Shifted to a new apartment rent is reasonable. I can pay, advance took blood out of me. It has a good view with road facing. I hear sounds every day and don’t have to use an alarm to wake up the traffic does that job, but the apartment is great. There are two more apartments in the same block where I live. Couples live there. In one apartment there is a woman, a man, and two children. In the other one lives a man and a woman. Both seem to have spent a lot of their lives with each other. I see them every day there is something I feel is not right, but I am new here. I just don’t want to get involved in this.

Days passed. Both the couples look happy but somewhere there is a need for help when I look at them. Was getting late to the office the other day lift wasn’t working had to walk down the stairs. There were a lot of them. The guy next to my apartment was heading somewhere we started knowing each other. The guy looks innocent, and gentle and is smiling under pressure. I see him forcing words. He isn’t clear in his Conversation a lot of things are going on in his mind. More 20 stairs to go we talked about our work, the transport we take just a general conversation the stairs ended I forgot that I was getting late I got so involved with the words of that guy. I told him goodbye It looked like he still had a lot to say. When I came back, he was standing in the same place and was looking at his apartment that was weird as he was staring for 20 minutes he keeps his leg forward and then takes it back again after looking at him for a while I went to him and said let’s go up. He stood there numb as if he wanted to run somewhere far he told me he wants some time. I left him there and went to my apartment.

Every day, I would see that guy staring at his apartment looking numb didn’t want to move. A few days later I met the woman from the other apartment leaving her child on the school bus and heading to work. We smiled and had a little chat about how our lives. She looked at me and replied it’s not life anymore it’s a count of breaths and hoping for it to stop and she left. The statement had a hard time for me. It kept on running and chasing my thoughts what did she mean by that and why did she say that?. I couldn’t meet her for a while. Coming back from the office I found that man standing and staring at his apartment. I decided to ask about this when I went towards him he looked at me and said don’t ask me why I stare, just know the four walls have stories and walked to the other side of the apartment.

That day I went to the park. I think I went to the park because I see children running, a few people jogging and walking. I am just sitting there, ideally have no job to do. Look around for a while. I take out my phone and start reading my old texts with the people I know and a few strangers who met me on my way. We had exchanged weird conversations. I look uninterested in all my texts. I think of how exhausted I would have been to write. Maybe you are good. Few of them made me laugh, and I cringed on most of them, No I think all of them. The park had noise. I wanted to run in the mountains with the water falling. I was fine with voices of nature but humans, that’s just not happening with me anymore. I started walking to my apartment. I see a child posting a card in the red box. It’s strange for a young boy to post a letter at this time. I am curious about this boy. I ask him what is in that letter. He says a reminder to love. I ask the boy to whom is the letter addressed. He says to my home I post these letters to myself. That’s strange. He looks at me and says don’t you want to run away from this world, these noises. I want to, but I can’t so I tell myself to love and think I got this from someone there is someone who sits and writes to me, who makes time for me. I have never been appreciated, I guess this is my way of appreciating myself for breathing, holding, and moving on. He runs as his mother calls him home.

 All of these words of the man, woman, and child keep running in my head. I am getting disturbed. I want to ask them a lot of questions. I want to know what was wrong. I want to know what’s this hard. I saw the woman after 5 weeks I finally asked her what she meant about the things she had said the other day, she looks at me and says how do you want to live your life I said on my terms she says getting married with your consent, working with your consent, having a child with your consent, living your life with your consent but if your body is being forced by the partner you choose as your soulmate disgust you. Nothing feels the way it is meant to be. Getting married is not about owning the other person none of us own any of us. Society is still in disbelief that this exists and walks away.

I see the guy staring I confronted him and asked his problem he has a light smile and says the four walls have stories that room has a different life made up. You get beaten up Every day by your loved one. You are being broken, shattered, and humiliated in your life. But the world outside the doors doesn’t understand this you are a man. Hold yourself up, and walk with pride even if you are a mess inside. I look at this apartment every day because it reminds me that both these worlds outside the room and between the walls both are equally disgusting. In one you are not allowed to speak, in the other, you are not allowed to cry.

Went to the park I couldn’t find the child there nor near the red box. The Child’s words were running in my brain that’s all I have been thinking for the past 3 days. I check on my store room it had letters of love, heartbreak friendship. I read those and laughed, cried but none of these letters make me cringe. I think in letters we write with our feelings out, but in texts, we erase the main thought and cover it with a cloth of manipulation or we just delete it before it gets stored. I am sitting in the park and get up looking this was just a dream and head back home where I see a child with a letter, a man staring at the apartment, and a woman dropping her child to the bus.