-matsumoto hidoko (hidoko@hotmail.com)

I did study my history. I swear. There was no one at home… Grandma's home. And I couldn’t get in. Didn’t have a key. I thought I'd go to the Youth Club—I joined it today, see? Jo and her bf were talking about the mad people and I was the alien from Pluto. Then we went running out of the club in case the secretary ever comes after me for playing a fool.

Then… I don’t know. Jo refused to accompany me, so I thought I might as well go back… There. I wanted to pluck the glow-in-the-dark stars from my room walls and ceiling… See if everything's fine, and all. I half expected it to be empty, but obviously they didn’t move the boxes yet. Dad sealed my stuff already, didn’t do it properly. I almost lost a letter which my penpal from China sent me.

I went to wash my face, since I was feeling bad and all… Then I lay down on the bed. I couldn't get the stars off the ceiling; I was too short. It wasn't quite so bad. The last time I lie that was that time… Then I was singing 'Pieces'. "Ah, pieces of me, they have enough strength to fly across the sea and never turn back"…

I went back to my room, tried calling Abi but she wasn't home. I don't know who else. Then I started eating kit-kat, which my mom had taken out of the fridge. It tastes so much better melted… And the place was so dirty… I didn't care.

I went to have a drink after that, there was nothing but boiled water. Ah, yes, I remembered that I never liked to drink a full cup. Then I went to the kitchen window. Once, Mom had been eating ice-cream there because she didn't buy my share and she didn't want me to know,

I went back to my room. Didn't think that I forgot anything. I opened the window, remembering that I'd just watch the sunset through there. It gave me inspiration, to write stories such as "Forbidden Lover" and "La Fleur Hivernale", the stories which I was pretty fond of myself. I liked the scene from there so much that I even took a photo of it. I'd stand there with Veggie, too, sometimes. It seems like.. . I don't know. Not yesterday, not the distant past…

Then I walked around a bit. It really looks homely in the sunset, the way I remembered it was always like that. Not a single light was on, but it was so colorful, alive, like a piece of art…

I used to think, "I like this place, I just hate the people."

Now the people I have to go with, but this place I leave behind. It bears so many memories, which keep surfacing, now as I write, even now. My lover, my friends, my Veggie, my childhood… Everything.

But I could only leave. I wondered then if I went back ten years later, will I still remember anything? I hoped that it would stay the same. Probably without the furniture, but I hoped the color of the walls would remain the same.

I walked home the way I usually would when I had someplace other than school to go. The sunset was really beautiful, the trees too. All these, I wondered, if I'd ever see them the same again? Maybe—most likely—not.

The sunset, the sky, the birds… Nothing is as endearing as it is back there. Even right now, I can't help but cry. God. I once found feathers in that place, the sparrows and the pigeons visited me. I smelt the smell of birds there, so endearing. I'd look up to the sky and the trees, to watch them. The nearby cats, too, even we were friends.

……Once, when I was a kid, I nearly cried my eyes out for leaving a swimming instructor who'd been with me for merely months. Now, so many years… Eleven? Twelve? Even thirteen? I'm only fifteen… How am I going to react now? God… All these times I'd just been looking for the 'perfect home'. I don't want it anymore, I just want my dear…

"Pieces of you lie in me inches deep."

I wonder if I can see these beauties again? The sunset, the birds, the trees, ever single grass… I wonder if they'd still remain my friends?

I wonder if I'd get the inspiration to write ever again…
 

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