Fate suggests, within its own nature of suggestions; that in the very least we’ll find happiness at the corner of darkness, or that darkness can find a way to your happiness. Again fate can only make suggestions, its ruthless enemy being of our consciousness. How it can pack heat of doubt and shame, inaction or action. We will always, as it’s built inside of us to fight probability to the greatest extent of ourselves. There is a time, though, when we just have to let ourselves go.

It’s hard to reconcile what I am. I can in a different light, realize what I have, and what it is to keep it, and what is necessary to give for it to remain. As it gets worse and worse, it’s hard to recall what it is to be home. I shed my armor, exposing my weakness, rendering myself helpless, her hold like a baptism, to be born again. It is within this grasp that I can understand what home is, it isn’t quite a location but more of a state of being. Where it can be safe to remove the pieces that protect you on a day to day basis. When I am in her arms it’s difficult to imagine there’s a storm outside of her embrace. I set my anchor here, for now, closed arms, closed thoughts.

Her sweat is as sweet as her, but I fear the mention of it. I grasp her as in to fill up my reserves, a basis of reason to keep on. The cadence is unwelcoming, arms part, and the rhythm of routine comes into focus. Bills will need to be paid, a mouth will need to be fed. She vanishes far too often behind the walls that separate us. I want to shout, to scream, to tell her not to go, but every time the conversation ends the same, so I remain quiet. She changes for work. The door closes with a memorable 20th-century click. I roll over to face the window of vacant facades. I try not to think how my facade must look as I hate her for going. Is it right for me to claim what’s between her legs as mine? She may keep the heart for me, she may, but her body is hers. I twist the sheets over myself. A constricting tightness to match the feelings in my chest. I pull harder and harder, my shoulders buckle inwards. The hot air escapes between the smalls cracks. “How, how can I claim what isn’t mine.” I say into the void. The sheets shield me as I continue my discussion of what. “I cannot own anyone. I am not like them. She gives herself to me now.” I want to promise myself this but at the same moment, I want to vomit as I picture the other men lick at her sweat, her sweet sweat. I pull the sheet as tight as my bones could muster. “She’s not mine.” I say out loud. “I’m hers.” the pull of everything loosens its grip upon the understanding.

The door is open again. I don’t know if I can blame gravity or myself for being on the floor. The smoke rings rise like halos above me, false truths I suppose. Kicking off her shoes off she plucks the cigarette from my hand and sits on the bed. I get lost in the patterns of the chipped nail polish as her toes clench into the carpet. I shake the feeling then speak “Did you have a nice day at work?” I ask. She slips off the bed and places the cigarette between my lips. “Can you be this hopeless?” she asks me sliding her hand over my chest. I swear I smell the scent of someone else. “I can.” My dismal thoughts must have shown on my face because she pushes off of me like lighting returning to sender. Before I can stand she’s in the shower, I try the handle but the door is locked.

The politics of emotions are just, to be frank, fucked. I sit on the side of the bathroom door. Steam whispers from the cracks. I hear the water beat against the shower door and walls, the beat of trying to clean what cannot be cleaned. I flick the lid of the lighter open and close as I wait for her to exit the shower, the clicks remind me of something not long ago. Palming the lighter I sit listening to the beat. The flow of water stops after what feels like a century of waiting. Hesitant, I slowly stand and knock at the door. “I’m sorry…” My fruitless apology seems as hopeless as I felt. The lock disengages. Several seconds pass before I attempt to turn the handle. The warmth of the room brushes my face as I push the barrier open. Sitting on the toilet her skin is bright red as water drips from everywhere. She flicks the match, again, and again, but it’s ruined by the moisture. “Piece of crap!” She yells throwing the cigarette and matches on the sopping wet flow. Her head snaps upwards to stab me with eyes as red as the rest of her. “You know I don’t enjoy this. You know I don’t, but somehow you always to find a way to make me feel as if I’m not someone, but a piece of meat in, a, a, meat shop somewhere!” I feel the urge to correct her, then correct myself and don’t. “You come here, and you cry, and you complain about horrible things. How do you expect me to take any of this Karl?” My chest becomes tighter and tighter as she shouts out me, I begin to miss home. She stands, though I felt more naked than her. “How is that you can’t take me for who I am?” I want to hold her, to wrap every limb and then some around her, but I just stand there. She gives a sigh and storms out of the bathroom. I want to shout, to scream, to tell her not to go, so I do. “I’m scared!” in that instant I didn’t feel like the man I pretended to be, but the boy standing outside the orphanage so many godless years ago. I buckle, I swear I could feel the gravel on my knees. “I’m scared too.” her still wet hands slide through me, but on me. “I see the danger in you. It terrifies me.” she says as I push my face into her collarbone then let myself go.

My throat felt raw, I must have talked for hours. I told her everything, every mistake, every threat, everything. My transgressions stacked on top of each other, I saw, she saw, quickly what I was becoming. “Isn’t there something you can do, can’t you run?” I start to open my mouth when the squeaky hinge to her tiny liquor cabinet makes a sound. Yumi’s skin goes white as I turn to look at the cause of the noise. Edna pours a glass of some cheap gin into a plastic glass. “What…” I start to stand, but she moves a hand up. “Honey, if we can skip the dramatics, that be swell.” She drinks the small amount of spirit in her glass. Twitching her head to shake the bad taste out, she takes several steps forward. “Dear, you’re probably, well, to be honest, it would be queer if you were not, you are most likely wondering…” Pulling her hands to her face she does an impression of me. “Oh, how did this bad woman ever did find me.” She removes her hand from her face then sniggers. I try to inch close to the edge of the bed, but she stops her laugh and stops me with a glare. “Well sweetheart, this is really just a show a strength. There’s just isn’t a thing in this world we can’t touch, dear. Now you go ahead and remember that now.” She finishes with a smirk then vanishes. The plastic cup falls onto the floor with a padded thud. Returning from shock Yumi asks “Is that her?” I stare at the cup on the floor “Yes, the mother of monsters.” I stand and push on my shoes. I walk to her side of the bed and kiss her on the forehead. With one hand in my pocket home disappears in front of me.

-Karl