eleven-pm

[eleven-pm]

june

This summer is a dream. It’s fickle like one, too. Some days it’s as hot as an oven, and other days it rains like the heavens aim to flood the earth once more. The sky is iced with dollops of creamy white clouds with swipes of smog here and there. The roads are gray, the highways are gray, the sides of buildings are gray and getting grayer. The air is thick with heat or water or both. The trees don’t move and there is no breeze that whistles through their leaves.

            This summer is perfect. Bare feet on mahogany wood floors, a little gray from the dust. Musty old couches and pillows, and aircons loud enough to drown out the morning alarm. A pool dotted with leaves that make the watery grave of a few unlucky bees and beetles. Electric fans sweeping this way and that, lulling everyone to a gentle sleep.

            This summer is special. Cicadas orchestrate the background of every scene like an animated movie. Pairs of shoes carpet the foot of the stairs, sitting in rows chaotic and orderly all at once. The door opens to let in another arrival every other week until the lonely house is almost bursting with light and laughter.

            It’s only once a year that summer comes around, and when it is finally here, all you want is to live in it forever.

[eleven-pm]

may

She preferred people’s reflections to their real selves. She studied their images that gleaned off of glass windows and white boards. She looked their reflections in their eyes and studied them from a third-person perspective. It was easier that way—they didn’t have the chance to look back at her.

            She gazed fearlessly at the back of their heads reflecting off the shine of her screen. She observed them as an omnipotent narrator would in a novel. She pretended like she knew their ins and outs without once taking the risk of having them look back.

[eleven-pm]

april

It’s five o’clock.

            She slaps her laptop closed, stretching out her arms and twisting her back. She gets up from the chair she’s been sitting in all afternoon and heads downstairs.

            The electric fan whirs in the living room. The glass curtains hang silently in the stillness of just-before-dusk, and the creamy light of golden hour filters through, casting the living room in mismatched shapes of rich orange. She claps her hands, an invitation.

            The spritely sheepdog runs in from where he’s been sniffing around in the garden. He comes up to her, jumping on the pads of his paws, tennis ball in mouth. She laughs, ruffling up his mottled brown-and-white fur. She steps out into the sunshine, armed with a plastic bag for emergencies. She finally wrestles the ball from his grasp after having to chase him all over the driveway. She looks both ways before hurling the neon green ball as far as she can.

            He breaks off into a run and streaks after it like a comet.

            It’s five o’clock.

            She clicks her pen, leaning against the back of her chair. She rotates her neck, wincing at the stiffness. She gets up and heads downstairs.

            The aircon is on, blowing cool air into the empty house. She pauses on the last step, twisting around to giver he back one last satisfying pop. She looks underneath tables and around sofas. She claps her hands.

            The sheepdog comes trotting up to her from where he’s been napping in the corner. His stub of a tail is wagging so hard it’s causing the rest of him to vibrate. She strokes his head, scratching that one good spot just behind the ears that makes him purr like a kitten. She laughs, and he bounds ahead of her to the door.

            She picks up his tennis ball and rips out a plastic bag for good measure. She walks out onto the driveway, looking both ways before tossing the ball just far enough for him to run. He snaps at it a few times before finally catching it. He runs back to her, shaking his head and taunting her to catch up with him.

            It’s five-thirty.

            She looks out at the window and see pearlescent clouds swimming in the richest blue sky she’s ever seen. It’s about time she and the dog take their walk. She turns back to the show she’s been watching and tells herself, “What’s a one-day break?”

            It’s eleven forty-five.

            She sits on an unfamiliar couch. The broken leather bites into the fabric of her pants making her itch all over; still, she doesn’t move an inch.

            The sounds of cats and dogs in cages drown out her thoughts. The smell of disinfectant wraps around her is a painful reminder that keeps her tethered to the motley brown-and-white sheepdog lying on the metal table in the room across from her.

            She catches glimpses through the door—wires and tubes, scalpels and a handful of his ruffled fur.

            When he comes home the next day, she wraps her arms around his neck and cries when nobody is around. He sits still and lets her tears run into his fur. When she pulls away he nuzzles his head firmly under her arm. She scratches his ears, and her purrs with pleasure. She strokes his caramel-brown muzzle, streaked with white. She kisses his nose and he gives her a slobbery one in return.

            It’s four-thirty.

            She gets up from where she’s been lying on her bed, staring at the ceiling. She paces downstairs softly. The electric fan is whirring in its corner, blowing air through the house. The glass curtains move with the breeze. She claps her hands. He does not come.

            She looks by the door and sees him curled up against it as if he’s cold. His bleary eyes open as she approaches, and the little stump of his tail wags and makes his whole body vibrate.

            She helps him stand up and leads him outside into the soft afternoon light. She walks by his side, holding him up every few paces and waiting as he buries his nose in something. She stands and looks up at the sky so he cannot sense her crying. Still, he nudges her hand carrying the tennis ball. She looks down at it in surprise. Force of habit.

            She sits on the grass, and he gingerly sits down next to her. His bones are creaking and popping with every move. She runs hands through his fading brown-and-white fur. She lifts his head into her lap and traces the spots on his nose. She scratches his ears, and his head leans into her hand even if he does not purr anymore. She looks into his eyes and sees the gray clouds that have rolled in one day and have not left.

            She passes the tennis ball in front of his nose. He pokes his snout at it, then opens his mouth ever so slightly as if to grab it. Then he drops his head back into her lap and lets out a sigh.

            “It’s okay, buddy,” she says, stroking his fur. “What’s a one-day break?”

            It’s five o’clock.  

            She gets up from her chair and sends her laptop to sleep. She stretches her arms out and sees the sky. Wind is blowing branches of trees and the leaves are singing in chorus. She smiles to herself in the golden sun.

            She makes her way downstairs. The electric fan is off and faces the floor. The windows are all open, letting in the breeze. The glass curtains flutter like angel wings.

            She looks around the house, looking under tables and around sofas. Even if she does not find what she looks for, she smiles to herself. He’s still here, even if she cannot see him.

            She claps her hands.

            Behind closed eyes she can see him bounding up to her every single time. The little, stubby-legged puppy with puffed fur and blue eyes. The lanky adolescent with long, thick, fur and slightly awkward limbs. The well-groomed adult with a proud air. The slightly-rounded dog with a speckled white muzzle. The sleepy, happy elder with faded patterns on his mottled brown-and-white fur. All of them greet her with a wagging stub of a tail.

[eleven-pm]

march

She was like a sudden waft of spring breeze in the middle of a hot March day.

            The bell of the café door rang more cheerfully than it ever had before as she entered. He looked up from the laptop screen he had been staring at blankly for the last half hour, only to gaze blankly at another thing.

            He watched her walk up to the counter and order a salted caramel macchiato. Fitting, he thought, taking in her hair that fell in soft chestnut waves in the filtered light of the morning café. Her clothes were comfortable, and yet something about the ease of it made him think she knew exactly what she was doing. She glanced over and he suddenly forgot how he usually held his head up.  

            He averted his eyes to the screen of his laptop without sacrificing his attention on her even for a second. Even as much as he wanted to peel his brain away from this stranger, it was like he developed a sixth sense meant to keep her in his awareness at all times.

            She made her way to a corner near the back of the place, next to a window. She slipped out a book and began to read while waiting for her order. He typed meaninglessly on his keyboard, trying to keep his fingers busy even if his eyes wandered again and again to that sun-soaked corner of paradise.

            He knew he had no chance going up to her like this, and he told himself he was content with sitting where he was and admiring her from a distance. The what-ifs were too much to think about, anyway. Here, framed like a bubble-framed scene in an anime, she was perfect enough for him.

---

He was like the shade of a tree in the middle of a sweltering field in March.

            He was the first thing she saw when she entered the café. In the breadth of a second that she glanced at him she took in eyes perhaps a little tired from working too long, a half-finished cup of coffee next to him, dark hair that curled in soft whorls around his head. A thin frame of glasses rimmed his eyes. When he looked up she was too shaken to hold his gaze. She swiveled to the counter, standing there an agonizing twelve heartbeats before remembering her order.

            As the barista slid her card into the reader, she risked a glance over her shoulder. When he found her already looking at her, the bass of her heartbeat doubled in her ears. He looked away before she could. She slowly turned back to the barista and claimed her receipt before listlessly following wherever her feet took her. She found a sun-warmed table by a window and took her seat.

            She pulled out her book to make herself at least look busy. The words didn’t make sense. Her eyes were trained on the sentence at the top of the page for an unnatural period of time. Her entire awareness was pointed at something else entirely: at the boy sitting across the café with impossibly soft hair and perceptive eyes. She panicked thinking he would notice she hadn’t been turning any pages.  

            She knew she had no chance with him like this, and so told herself she was happy enough to be seated in the same room as him. What were the chances that someone like him was free, anyway? She was content enough to watch him behind rose-tinted glasses, and lose herself in a daydream even for just a little while.

[eleven-pm]

february - a collection

suddenly the name you carry

becomes that much heavier

feb 2 2023

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

how is it fair

that i am having the best day of my life

while someone just at home is braving through the scariest hours of theirs?

feb 3 2023

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

spike of ice

painless, yet you hiss even as it barely touches your skin.

so deep you don't know how far it goes; twisting, twisting, burrowing deeper and further. your breath hitches and your eyes cloud over, tinging you vision with an ugly green haze.

you can't pull it out, even if you wanted to, even if you could. it would snap in half inside of you, then keep on growing till it consumes you whole; until nothing is left but a cold so intense it burns ebony.

feb 3 2023

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

why does it take their passing

for you to realize how much they meant to you?

feb 5 2023

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

we grieve

not only for what once was,

but also for what will never be.

feb 9 2023

[eleven-pm]

january

1 28 23

            He came for the last time. He came into their lives knowing exactly what he was.

            Even at five weeks old, he knew the life he was going to lead. Even with no mother, no home. Cold, hungry, scared, alone.

            Golden light tumbled out of their open door that cool March evening, calling to him as if he’d been walking all his lives to reach this point. It was as if the spirits above were leading him to this very place, where they knew he would become what he was created to be.

            They took him in without hesitation. The mother led him to their front porch. The father clicked his tongue in exasperation but did not chase him away. The daughter offered heaps of food on a silver spoon. The first son stroked his dirt-streaked head with utmost care. The second son looked over their shoulders with a wide-eyed curiosity that matched his own.

            They called him Orion, because that is the name the spirits whispered in their ears.

            Like all babies of nature, Orion grew day by day. Blue eyes melded into a coppery gold. Sandy fur turned into a fiery orange. Claws like little plastic toothpicks became as sharp as needles. His size sextupled in months. He stole food from the table, and became quite adept at it. He liked annoying his older cat sister, much to her chagrin. He rubbed the legs of the wary shepherd dog. Unlike other babies of nature, however, he grew into different things.

            Whenever they picked him up, they wondered how an slightly larger than average-sized cat could be as heavy as a sack of rocks. He would appear inside rooms when all the doors were closed. He would sit out in the garden, staring at an empty wall, hackles raised. They didn’t think much of it, just laughed it off as one of his many quirks.

            What they did not see was the shape of a much larger creature that clung to the form of a regular orange tomcat. His essence had paws as big as dinner plates, claws sharper than knives. It had eyes bright and all-seeing, with fur soft and coarse all at once. Its tail was twelve times as long, sharp and snake-like.

            The family the spirits brought him to had filled him with so much love, it grew into a guardian that aimed to give the same protection and safety back to them.

            He spent his days stalking the perimeters of their grounds, standing against any tendrils of darkness that tried to get close. He slept in the second son’s bed at night, knowing he had nightmares. He played with the shepherd dog that was lonely after losing his mate. He annoyed the other two cats in the house, like any younger sibling would. None of them had any idea how much he was doing for them; that the wounds he would get after slinking back into their house were wounds from demons and not other cats.

            And that was fine with him. As long as he could keep living like this, he would spend his last life to protect all of theirs.

[eleven-pm]

december - a collection

------------------

sitting at attention

at the dinner table, looking more like soldiers than nephews, listening to him lecture on and on until the words blend together in a meaningless drone

dec 15 2022

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i wonder if he ever gets lonely

at the head of the table. the house full of light and laughter and noise; of voices other than the one ringing in his head. but i wonder if he feels any different, sitting at the head, watching conversations ping back and forth like an audience at a play, barely a part of it at all.

dec 16 2022

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stars are photographs

of lights long gone

dec 16 2022

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developed countries worry

about corporate businesses and housing problems.

developing ones worry about famine and access to education.

it's one series of problems to the next; is there ever a society where there isn't anything to worry about?

dec 16 2022

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hearing mass

with ghosts. who're the living among the dead?

dec 17 2022

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how often do perfect days come around?

you know the ones with magazine cover-perfect skies, when nobody seems to have a bone to pick with anybody, when everything that happens happens spontaneously and yet comes at exactly the right time. when a smile comes easily, and laughs ring out like wind chimes, and it seems like nothing in the world could ever go wrong. when the sun sets, and the clock turns, you realize how special of a day it was. the biggest wish in the world you have in that moment is to replay the last 24 hours over again, just so you can pay attention to every little detail and hold it in your heart for the rest of your life.

dec 29 2022

[eleven-pm]

november

26 Nov 2022

Like a broken record, I hear it all around me.

“Good job! It paid off.”

“You did really well.”

“You’re great at doing these things.”

“Be proud of yourself. Aren’t you?”

Am I?

Maybe it’s a beautiful melody written for me. But it’s a broken record. And a broke record loses its tune after a while.

I see what people tell me. I hear the results of what I do exceed my own expectations. I feel the way people look at me, like they expect something from me, but are too far away to truly care.

I hear what they say. I hear them repeat it to me. Mouth to mouth, face to face, it doesn’t matter what language it’s in—nothing comes through. The compliments and encouragement stick to barbed wire fences, tearing into meaningless shreds and drifting away in the wind.

But the misplaced glance, the silent comment, the words I pretend I think I see behind their eyes—those slip through all the defenses. Past battalions and garrisons fortified with steel and iron; past the moats of lava and volleys of arrows. A papercut feels like the stroke of a broadsword.

These are the words I take in. These are the gestures I attach meaning to. These are the scenes I replay over and over and over in my head, with each rendition getting more and more preposterous than the last. And I know, I know it’s all just in my head. And yet it won’t stop repeating. Over. And Over. Like a broken record.

“Good job. That really paid off.”

“You did really well, huh?”

“It’s a great thing for you to try.”

“Are you proud of yourself?”

Should I be? Are birds proud of themselves for flying? Does the sun congratulate itself for shining each day? Does the flame smile in the mirror after a long day and say, “You did something special today”?

I do what I do because it’s the only thing I know how to do. I am what I am because it’s the only thing I know how to be. Is that something to be proud of? Broken record. Even the brightest melody becomes monotonous.

[eleven-pm]

635. Alarm. Snooze. Repeat. 1,2, 3, 4 times over. Wake up, roll over, stretch, groan. Sit up, yawn, lie back down. Get up, wash up, change. Button uniform, then once again, this time properly aligned. Head into brothers’ room and turn off their AC and pull back their blankets. Poke exposed behinds and draw the curtain. 1, 2, 3, 6 hours of school with barely any break in between. A free period. Lucky day. Power nap and a milkshake. Stand up, stretch, look out the window. Sit back down and attend after-school meetings. Watch the sun set as finger set upon the keyboard, reluctantly waiting for a signal from the brain to start working on another assignment. Dinner at 6, 620. Walk outside maybe, laugh a little, try to forget the pile of work that seems to exist only in the four walls of a room, and the endless dimensions of your brain. Shower.

 No more body wash. Good thing there’s a spare hidden in the sink that no one else uses. Leave it to the brothers to worry about their own hygiene for once.

 Towel off, sit in front of the laptop again and finish off schoolwork. Read a little. Write in the daily journal as to not break habit. Sleep at 11.

 Repeat. 1, 2, 3, 4, 522 times over.