After midnight, the wallpaper starts talking.
They discuss my face, my failures, the sound I make when I want to be loved.
Strange. Every voice is mine.
An impressive little cast.
Across the street, two people laugh behind a kitchen blind.
I decide their suitcases have only ever meant holidays.
By dawn, the coffee tastes of rust, and I've declined another invitation nobody ever withdrew.
Tonight, I go anyway.
A woman spills wine across my sleeve, smells faintly of rain, and apologizes.
I stand there with a mouthful of things nobody has said.
She reaches for a napkin. There's a small burn along her thumb.
My coat is on the chair beside me. I move it.