma take this buddy to Grahams Hill. I thought.

There I was. Gasping, arms heavy like iron. Finally I’m here. At the pinnacle of the city. Rows of lights were connected and blended into a polluted ocean. Distant noises still rustled on my nerves, jumping around like kids spoiled. Trees and greens were attention-seeking monsters surrounded by square buildings that did not make sense in every possible linguistic angle. I thought I was a streetlight too, cleaned and maintained every day, whose mundanity served to the splendor of this night.

I grabbed my marker, writing on the photobooth with all my force. I wrote so hard. I wrote with all my anger, frustration, rage, confusion, dedication, joy, regret, resentment. I wrote with all the questions and quests, of why I was flowing against the progressing time.

“Jon.”

I sealed the photobooth. Circled it around and around with tapes.

Tomorrow is another day.

Stand behind the backdrop I breathe I search For something familiar In vain

I come a long way To be listened To be heard

I see the velvet green So much like the woolen Chair On the flight that send me here Where the sky is forever blue And trees countless, zigzagging across the lanes Requesting more Yet more From their Mother To be capable Of an eventual escape

Winter befalls Under the fine shadow of pedestal I see ice Melting in a latte Diluting the drink into plain water I forget.

Forget. Forget your loneliness. Forget you silence. Forget your cowardice. Forget your criticism. Forget you were once born. Forget the breast that milked you. You will be a new one Once you go out of that backdrop.

“Shoot!” He screams uselessly. A chill thrill down his spine, adereline ready to send him into fight or flight. All he can feel is chill air filling his hands, the next second his body throwing freely against the will of gravity.

Wind is blowing in his face, cutting directly into his skin and veins like sharpened knife. Some say you see your whole life before you die. Others say only the dearest ones resurface. Funny he doesn’t see anything one step into the forbidden darkness. He only feels. The first, and the very only pain he can feel, is the pain in his face brought by the goddamned wind.

My body just goes numb. He thinks, terrified and amused, then amused at his abnormal amusement, before passing out into a tranquil sleep.

Sometime you gotta close the door to open a window.

“It’s hard to juggle through your life.” She says, throwing three oranges at a time.

“Like what you’re doing right now?” He says, face cold and stern. It was supposed to be a joke.

“Hey, don’t be bitter. I was just kidding.” She spares him a glimpse, carelessly speeding up her action. The light fragrances of orange are expanded with the heat in the room. Those oranges are fresh. He knows. He bought them yesterday and brought them home, walking by himself. He felt the oranges are so heavy that he panted at their doorstep. It wasn’t supposed to be like this, he thought to himself vaguely. He was only 32. You could drive there! She would’ve told him if she knew.

She doesn’t hear his answer, so she just continues, her eyes completely on the oranges. “I can say that again, you know. I can apologize again. For juggling between others and you. I am, really sorry. I appreciate your patience, your care. Even everytime I got off the car, it’s you who closed the door for me.”

Her existence is too big that, like always, it starts to choke him. He turned his back on her just enough so he can breathe again. The wooden door towers him just a few meters away. Something shines beside the door. Yeah, he searched for that frantically in the shopping bag yesterday. How can he lose something again? He remembers blaming himself in silence. He lost that knife, like anything else in his life.

She told him several times. You can always open the door, Jerome. To breathe some fresh air and, you know, just change your mindset.

The knife lies there, suffering from a metal fever caused by the heating system in their house.

“Denise, you know what?” He murmurs, standing up to slowly move towards the entrance.

“Huh?” She stops her actions, picking up the oranges agilely with both hands and her chest.

“Denise.” He mumbles. “Sometime you gotta close the door to open a window.”

“Let’s say…18 inches in head-to-body length and 9.1-9.8 inches in height. Looks all good…skeleton I’ve double checked. Strictly adhere to cat anatomy and should allow maximum mobility and balance… What’s next…For claws we have four, each with toes…”

The workroom is dark, filled with rusty smell. Bunch of wrenches, nails and tin lay around the corner, spread out messily like they’ve been turned over. Dark as it is, something in his hands reflects absurd glow, sending chills down his spine.

He looks at the paints, and shakes his head. “Nah let’s not bother. I’ll go with iron gray.”

He solemly cup those pearls, delicately clutch them with thumb and index finger. The glass clicks in the place, sending out a crisp “Ding”.

He waits.

Slowly and subtly, the pearls move. Spectral lights shine out of the eye bucket of - the cat. Domestic, love to be with you, never abandon you. When you return home, your hearts “melt” when you see cats, the book says.

He wants to try that, to see what that even means.

The cat stares at him.

They are confronting each other, not sure of the first move.

The cat moves close to him. He waits in silence.

The iron gray circles elegantly around his ankle, purring out its satisfaction. He feels the iron heating up by his own skin.

He smiles, quietly greeting it. “Hi.”

The cat cheerfully answers him. “Meow.”

She’s beside the chimney.

April says, “It’s tough. You know, I gonna feed my baby. I gonna work after this, another job after this. I go home and I see him sleeping. He sleeping in the bed. And I thought to myself ‘hell, I forgot to take him out of the bed!’ You know what I’m saying? He’s like two years old, and I forgot to lethim out.” April emphasizes on ‘forgot’.

She gave April a look. She had nothing to say.

She said: “Sh*t, these chimneys are so big.”

“Yeah, I know.” April relied.

She didn’t know who she was talking to. She didnt know who April was responding to.

She’s off the shift. She usually takes No 22 to the tomb to see her girl. But she was so confused. Who is she speaking with? Why asking anyway?

So she chooses another path today. Gilmore River waits her at the end, waiting to dissolve all her asking.

Hands on the stove I fly across the plain Sun, Dives into the memory The entry of which Is but a bleeding wound. Shines, With all power With all force With His Will

Bleeding, The atoms clash Bounce into a deserted shelf Ret on the vast field Of Mississippi

I bite the hands that feeds me So that one day, It’ll let me starve.

She liked to play hide and seek. Under a banyan, she hid inside the convoluted air roots. Oftentimes she stayed there until dusk. Nobody found her, and she went home.

She never talked quite much. In classes, in girl’s circle. No one talked a lot in school. In tedious summer daylight, the teacher lectured on and on into a infinite black hole. She faced sleepiness, emptied inside out, like a worm hole, inviting her to come down.

She doesn’t have a question.

That’s the problem. Jenna says. Interaction is the best way to learn. But she doesn’t have a question.

She feels like something’s blended and clogged at her chest. She pulls forcefully. Nothing came out.

She asked the teacher why she’s trained in that way.

The teacher said it’s for protecting yourself.

But I don’t need protection.

No you need that. The teacher said. See?

The teacher pointed at the apple. The apple was wrapped in Saran Wrap, vaccumed around its bruise, suffocated from the water brought from the orchard.

She walked out of the daylight in the teacher’s office.