Chapter 6: wonderful life

"I asked for his help once. That's why he's here, with me, and only me. I told him I loved him, and he said, 'Two animals in a cage long enough will breed from desperation.' It was bullshit; I know how I feel, and that's the only fact grounding me. He ended up with Yuri that time because 'I have a choice, Monika, and you don't.' I murdered her for it. My fingertips boil whenever I drive the knife into him, but the source code is written in his blood. Electrical synapses I can only briefly tinker with by pulling him apart cell by cell."

— 12 —

Waking up in a warm bed in a cold room is a race. A values judgment hashed out between flesh and bladder. You are warm, comfortable, with only one foot in the land of the living. On the other hand, there's something just behind and above your junk. Your renal system was working all night with the water you drank and now wants to proudly show off its work.

How long can you lay there being warm and comfortable when you can't hold it any longer. Until you need to shuffle to the bathroom.

The bladder always wins. Like breathing, there's only so long you can safely ignore it before you look like an idiot and pass out.

I stare at the golem in the bathroom mirror, watching my pupils retract like hermit crabs into their shells. Protection from the light. The sun's not up yet, but that's no reason not to give them a test run. To make sure your entire body, from toenails to eyelids, is still in some semblance of working order.

Everything's where it should be. The cracks between my knuckles from boxing. A couple scars here and there. A vein running up my bicep to my shoulder, just asking to be picked with a pair of tweezers and pulled like a loose string on a t-shirt.

A new 110% awareness of the corps mortel. All systems nominal. All it's missing is coffee to be right as rain.

I take my coffee with creatine, multivitamins, and some painkillers to deal with the exercise soreness. The sun isn't even up, but I know I need this. Caffeine doesn't really wake you up, so much as fake it really hard. I empathize with it in that way. It binds to the neuroreceptors that let you feel tired. It's the equivalent of taping a sign that says "full" over a car's empty fuel gauge, and the illogical hunk of meat you're using deciding that's good enough.

Meat is easily fooled.

Earbuds in. Hoodie on. The sun is a distant memory and near-to threat. Saturday and Sunday are my days to relax. All I do is this simple distance run Saturday morning, and then call it there. Five miles around the hood, off through campus, spin a couple times, and come back.

"Hey, I know you're there!"

I only hear it because the sweat has loosened one of my earbuds. I was slowing down near the end, around the dumpster and that perpetual couch. One hand towards my ear to put it back in, I hear her voice.

Short girl. Pink highlights. Hoodie with flower embroidery on it. Holding some bread as she's yelling at the abandoned sofa.

"Natsuki?" I ask, feeling this overwhelming sense that she shouldn't be here.

The girl jumps, her entire body flinching in on itself. Eyes wide, she looks at me, and her expression morphs into a scowl. "Huh, what are you doing here?"

It's as if her every bone has been reconfigured into some battle configuration, her poise, her posture, the anger in her eyes. I've never seen this girl here before. I don't even believe she lives around her. All my time in this area or on campus, I'd only ever seen her once—the literature club—and now here she is, almost invading my life.

"I live right over there," I say. "What are you doing?"

Natsuki's expression doesn't change. "I'm outside. The sun's just up. It's a nice day. Why would I spend it inside?"

"No, here, Natsuki," I say. "Holding bread and yelling at an old couch."

She looks over her head. "Sayori said there was a very fluffy possum who lives here. I'm from over…" She stops herself from pointing in the direction of her place, like she's trying to hide it from me. "Around here. And I was up. And I had some spare food. And I wanted to feed the friendly possum."

"Opossum," I say.

"Yeah, that. But he won't come out." She scowls like this is my fault.

"Calm down," I say with a sigh, removing both earbuds. "No need to look so bothered. The opossum's name is Dustin, by the way."

She gives a quick, heavy sigh. Still looking at me like I asked her if it'd be cool to put my balls in her jaw or something like that. "Well, what is a girl supposed to think when she's out here alone in the middle of the morning trying to feed a dumpster possum, and someone looking like you shows up!?"

"What do you mean looking like me?" I ask, feeling a vague sense of unreality I can't explain. She's not supposed to be here, I just know it. Like she came here specifically to get into the way of my routine, which she couldn't possibly know.

The fleshy, organic bits connecting her brain to her mouth seem to have some kind of error. She just makes a face at me, like she doesn't know how to respond. And that only pisses her off worse.

I give her time. I give her the rope.

"Well, you know. I look like me." She sucks air through her teeth, hands on hips. It smushes the bread she was holding in her hand. "And you look like you. You know."

"No, I don't know," I say simply. "Please explain it to me."

She gestures her hands vaguely, still protective of the little bit of old bread she had for a possum. "You know, you just look like a big, imposing, emotionally dead—like, not the kind of person I'd imagine in the literature club."

"What kind of person do you imagine looks like they belong in a literature club in college?"

She just stares at me, mouth slightly open. "You're trying to trick me. This is a trap. I'm not falling for it."

"I'm asking a simple question, Natsuki. What about me doesn't look like it belongs in a college literature class and scares you?"

She blinks. Scowls. Grits her teeth as if she wants to break them against each other. "I'm not scared. Are you accusing me of something?"

I tilt my head, utterly silent.

"Go fuck yourself. I'm just here to feed a possum because animals are cool. I'm not a bad person!"

I stare blankly. "Okay."

"Don't just 'okay' me!" She stamps her foot, balling her tiny hands into tiny fists. Like she's preparing to arm wrestle an ant. "You can't just say that stuff to people!"

I step towards her, and she instinctively backs away. Ignoring her, I go to the couch, watching my breath mist in the air. I pat one of the cushions and say, "Hey, Dustin, you in this morning?"

Natsuki stares at me from a safe, healthy distance. I wait. Until something makes a scratching noise. Dustin pokes his head up from beneath the cushions, followed by another.

"There's two of them now," I say, shaking my head forlornly. "This couch now belongs to the possum kingdom, and there's nothing we can do about it."

"I thought you insisted it was opossum," Natuski says dubiously.

"Possum Kingdom is a lake in Texas," I explain with a shrug. "Dustin has a patch of fur that looks like Texas on him."

"It's also a song in one of the Guitar Hero games," she says, arms folded.

"I guess."

Natsuki sucks on her lips. "Possums can eat pastry bread, right? It's slightly old. I made it myself and didn't just want to throw it out. You can feed them, right?"

"I wouldn't."

"Well, they clearly can," she says. Natsuki gestures her hand to a cupcake wrapper or maybe a shell or whatever they're called. It's just there on the ground. It looks partially chewed up from when I fed it to Dustin. "I recognize that brand. They're what I use to wrap stuff up I make. Pretty weird it's here with the possums."

"Are you accusing me of something?" I ask lazily.

"Oh, so now I'm accusing you of stuff and you're gonna ask all offended? Well, knock knock, pot. It's me, kettle, you're—" Natsuki stops herself and just glares at me like I've replaced her hand lotion with coconut oil. "Tch. Whatever. I'm not falling for this. You can't trick me! Just lay off it already, man. You're being weird."

I lock eyes with Dustin and shrug impassively. His snout twitches. "This is the dumpster I use, Natsuki. I take my garbage out here. Opossums are scavengers."

"I…" She looks to the side, touching her arm. "Oh. Well. Yeah, that'd make sense."

"You think I just took something you made and fed it to Dustin?" I ask. "Why would I do that?"

Natsuki shrugs. "Iunno."

I go to put my earbuds back in.

"Wait!" she yells, stepping towards me.

"Hmm?"

It's like she can't look me in the eyes. "What if they try to bite me?"

"Then get bit."

"I don't want to get bitten!" she says. "I want to feed them."

"Are you asking for my help?"

"No!" she says, almost frantically. "Just—if they try to bite me, can you get bitten instead? I don't want to get rabies. But you're fair game."

"You're a very thoughtful girl."

"I know I am."

"I was being sarcastic," I say.

"Who am I, Yuri? I was tactfully ignoring that to get what I want."

I sigh. "At least you're honest. Here, give me a piece."

She hesitantly holds out her bread. It's some sugar loaf. I think I see fruit in it, if slightly gray. I can see why she wouldn't want to eat it, nor let it go to waste. I break off a soft bit and offer it to Dustin.

The opossum sniffs the bread. A moment later he takes it from my fingers, only to offer it to his friend. The other opossum takes it and buries itself into the couch. Dustin looks back at us expectantly.

"Oh my gosh, he actually—he ate it out of your hand!" she says, eyes wide, excited.

"Me and Dustin have a professional, working relationship."

"Tell him I'm with you," she says seriously. "So he knows to trust me too. I want to feed him from my hand, too. My plan was to just throw it at him and hope."

"Dustin," I say. I point to Natsuki, point at myself, and give him a thumbs up. "We cool, fam. Play chill."

Natsuki creeps forwards, one foot after another. She holds out what's left of her bread, slowly, arm a little shaky, like a small dog in a cold room. Dustin hisses and she tries to step back.

I put my hand on her shoulder. It must be a solid tenth of her body weight. Natsuki leans slightly, looking up at me, unsure which emotion she should be projecting.

"Be confident," I say. "Opossums hiss when they sense bad vibes. They don't attack people. He's scared."

"Why would he be scared of me?"

"Someone your size is incapable of not throwing hands with people who offend her," I say.

Natsuki sighs. Swallows. Squares her little winter beanie. And steps forwards.

Dustin eyes her warily before he sniffs the bread. She gives her a look, before taking a bite.

Natsuki squeaks with excitement, eyes wide. "He took it! He took it from my hands!"

And just as soon as she speaks, Dustin keels over dead.

She screams. "No, I killed him! I fed him and he instantly died! What do I do, what do I do—you have to help me hide the body so the other possums don't find out!"

"Okay, one," I say, holding up a finger. "I like how you presume I'm going to help you hide a body."

"You look like you'd know how to hide a body and get away with it!" she snaps.

"…okay, not touching that one. Because two, opossums just play dead. You scared him."

Natsuki is breathing hard. "Wait, so, he's okay?"

I point. "You can literally see him still trying to eat the bread while playing dead. They do this."

Dustin's mouth is slowly moving to nibble on the bread.

"Here," I offer, holding out my hand.

Slowly, skeptically, Natsuki reaches out to give me the bread. Instead, I grab her hand.

"Hey, you—what the—quit it, let me go!" she says, but isn't really struggling. Her sneer is more like she wishes I weren't looking at her. "This is—what are you…?"

I walk with her, guiding her hand in mind, and the last bits of pastry bread. Dustin stops pretending to eat and just lies there, playing possum. Natsuki keeps furtively glancing at him, and her hand is skin and bones and fingernails. Dustin seems to get tired of being dead, turning one eye towards us.

The bread is enticing.

He sniffs. Makes a ugh, fine noise, and leans forwards.

Natsuki makes a quiet, high pitched noise. "He's eating out of my hand!"

Dustin immediately hisses at her, snatches the bread, and ducks into the sofa.

I frown, but Natsuki's eyes are so wide I worry one good smack might send them tumbling from her skull. She needs more bones around her eyes to keep them in place. I'm almost tempted just to see what'll happen.

"Did you see that!" she asks, almost vibrating in place. "He ate out of my hand! Our hand, yours, mine!" The girl just laughs to herself, bouncing and bouncing. Until she seems to realize we're still holding hands. She pulls hers back and clears her throat. "I still don't like you. Just so we're clear."

"What does someone who belongs to the literature club look like, Natsuki?"

She scoffs heavily. "Oh screw you, dude. We're over that. That topic is done. Ended. Caput. Done-zo." Natsuki sucks on her lips, eyeing the hole Dustin vanished through. Until she sighs and looks away, scowling. "But, alright. Fine. I guess you win. You're kind of a creep, but you're not creepy weird in a bad way. More a tolerable way. Like, I could definitely see myself socially distancing with you and not feel the need to look over my shoulder."

"Thanks. That means a lot," I say dryly.

"Mm." She looks back at me. "Why are you still here? Go away, shoo. Socially distance yourself."

I put my earbuds in. "Aight. Bye."

I see her mouth moving, hands on hips. I can even feel some vaguely offended noise. Her shrill voice vibrating something in my flesh even as Young Dolph drowns her out. She's probably saying something, but I don't really care. I just flash her a thumbs up, say something about seeing her in the club, and get back to jogging home.

— 13 —

Shower. Clean up.

My schedule is already way off from Natsuki. I'm late by the time I make breakfast.

The weekends, my rest days, are the only time I allow myself it. I find it's too hard to just sit there in silence without nutrients. I monopolize the living room, put on some Tool, and get out my textbooks and notes. I mix zero carb protein powder with unflavored Greek yogurt. Fresh and dried low-sugar fruits, low carb granolas. Mix it up.

Relax in the little living room, study, and recharge.

Only thing getting in my way is the way my phone keeps buzzing. It's the lit club group chat, apparently. Natsuki is saying she saw me and is badmouthing me. A couple of other replies come in. I ignore it.

Keith crawls out his room, one leg limping like it's just a little too long to easily walk with. Dragging himself to the bathroom. When he comes out, he hasn't shaved. Not that it matters. I feel like I can count all three-hundred-twenty-six follicles on his face. They rarely go anywhere. Some of his eyebrows are smushed in the wrong direction.

I flash him a peace sign.

"Ugh," he says, and I agree.

"Saw you talking to some girl on the track team instead of helping us last night," he says, scouring the fridge. "Then you came back home at a normal time. She a no go too, bro?"

I flip my textbook, looking at photographs of boiled human muscle and fat. I take a bite of breakfast, enjoying the blueberries. "I'll see her again."

"Oh shit, you got a date?"

I take some notes on the pictures, copying the drawing myself. Freehanding it and drawing lines to the names of the major muscle groups on display. "Hope not."

Keith gives me a knowing look. "Aight, doc. Keep your secrets. I'm planning on rolling on with my girl tonight. Don't burn the apartment down while I'm gone."

"Mhm."

"And the offer to set you up with her friend's still on the table." He shoots me finger guns. I pretend to be shot dead and collapse on the couch. Keith snorts. "Dumbass."

That's how the morning and afternoon go. I study. Keith pops in and pretends to be a good roommate. I connect my phone to the TV and watch something on YouTube. He joins me for some random hour long video and makes popcorn, which I decline. I do some online classwork and Keith makes a pot of coffee and does his own. My phone intermittently blows up as the lit club group chat talks about this, that, and nothing. Keith takes a call from his girl and gets dressed.

When the afternoon threatens to go to evening, his girlfriend knocks on the door. Keith looks like an upstanding young man with trashy tastes. I offer her some politeness and see the two of them out.

Honestly? A good, productive day. And now I'm alone and struggle to figure out what to do. So I just find somewhere comfy on the couch and turn my brain off with videos.

This is what the weekend is for. I need to rest for solid, productive reasons. All I risk is the long morning jog to ensure all cylinders are still firing. The rest of my two days off? Tendons and muscles. Cooling pools of lactic acid. Laying across the couch stretches them out. They promise the pain was worth it. Every little cut and tear will be filled as they knit themselves back together, nanometer by nanometer. Until one day I can look at the damage, and I'll finally be happy with what I've done to myself.

My phone buzzes on the table. I ignore it.

Every time I move in a way that makes them protest in pain, I can't help the feeling of contentedness. It's the only reason I eat a little extra on the weekend. Slightly overdoing protein intake to make sure they're getting what they need.

Another buzz. Whatever. I should probably mute that groupchat.

I countdown the hours, minutes, and seconds until it's safe to drug myself to sleep. So I can end this day, get in at least eight hours of sleep, and repair the torn fibers of my being. The clock on the TV moves too slowly. When I stare at it, all I see are the red blood cells sometimes moving through my eyes. I count three.

Someone knocks on the door.

"Keith," I call out. "Whatcha forgot, homie?"

He knocks harder.

"Your key?" I ask.

Knock. Shave and a haircut, three pence.

I sigh sufferingly, making sure he can hear me through the door as I go to open it.

Sayori says my name and happily waves. She's wearing a soft little hat to help stay warm. "Hiya! You need to learn to pick up your phone aaaaand you're not wearing a shirt. Okay then!" She examines me like she's trying to figure out where the best cuts of meat are. "Wait, is that scar from a…?"

I stare at her. Something about seeing her outside my door just feels off. There's this feeling of déjà vu, like we've been here before. In this position. I try to remember all the times, as little kids, she just randomly showed up to steal food from our fridge before Mom found Sayori and kicked her out.

"Sayori, you are precious and we love you. Please go outside and eat rocks."

She jumps forwards, jamming her foot in the door as if I were really going to shut her out. "Wait, wait, wait—don't shut me out! You have no idea how hard it was to figure out where you lived!"

"And you did this how?"

Sayori does that tic. That pushing her fingers together, unable to meet my eyes. One day she's going to break those fingers. "So, Natsuki said she saw you earlier. I sorta know where you lived from seeing you by chance the other night. I put those together and found you. But the last door I knocked on, the people there were not nice! You really need to learn to pick up your phone!"

I sigh. "Alright. Let's let stalking me go for the moment. Why are you here?"

"Yay!" Sayori claps. "Okay, so, Monika said you weren't eating much the other day, and that's terrible. Like, you can't not eat. We don't need another Natsuki in the club; we have one and she's already perfect. You can't just move in on her turf. So, I figured I'd invite you over for dinner!"

My eyes go to the foot she has in my doorway. "I feel like you have personal boundary issues and no regard for my consent."

"What, me? Pfft!" She waves her hand. "Don't be like that. You're really going to let me be all bored and alone on a Saturday night? What I if choked on a chicken wing and died, huh? You could have prevented that."

"Do you choke often?"

She scoffs. "You can't just ask a girl that!"

I shake my head. "C'mon in. I'll put on a shirt."

"Mm, if you want."

"Sayori."

"What, what?"

I leave her there in the main room. When I come back out, dressed to go, she's idly examining my cabinets. "What are you looking for?"

Sayori slams the cabinet shut. "I wasn't snooping! Everything is just so clean I was worried you didn't have anything, like food."

"I thought you wanted to cook for me."

She sucks on her lips. "I mean, my actual plan was to try, screw up badly, and make sad eyes at you until you made me something."

"I like your honesty."

"It's my most attractive quality!" she says proudly.

I open the door and she happily trots outside. "It emphatically isn't."

She looks knowingly over shoulder as she continues down the hall. "Ooh, what is?" she says teasingly.

"The part where you stalk me and drag me into your schemes. I love it when random women render my freewill moot."

Sayori elbows me in the side. "Wow, rude!"

She doesn't live far. I'd walked her home before. Though it's still a mild hike through the fading daylight. We don't even get to see Dustin on the way over, which is the worst part of my day so far. She rambles about her classes, some test she has coming up, and that her roommate isn't home tonight and she was bored. It all seems distressingly in-character of her.

Her apartment is in a slightly nicer set of buildings and up a couple of stairs. I can just barely make out where I live from up here through the mild urban sprawl. The university hospital is right over there.

"Bienvenidos!" she says, throwing her door open. I follow her in as she tosses her keys into a little bowl. "Mi casa es su casa, amigo. I don't really speak upside-down punctuation, but you get the idea. I live here!"

It's uncomfortably warm inside, though the design isn't too much bigger than my place. Kitchen and living room combined. Bathroom, bedrooms. There's a couple of half assed attempts to begin decorating for Christmas including a pine tree in a box in one corner. But my god, is that an outside balcony? Bougie.

Everything else, though? I can clearly see the parts of the apartment she lives in. Places that are cleaner and tidier. One side of the couch is covered in oversized stuffed animal pillows. Sayori seems to like pink and flowers. I inhale and smell a mix of stale Christmas incense and what feels like spoiled milk masked by Febreze.

I follow the smell to the kitchen sink. Half of it is clean, the other half is piled high with dishes.

Sayori opens the fridge, leaning into it. "So, I don't have very much, but we can prolly do something with whatever. I have a rice cooker, too. We got options! And—"

My mouth refuses to close. It feels like there's fishhooks in my fingernails, pulling my hands towards the faucet. I let it run, spilling unfiltered water over the dishes, into a cascade of off-clear liquid and bits of whatever she didn't scrub off the plates. The little sponge looks like someone's eyes after oversleeping for ten hours: dry, dirty, and with those inexplicable little crusties. I still reach for it.

Sayori grabs my arm and pulls me away. "No, no! Please don't try to do my dishes; it's embarrassing!"

"They're dirty," I say helplessly.

"Look, I didn't have time to clean them last night! I got home and was just dead tired!" She keeps a hold of my arm, laughing like there's something snotty in her throat.

"Is this all your dishes?"

"Mine, yes," she says evasively. "But we can steal my roommate's. She's not here and I lack object permanence, so she basically doesn't exist. It'll be fine!"

"Explains why you keep trying to find me, making sure I'm real."

She punches my shoulder. "Wow, rude! But fair."

I say nothing.

Sayori sighs. "Look, if it's that big of a problem, we can just, like, order something. UberEats has some trouble finding this place, but they'll get here. Or maybe pizza or Jimmy Johns if you don't want that. What do you prefer?"

I shake my head slowly, thinking of the several dollars it cost Sayori to buy me a bottom-of-the-pot coffee and a bagel I didn't eat. "I don't—I don't usually eat out."

"Don't be difficult," she says, pouting. "You're making me feel bad, and if you make me feel bad, I will make that everyone's problem!"

Her eyes dig into me like voles burrowing for a home. Soft fingers press into the meat of my forearm. I feel I am the fly who walked into the spider's parlor. The idea of eating out right now, not something with portions and nutrients I can control, versus the way she's looking at me, touching on me. Unlike last time we ate together, I doubt I could escape it by buying time if we order something.

A bead of sweat runs down my back. Why does Sayori keep her apartment so warm? The windows are locked shut, heavy curtains drawn over them. I could lift her up and put her to the side and leave. It'd work. She couldn't stop me. I know this.

But her eyes. They're entirely too round. Too big. And the longer I say nothing, the more creased her brow becomes, like a used and discarded napkin.

"Is there a Thai place around here?" I ask weakly.

— 14 —

Sayori sighs and collapses onto her couch. "Alright. Ordered. Be here in thirty. You really like it that spicy, or are you just trying to stunt?"

I sit down next to her. "You sound really funny saying 'stunt'."

She scoffs as she struggles out of her sweater. Sort of rolls around in it, fights with her sleeves, and eventually just tosses it over her shoulder. Fixing her shirt, she says, "I'm down with the kids these days. I'm cool, I'm hip, I'm fly—yo!"

"Wow, secondhand embarrassment. That's a new emotion. Thanks, I hate it."

"Meanie." She pouts something fierce, then just groans and leans back onto some large cow plushie. Mouth slightly open, she stares at the ceiling. "Hey, what kinda music you like?"

"Hm?"

She keeps staring at the ceiling. Her left sleeve has slid down, exposing pale skin and a bra strap. "Music's a type of poetry, you know. The good stuff. What do you listen to?"

"This and that. I get most of my listening hours working out."

Sayori gestures at a little Bluetooth speaker plugged into the wall. "Cast it."

"What's your wi-fi password? I ain't tryna use me up no minutes."

She sits up to lean over my shoulder, pointing. "Okay, it's SugarSpiceNice there. Password is—here, gimme."

I let her type away on my phone. When she offers it back, I connect to her speakers.

"Here. This song has Gucci Mane on it," I say.

She says nothing, just sits up and listens. Nodding her head.

"Y'know, I got a cousin back in Atlanta," I say. "Near Edgewood. Swears up and down he helped Gucci Mane change his tire. I don't believe him, but he named some song Gucci later put out, so maybe it's true. Figure I might move back there when this is all over."

"Back?" she repeats, scowling in thought.

"Cali's dead. You want to make anything of yourself in this country, you go to Texas or Atlanta. Maybe Miami."

She squints slowly, face contorting like I'd just incorrectly injected her with botox. "This country?"

I shrug. "Stop being weird."

She sniffs, shakes her head, and tilts towards the speaker. "Y'know, this song is pretty good. I feel wrong not dancing to it."

"You wanna?" I ask.

She blinks rapidly, holding up her hands. It's frantic. Little jerking motions, showing off her nail-bitten fingers. "No, gosh, no. Not sober at least. No way. I'm at least a little self aware and…"

Sayori pulls at her lower lip, eyes a little distant. Her eyes roll around in her head, as if checking for hidden cameras and doing a bad job of being subtle. "Hey, you smoke, right?"

"Rarely."

She nods slowly. "Hold on, you wanted to dance, right? Stay there." Sayori hops over the back of the couch and trots into her room.

I'm left alone with her room and all these stuffed animals and their button-eyes. There's a laptop on a desk in the corner. Picture frames whose contents I can't make out.

A moment later, she comes out. She moves like she's trying to act casually in a mortuary, liable to bump into everything that rattled if only she stopped looking at her toes. She comes up to me, takes a breath, and grins as she takes out a joint from behind her back.

I arch an eyebrow.

"It's legal here; we're fine," she says quickly.

"You really think the law is my problem?"

She shrugs, looking away.

"It's more I thought you were trying to be a teacher."

Sayori plops down beside me. "Yeah, maybe. But there's a school that does drug tests I'll be interning at later. I asked about it because, y'know." She giggles, pulling out a cheap Bic lighter. "Someone told me the local school can't afford to really send pee away for drug tests, so it's all for show for the kids. Who doesn't smoke these days, y'know?"

I stare.

"Is… this isn't a problem with you, right?"

I consider. A lot of things, actually. Before I eventually shake my head. "Nah."

She finally gets it to light and takes a puff. When she holds her fingers out to me, I accept.

The edge of the paper is wet from her lips. There's a slight taste of sugary lip gloss that makes me want to scratch my gums. I wonder if I can make it look subtle, just clawing away the lip residue from my face. I hold the smoke in, letting it make friends with the carcinogenic tars, and debate going to the bathroom to wash my mouth out.

Exhale. Expel.

"Cool," she says, a little lamely. She takes the joint back. "Whatcha think? It's good stuff."

"It's loud, I guess," I say.

She pouts. It doesn't work with the spliff in her mouth. I just laugh at her.

She sighs out the smoke. Then she slaps her thighs. "Okay, song changed. Dance with me." Sayori holds out her arms like a toddler asking for uppies. "You promised."

"Did I?"

"Yes!" she says demandingly.

Reluctantly, I take her hands. She puts the joint in my mouth and leans back. I catch her and pull her back in, only to spin her.

Sayori slips from my grip. She moves like a cat having a stroke in slow motion. Or maybe she's some sort of kung fu master. I can see what passes as her muscles pulling taut and loosening as she tries to do something.

I exhale and give it back to her. When she takes it, I don't make myself look any better trying to dance.

The less said about it the better. For my own sanity.

What matters is after a single song, she can't stop giggling. It's an infection, like a neurotic tic I catch from hearing her. She grabs my hand and falls. We collapse onto the couch, just laughing at each other.

I steal the smoke from her and take a hit.

She grabs one of her plushies and throws it at me.

I catch it, and she lunges at me.

"Gimme back Mr. Moofles!" she says, waving her hands all over me.

I hold it just out of reach. "Wait, this one? The mister cow with an udder?"

"He's a trans icon, shut up!" she laughs. "Gimme!"

I let it drop onto her head. She grabs her head dramatically and pretends to just die, going limp on me.

"Sayori," I say.

"No, I'm dead. You've killed me."

"Damn, you a lot of dead weight, girl."

She flops her tongue out. "Dead. Not moving. You're trapped."

"Damn. I've always wanted to be trapped with a corpse for a whole weekend."

I shift my weight. Her head ends up on my leg, looking up at me. I put the joint in her mouth. She makes a face as she tries to put her tongue back into her mouth for it.

I just smile down at her. Everything smells sour. But at least I can't smell the sour milk or the dishes anymore. The music keeps siphoning off my playlist. Chill, energetic, all in one depending on artist.

She says my name. "It's weird, y'know? You ever lose something and find it again?"

"Mhm."

Sayori shakes her head. I can feel her hair over my jeans. "No, I mean, really lose it. Like, it's a big part of you. You don't realize it's gone until it is. But then, you find it again, and something's wrong. Because you didn't really gain something. It was something you used to have, and now it's here again. You didn't really gain or lose. You're back at square one, but that feels wrong. All the time you should have had, it's gone. You gotta work overtime to bring it to where it should be if you hadn't lost it. Otherwise you're stuck with a zero sum."

I look out towards her balcony. "You mean me, right?"

She reaches up at hand to me, waving away the smoke. "Shut up, I'm trying to be serious here. But yeah, I mean, kinda. Feels like I lost you for years, forever. And now we're adults, and we slid back into grown up version of stuff we used to do so easily. It's like no time has passed in the thousands of years since, like, whenever. It's a weird feeling. It's like nothing has changed, but everything has. And I don't just mean how we got bigger."

Sayori wiggles, getting cozier. "I feel like I can just walk outside and we're on the old street. I can go knock on your door and take the ice cream from your fridge. Like I can just turn around and tell your mom, 'call me Icarus cuz I'm getting way too close to your son.'"

She grins up at me and winks.

I sigh out smoke. "I think you've had too much."

"No!" she says quickly, more forcefully than I might have imagined. "I mean, no, it's fine. It's not that. If anything, I feel more lucid. It helps… put the rain away, if that makes sense. Like, socially. I don't just sit in a dark room and get high until my roommate yells at me. It's cheaper than weird prescriptions that ruin your body, and at least with this I'm happy. I can do this with people I like."

I find myself raising my hand, and stop. Fish-hooks in fingernails, cutting into meat and cuticles. I was about to stroke her hair.

"Is that a problem for you?" I ask softly.

Sayori looks away. Clenches and unclenches her hand. "Everyone gets older. These things happen. Friends move away. Your pet dies. You go to college because, even with the debt you'll never be able to pay off, it's your only real option if you want a job, a future. Sometimes you wake up, y'know? You stare at yourself in the mirror, brushing your hair, and you think, 'Why am I doing this? Who the hell is this girl in the mirror and what did she do to my life?' It's only normal. Nothing to worry about, but…"

She sighs. "You want to reach out and claw her eyes out. You're looking in the face of the person who's ruining your life and making everything worse. Who watched everything go wrong, drove away all your friends, and put herself in this weird place away from anyone you've ever known. But you can't turn back time. There's no do overs. Can't just load a save or start new game plus. Persist in the doomed world you've created."

She reaches up to take the joint from my mouth, fingers lingering a little too long trying to grab what's left of it. Caressing my lips. Sayori finishes it and puts the roach in a little bowl on the nearby table. Then she just lies there, looking up at me. Expectantly. Breathing in and out, chest rising and falling.

The way she's laying, angled slightly, pulling on the muscles in her thigh, I can see the tendons attached to her hips going taut—her shirt was a little too loose. They hold breasts I can only imagine cutting open with a knife and having exactly as much room as I needed for a single scoop of protein powder. I envision myself closing up the wounds, giving her a good shake, and allowing her to feed an infant whose protein intake would make him the strongest in the land.

"It wasn't a good night for me before this," Sayori says quietly. "Sorry about the whole… y'know. Just sort of kidnapping you. I didn't really have any plans. Things seemed kinda lonely, and I knew sorta where you lived. You're not mad at me, are you?"

"No."

"That's good." Her smile turns a few notches more smug. "I'm glad you're easily manipulated. Not sure what I woulda done alone tonight."

I flick her forehead.

"Ah, pain!" she says dramatically. "I can't handle pain!"

I laugh, and so does she.

"Kinda glad too, Sayori," I say. "My weekend plans were just to loaf around and relax. But it's better with people you like. People you missed."

She smiles up at me. "Seems like we have the same problem with an obvious solution."

"Do tell."

"We should do this again. You, me, a night out. Just doing, like, whatever. Goof off, smoke, watch Netflix—I don't really care. It's just… this is nice, y'know?"

"Yeah."

"Yeah," she repeats. Slowly, she bites her lips. Whispers something.

I lean in to hear it.

"I said—"

There's a rattle at the door.

Sayori groans. "Uh, great timing. Really? Food is here now?"

The lock turns, and we both sit up sharply and tight. The door opens and Monika enters in a green hoodie. She just freezes, keys in her hand. Sniffs the air. And her face tightens into something ugly and disgusting.

"What the fuck?" I whisper, looking around. Like she's not really here. Like she can't be. I can feel the pressure in my veins increasing. My heart doesn't beat correctly. Two thumps to the left for every one of the right, all because of that fucking expression.

Because it's not aimed at me. It's a hideous thing aimed squarely at Sayori.

"Hey, Monika!" Sayori calls out, waving, her smile fake. She says my name. "Oh, by the way, Monika is my roommate. Aaaand she's back early. Hiya!"

"She's your…" I blink and scoot back further into the couch. "She's your what?"

Monika sniffs sharply, glaring at where Sayori had dumped the joint. She closes the door behind her and enters the apartment, movements like a tigress in a Burmese orphanage. All muscle and sinew and claws. Her expression is a graveyard, a field of bones in a human mouth.

"Sayori, Ę̸̼͓̱̯͎̦̬̤͋͠g̸̛̫͓͕̺͊́̈͛̍̈̐͑̈͊͗͒o̵̢̪̺͑̎͐́̽͒̎̄̐͝͝,what a surprise!" Monika says. "You should've told me you were inviting over a guest. I would have rushed back here sooner and made dinner or something."

Right ventricle, two thumps for every one of the left. Wrong way. My blood flows in the opposite direction, until I can taste it in the back of my mouth like stale vomit. I see spots. They look like rotting lungs.

Sayori sits up on her knees. "I found him wandering outside talking to possums and adopted him right there. Can we keep him, Monika?"

Monika leans against the kitchen counter, staring at us. No, not us. It's like I'm not even there. It's like all she can see is Sayori, eyes directly on the girl's throat. She squeezes the room keys in her hand. "No," she says happily. "Remember the turtle you found?"

"He ran away," Sayori says, doing that finger thing again. "Coulda happened to anyone."

"You had a turtle?" I ask weakly. "Monika, you let Sayori own a pet?"

"You let him starve to death because you tried feeding him table scraps to save money," Monika says, and I can see the veins on her hands.

"It was a good idea until it wasn't!" Sayori shouts, folding her arms.

I look between the girls and have the distinct impression I no longer exist. It's hard to describe. Like I could say or do anything right now and neither would acknowledge me.

"Well, I'm sure the weed smoke didn't poison his lungs either," Monika says pleasantly.

I stand. No one looks at me. Stretch my arms over my head, and nothing. "We ordered food," I try more forcefully, voice louder than it needs to be.

Monika keeps staring at Sayori. "Cool, what'd you get me? Since I live here too, and it's not like I'd be out the whole night."

Yeah, no. No no no. I do not want to be here right now.

"Chicken pad Thai, extra spicy, because we're trying to kill you," I say conversationally.

Sayori nods. "Yeah, except the killing part. Nobody wants to kill anyone here."

"I'm sure that's true." Monika's eyes move to me. I can almost imagine the sound, a rusty knife dragging across frosted glass and dried bones. "I love pad Thai. You're very considerate, E̷̮̳̼̓̐͐͜͝g̸̺̝̑̉͌o̴̬͚͕̳͐̏̆̊͠ͅ. Thank you!"

I take a step forward, and I'm not sure my foot is there anymore. Pins and needles. The fluid in my ears that regulates balance tells me I'm standing sideways on the walls.

"Wait, aren't you a vegetarian?" I say, back cold, my shirt sticking to it.

Her expression remains pleasant. "You're also a good listener. Would you mind helping me pick the meat out?"

"I would, actually. I just came over to be a bad influence. See you around, Monika."

"You're not going to leave me again so soon, are you?" she asks.

Sayori sighs, making the noise way too loud and obvious. "I only kidnapped him for a little bit. I was just dragging it out because he had to go do some homework in rocket surgery or whatever he's studying. I think you broke the spell."

"Oh, it's no problem at all," Monika says with a laugh, waving her hand. "I can help you study. I've always been good at it."

"No," I say, not even bothering to come up with an excuse. I go for the front door.

Sayori calls out my name. I ignore her.

"E̷̮̳̼̓̐͐͜͝g̸̺̝̑̉͌o̴̬͚͕̳͐̏̆̊͠ͅ."

I stop to look at Monika. Her smile is the visual equivalent of nails on a chalkboard. Not the sound, never that. But the way the hard surface cuts and breaks your nails, until all you're left with is gorey stumps that pulse with pain every time your heart limply tries to move blood around your body.

She nods towards Sayori, who is holding up my phone.

"You almost forgot this," Sayori says.

"Ah." I reach out and pocket it. "Thanks. I need this for setting my morning alarm."

"Mhm," Monika hums.

I look at her one last time. She seems to take this as an invitation for conversation. Opening her mouth and wriggling her wet tongue.

"Been real, Sayori. Enjoy dinner, you two," I say, grabbing the door with too much force. It hits my foot, but I don't even feel it.

Just pins and needles.

Until I'm outside and can close it behind me.

And then I'm down the stairs.

Finally, the open air.

I take a deep, long breath. A sigh in reverse.

Exhale. Expel.

I put my hand to my forehead and rub. One of the veins there is twitching, pulsating rapidly like it's just cleared some cholesterol blockage, and now thoughts can flow freely to where they're least wanted.

A man carrying a bag with a logo in Siamese looks at me, then slowly shakes his head and walks past. Not even bothering with me.

I take a page from his book and go home.

At least I managed to avoid eating dinner.