rice papers i carry

I wrote this two years ago on my shouji. Ripped, folded and carried it across the Pacific.

David's Gray's falling leaves....in seconds he becomes alive.

I'm at Stella's and he's putting salsa on his baked eggs.
"That's the last time we're drinking that much gin."
I nod in silence. It's three in the afternoon. The sun hurts my eyes. I would have opted to stay on his couch reading a book, but he insisted on having breakfast. He kept rehydrating me to force me out of bed. To shower away the night's stench.

Normally he'd jump in the shower. But after a night of gin, sex is laborious, the same way trading words become pointless. When I got out of the shower my hair was tangled. I refused to buy conditioner and leave it at his flat. And he never bothered to shelf things I needed, the way other lovers would.

Lovers offer the strangest thing: pink purse, framed happy photos, apartment keys. In his case, he offered me Naomi Klein's No Logo on our second date. Betrand Russel's Why I am not a Christian appeared the next day on my porch the first time he spent the night in my single yellow bed.

"There's a brush on the counter of the dresser," as he looked at my dripping hair.
"Uh-huh." It belonged to his previous lover. Unlike me, she brought things in his apartment. Face cream, hair wax, conditioner. I discovered them neatly aligned in his medicine cabinet. Perhaps, they wanted permanence. Or perhaps, she wanted to look human when she walked back to her place.

I used all her stuff till they ran out. I also used her brush till I saw no point to it. I would have continued using it if it was the right bristles.

Lovers and Property. How could it be wrong to have ownership? To be claimed. To announce that you're in love. There isn't.

My relationship with him is shifting. I feel it as I sit across, watching him chew. I've seen the expiration date on the milk carton, but I turned the date so he wouldn't notice.

A friend told me that there's no such thing as soul mates. Relationship doesn't even have to have love. That all relationship is a contract. Sex is a part of the contract, so is sharing the bills. She said this so passionately, I almost believed her. Except her words didn't carry the weight of what's trully behind her heart. Like all good friends, I agreed. And we ordered more wine. Like all good friends, I spat on the architect's name that broke her heart.