03-01-18

It’s been days now since I’ve fully moved in, and the warehouse is still learning me. The walls absorbing my movements and thoughts, all while holding things back, like they’re waiting to see if I’m going to stay. Sleep is like a stranger who arrives late and never stays. The over fuzzed guitars and thin, high drums of the band next door seeps in far too easily, keeping me awake until the small hours, listening. And once they’re done practicing, there’s always another that sighs into life. The warehouse has many tenants, and none of them seem to care for silence.

It’s about 7 a.m. now. I know without looking because there is a small opening between the poorly insulated ac unit and the jaggedly cut hole in which it sits, and the morning light hits it just right to project a reversed image of exactly what’s going on just outside of my wall. Not just shadows. An entire world is projected onto my interior. The light changes them constantly. On cloudy mornings they seem to dissolve, blurring faces and outlines and colors thin out, showing an image that’s barely there at all. Like an old, sun-damaged film reel. But when the sun strikes just right, the movie is crisp and clear.

The warehouses sit behind a small strip plaza. The only two memorable businesses being a church and the violin shoppe. I remember when M and I first went out, I think we went bowling. I remember it not even go well; I remember telling my coworker I didn’t like him. It was weird because he invited his ex and her friend. They were nice to me, but I know it was all some sort of joke in my face. I was 19, they both were 27. Back then I barely spoke, I was this shy fragile girl who just wanted to belong somewhere. So, I never said anything. After, he had me drop him off right in front of the violin shop. I probably asked him five times if he was sure this was where he needed to be dropped off; if he was going to be okay. He gave me no explanation, only a quick reassurance before vanishing down the narrow alleyway at the building’s back.

So, I watch people move on the wall. Like I’m watching the building dream and I’m lying awake in it’s head, watching the things it remembers. The people who appear as strangers, yet familiar in their movements. The careless gestures of morning: bags of trash and odd objects thrown away in the dumpster, a few churchgoers chatting at the back door before service, or whatever they do. But the image is always mirrored. A little world made of other people's beginnings while I lie awake collecting them.