Tag: persepolis

watching the princess and the warrior

Part of me is hoping you’re thinking of me when you’re lying in the middle of heaven. It’s the part of me that thinks of you in terms of precious lost cities half buried in sand, an archeologists wet dream, someone to explore with eyes wide with wonder and conversations in the kitchen. Here I think a line about apple-pie and hamlet which reminds me your flatmate reads this so instead of typing it, I suppress the urge to wave. The look on your face when you were looking at the ocean, that’s what I see. Half open eyes and a look of almost surprised contentment. The outside world, so beautiful and something rarely visited. The impression you gave, “I like you too much, I’m so sorry.”

A vast pool, you said, of clear blue. Shallow from one end of the bay to the other, it never goes past far past your knees.

It sounds like the sky.

The part of me that lets my fear die, it knows better. It sings to me that you leave to forget this place and possibly the people in it. Lying in such clear water, I know that I would let the architecture of Vancouver drown underneath me like an unwanted cat in a bag. I would close my eyes and listen for new people to fill my life with and then I would find them. You are unlikely to bring me a picture, unlikely to stand at the side of the velvet water and focus a camera, my name the plane of your chosen angle.

This won’t stop me writing you. I still want to illuminate your life like manuscripted letters. Until there is a cease and desist, I will try to convey what you seem to me, faded love or no. Nature or nurture, I look up to your window when I pass and I’m always sorry when the light is off. I blew you a kiss before you left, thinking of the glitter when we sat at the top of a dry water fountain that looked like a stepped pyramid and talked about lock-picks.

Happiness is one of those permeable things. I was happy then, though I didn’t know what I was doing or what was going on. I didn’t care. It’s been on my mind lately, how different I was this time last year, how my life was more important to me. Thoughts preying like a fever on my loneliness. It never used to be something I would consider. Time passes. Either it happens or it does now. All I carry with me is in me, a basic understanding that escapes every Prometheus moment of victory I embrace. Thrown from the mountain, bones were broken and I’m not sure they’re setting. I feel I’ve lost my liberty.

  • A prosecutor claims that a dominatrix dismembered and disposed of the body of a client who died of a heart attack during a bondage session in her makeshift dungeon.

    Today was a write off. Seems I’ve caught up on all the sleep I’ve lately missed, but that doesn’t help me find employment. This hunt is beginning to fortify my thoughts of being a write-off.

    • I’m so tired of being the responsible one. The star in my heart wants to go out.

    A. FOUR JOBS YOU’VE HAD IN YOUR LIFE (all previous jobs):
    1. He sent me a letter
    2. I met him dancing, I was sitting on the stairs
    3. Brought to his theater, we had a friend in common
    4. It was a new place and he was standing by the bar

    B. FOUR MOVIES YOU COULD WATCH OVER AND OVER:
    1. When I replied, I laughed, he thought I would know him
    2. He tapped me on the shoulder, acted like I knew him
    3. I took him up on a roof, surprised he would not know it
    4. We went home together, though we didn’t know each other

    C. FOUR CITIES YOU’VE LIVED IN:
    1. Smiling, we corresponded every day
    2. I was stunned to discover he had a wife
    3. Standing outside his window was so difficult and necessary
    4. In the cab, his english was better than mine

    D. FOUR TV SHOWS YOU LOVE TO WATCH:
    1. There were happy pictures, and clever sounds, and fun videos.
    2. I kissed him on the cheek and told him to ask permission first.
    3. My lips were hungry and two years later, so were his
    4. His apartment was neat, plants in the window, books in the glass table

    E. FOUR PLACES YOU’VE BEEN ON VACATION:
    1. I ran home through the park to meet him on-line
    2. We held hands when we walked and strangers told us we looked good together
    3. Curled up on the couch, slowly we curled into each other
    4. I sat on the counter and he explained his red wine

    F. FOUR WEBSITES YOU VISIT DAILY:
    1. Description sufficed to make my bed less lonely
    2. When I slept over, it was on his side of the bed, not hers
    3. Queen size bed now and we still almost fell off
    4. There was a wide mirror above the bed framed by two guitars

    G. FOUR SONGS THAT MOVE YOU:
    1. johnny boy – U are the generation who bought more shoes and u get what you deserve
    2. lamb – gorecki
    3. emilie simon – graine de etoile, lamb – gabriel
    4. marvin gaye – let’s get it on

    H. FOUR OF YOUR FAVORITE FOODS:
    1. Then the letters came less frequently and I didn’t know why
    2. Eventually I couldn’t deal with the fact he was married
    3. He was so beautiful, but I knew he never loved me
    4. The next morning wasn’t too late, but there was a phone-call

    I. FOUR BOOKS YOU’VE READ & LOVED:
    1. Hurt, I assumed that work was taking his time
    2. Hurt, I broke down, dissolved, died.
    3. Hurt, I tried to tell myself not to believe in illusions
    4. Hurt, I explained to myself that it’s what I should have expected.

    J. FOUR PLACES I’D RATHER BE RIGHT NOW:
    1. Then I finally went for a surprise visit.
    2. He divorced the wife, I took him back, he went away on a trip.
    3. He never calls, so I walk over to his house at night.
    4. Today he called me back, canceled our plans.

    K. FOUR THINGS YOU FIND YOURSELF SAYING:
    1. There was another woman.
    2. There were two other women.
    3. There might never be anyone.
    4. There’s another woman in potentia.

    L. FOUR FAVOURITE ALBUMS:
    1. He never apologized.
    2. I’m fragile too.
    3. Living with little is better than nothing.
    4. At least he’s sorry.

    over a year ago, do you remember?


    Heaven’s in the backseat
    Originally uploaded by Foxtongue.

    Here there are no weeds growing, there are no patches of green grass to startle the eyes through the snow and hard packed side-walk ice. The reality is fiercely burning ears, tips of noses too numb to feel, and lips slurring inexpansively from cold. It gets dark quickly with no ocean to snare the sun. Walking down the street is noticing the flash of neon signs reflecting off eye-glass lenses, is watching black trends in coats and scarfs, is wishing for someone beautiful to step out from the crowd to ask your name. I’m feeling like I’m failing at being at peace. I could find something here to capture me, but I’m lost for a direction. There’s so much to explore that all I’ve accomplished is walking. I’m not clicking into place like a missing computer chip, instead I’ve barely scratching a surface I’m not even sure I’ve been allowed to see.

    Why aren’t you here beside me? When I’m running on so few hours of sleep, my dreams are always just on the edge of sleep, as if hallucinations are forcing me down into the bed instead of the insistent hand of gravity. Around the screaming edges of my tired lids are dark curls bleeding into my field of vision, the institutional brushes of a fingertip along the inside of my arm, the certainty that a tongue has just shaped the sounds required to speak my name. I flinch away, turning my head into my pillow, and sink into sleep, haunted by subliminal echoes of another bed, the one I would rather be in, wherever that is. I’m not even sure right now. People make fools of places, expose them for the space occupied that they are no longer living in. My memory lies to me, tells me that if I put my hand out, the right hand will take it, swing it to the softest lips my needs spill into and take my heart from it to cradle gently and let me rest. Sleeping lately hasn’t been rest. My heart is soul searching without me, leaving me always on the edge of exhaustion. I’m finding it difficult to follow simple conversation and the native language isn’t sticking to me at all. Instead, I’m shoving off, wandering on-line, trying to find somewhere within walking distance that would be interesting to be at two a.m.

    I slipped out of the apartment earlier to try and look at the wonder that is the sky. (A pregnant woman survived a fall from it earlier, though elsewhere.) There’s an easily accessible rooftop deck on the twenty-first and a half floor. Through the tiny gaps in the clouds, the stars are a seemingly endless metaphor for a patternless universe. I’m considering finding some of my most solid underwear and going back up. The other part of the roof encloses a heated pool. If I can’t find freedom, I might as well splash my toes around and read a good book. Last night I stayed up reading comic books that James had chosen for me from his prodigious collection. Fast fiction snacks, I thought. Strange little things, not solid enough to take a full bite of. It felt odd to be reading dedications written by people I know in the front covers, like I was deconstructing reality just the tiniest bit. Enough so that maybe when I looked up from the last page, it would be perfectly in time to see an unexpected explosion through the window, chunks of building spinning orange and black into the sky twenty blocks away.

    Well, one can hope.

    I have a media request of the internet audience again. You folk were so utterly amazing the last time that I figure this particular search should be a breeze. James introduced me to a music video, (download), a few months ago at Quickie Culture Night, DJ Krush – Truthspeaking, (linked here as an mp3). He’s in love with the singer, I fell in love with the DJ. However, his work is easy to find. DJ Krush is high in the hierarchy of wicked hip-hop fusion gods to come out of Japan in the last ten years, but Angelina Esparza’s a bit of an enigma. James has been unable to find anything else of hers in spite of a rather intensive search. If anyone’s got anything, could you toss it our way? Personally, I find her a little generic. Instead of finding her enchanting, I’m left craving more video with this man in it. The depth of personality he’s got engraved in his motion is simply breathtaking.

    “and by contraption, I mean my computer, not my cock” (uminthecoil andrew)


    Burrow
    Originally uploaded by Foxtongue.

    Bless the day that I walked away with a smile on my lips and tears that were glad to be. I ran for the bus wanting to call out his name as the cry that would stop all time. My eyes shone, said the man who sat next to me. How do you do that? I’m young, I replied, and went back to my book.

    There’s a mirror in front of where I sit to type on my computer and if I look up into it, I can see the white of my hair framing my face like the colour of ashes rubbed into the roots of my hair. Some days it’s good to remember what I’m like from the outside.

    Also, pirates.

    Often, almost always, I’m living hand to mouth. I try to get used to being a little bit too hungry but instead I’m always hoping that my tongue will have the strength to claw me out of where I am to somewhere greater than myself. It can be so frustrating. I find, though, that there is a side-effect of running under the line for so long. Gradually, my requirements fall. It’s almost that aphorism: the less I have, the more precious what is left becomes. As if bird crumbs have grown into mountains, complements arias, and even if they don’t love you down to their bones, what they offer is more than enough simply because they’re smiling to see you.

  • Scratchless CD blanks keep data from touching your desk.

    I’m not scared anymore. That’s terrible and yet I thank you. You were set up for those shots across the bow. All hope was swallowed in the cold of another morning, darkness and rain making for a miserable one foot in front of the other, and I had to let you know that it was okay. That no matter, I am too tired to need very much, too broken down to dust to invest my care too much. You’ve been that face that swims across my dreams close to morning for over a year. That I can kiss you now, that I have a chance, love, this makes for no illusions. This only keeps me warm.

  • Bike helmet covers shaped like brains, frogs, mohawks, etc.

    Burrow is here, finally we get to connect. She’s come up from Bellingham a few times and every instance, schedules have conflicted. It’s a shame, as I most undoubtedly don’t have enough professional clowns in my life. If the bicycle circus takes off, she’ll be up once a week a least. She says she’ll teach me to clown properly. Bwah-hah. (okay, no. She said heh heh heh, then HA HA HA. She’s reading this as I type it). I’m starting to think about wearing make-up.

    TONIGHT, (Tuesday), at 9:30, there’s will be a group of us at Tinseltown go seeing what they’ve done to Aeon Flux.

    edit: some of us are going for food at the wild ginger before the film. (Think 7:30). it’s the william gibson restaurant tucked away in the tinseltown food-court that has the magical slow-motion exploding tea.

    • when the storm takes over

    It’s like waking up next to a lion. A lion who likes laughing.

    The fog has been here a week now, so thick that it seems almost possible that if could just reach your hand a little farther, you could grasp handfuls of it to eat from the air. Breakfast was a small paper bag of profiteroles from the bakery next to the laundromat. Cold cream explosions draped in dark chocolate. Breakfast was walking through early morning fog, wondering at all the people who were already awake enough to be beginning their day, as if nine in the morning were entirely a normal hour. (Benn being one of them.). Now, yes, I know I used to be like that. I quite liked my nine to five. However, this does not erase the fact that my mind instinctually tells me that eight a.m. should be possibly banned by law. When the sky blushes, embarrassed to be rising so naked, then you should do it the courtesy of hiding your face in some coverlets. Otherwise, disservice and a pox on your house.

    I love for the years he has on me, the time he wears so gracefully in his silver hair.

  • Manic depression scientifically linked to creativity.
  • Flickr claims they are only for photographs, bans pictures, illustrations. …damned yahoo.

    Sara came over after I and I and others went up the mountain, scared for her future. She’s searching for a purpose, just like all the other humans. We’re mammals with opposable thumbs who tell time with blood. In my more empty evenings, I would argue that meaning might be a bit beyond us. There’s people like Katie, who blows stars into being, and I know she’s as lost as the rest of us.

  • Vancouver Rhino Party seeking people with fictional languages.

    This was in my in-box when I got home:

    I walked out, into the cold fog, and looked back.
    I always have to look back.
    And there she was, the Sphinx standing in the firelight, standing in her cave.
    For a moment she was there and then, like grains of sand in the wind, she blew away and I realized that not only had I failed to answer correctly, I had missed the riddle.

    She had lain the opium of her body upon my lap, my eyes and arms drew her into my blood, making dreams of my senses and in the reverie of my answered prayers I forgot to hear hers.

    reminder: KEEP JHAYNE FROM JHAYLE -a party of proportion- #340 – 440 west hastings, Friday, November 25th, 9:00 – onward

    • That and he’s beautiful like a jade fire.


    Yelena Yemchuk
    Originally uploaded by Foxtongue.

    A pleased yet raffish smile deepened the perfectly etched lines around his face, around his closed eyelids. A sigh, and he looked up into my eyes. His own were very light, a sensuous honey infused with the essence of dead cities, empty of orthodox sins, and extremely open in a sense that has nothing to do with age, but with the eternal youth of ancient things. I thought of gods, the old greek imaginings that drove women to madness. I thought of braille and souls.

    I could describe him more, but I don’t know if you would recognize him walking down the street. He wears t-shirts and black pants just like everyone else. If he wore his hair unbound, then I might have a chance to let you stop, say hello, and examine him, see him for how beautiful he is under the poorly worn cover of being unexceptional. His hair is an inky explosion caught by a very clever illustrator, someone who fell in love with myths at an early age and let it reflect in every halo they ever drew. It’s exceptional. When his hair is wet, it catches in my throat and fills my lungs with the need to say that I am drowning. Maybe if you saw him in rain, drops caught like cliché jewels in his lashes, there might be a flash of recognition, a glimpse of how divine.

    I feel so antique, describing a lover in terms of looks, but I am always transposing feelings, depths of emotion or dialogue, and yet so few ever know who I’m revealing, even when it’s myself. Earlier in the car, when I tugged on Andrew‘s hand and said, “Oh! I have news! Persepolis has fallen.”, he understood what I meant, but Tyler did not. “We talk in shorthand.”, Andrew explained, and it occurred to me that here I write in it. A code of association so baroque that only by reading for any length of time will meaning emerge from the tangle of references. Truthfully, I find myself most comfortable with people who can follow abstract trains of thought without effort, but I’m beginning to question if it’s fair. I’m wondering how often my privacy is misread. (Graham got the impression somehow, in spite of my practically rabid monogamy in the face of people like Dominique and Christopher, that I was promiscuous.) At times, it’s been psychotically useful, but part of why I continue to update almost daily is that I want to explain to my friends and family my keystone ties and transformations.

    Matthew hated when I wrote about him but he would never tell me a decisive why. He would spin gluey reasons that would change, but always, (no matter how mutable), they were negative. I think, now, especially near the end, that he was trying to hide his whereabouts and actions from people who might possibly read this. After he came back, he attempted to expressly forbid me from mentioning that I stayed the night, and was upset when I ignored his injunction. (I still don’t know who wasn’t supposed to know this time. Last time it was Sarah. I know his wife used to drop by occasionally to catch up on things, her best friend tried to step in and defend him once from one of his first terrible injunctions against my decency before she understood what my complaint was, and there are other people. Friends, family maybe. I don’t know, they just show up on my counter and leave rare anonymous comments from IP addresses located in Perth or Sydney.) My next closest relationship, they were always delighted when they could find reference to themselves in my entries. It filled their heart, they said. Made them feel exponentially appreciated, like every letter added to their worth. My friend Wilhelm, he complains that he never appears here, that I only write about people I can hyperlink to, but I know that I put his little misdemeanors of complexity here quite often, so how else can I reply except by becoming, if only briefly, a more concise exhibitor?

    We used to talk until the sun came up, a confused tangle of how a head will fit into an arm, how the angle of a bent leg will comfortably into the slant of another leg of a different shape. His bed was small enough for both of us, and it was going to eventually be summer. Visits were too rare, for they were addictively pleasant, and I fell very into liking him. His casual strength of thought, his delightful leaps of imagination. Ostensibly, I was living in another part of town, staying on charity at a friends apartment, but as it gradually becoming more intensely uncomfortable to stay there, this small room full with its tiny bed became my home. I would always feel welcome, but an imposition. When I visited, I would stand silent in the street with my terrified heart, trying to collect courage with the pebbles I would find to throw at his window in lieu of a doorbell. Once Loki the cat found me and sat purring at my ankle, almost causing me to cry. I wanted to feel safe, and it was ten feet away, and I couldn’t move. My housemate had pulled a dirty conversation on me earlier, full of tense demands, and I was so nervous of the world that just this little cat being kind to me was enough to unbalance me. When I crept in, quiet as to not wake the baby, I hoped he wouldn’t see my hands shaking.

    Loki is gone now, replaced by two cats. One black and one white. The baby is gone and my lover’s switched rooms. His window is an undeniable bitch to hit with a pebble now. I tried the other night, failing, as it turned out, not because of my aim, but because we wasn’t home yet, and I worried with every stone about hitting the neighbors house on the rebound. It didn’t help that my hands were shaking again, my adrenaline screaming at me that I was being an idiot. Years pass and yet I stay the same. He claims it’s brave of me. To do something I’m scared to do because I know it’s the right action, but I’m not so sure. I’m expecting to have to apologise with impeccable courtesy for merely arriving while my heart is craving vindication, some forgiveness for the hour. If I’m scared, then I’m not being brave, am I? Being brave might be writing this down, not knowing what side of the disclosure line he stands on.

    reminder: KEEP JHAYNE FROM JHAYLE -a party of proportion- #340 – 440 west hastings, Friday, November 25th, 9:00 – onward

    it’s been a busy week


    derek
    Originally uploaded by Foxtongue.

    Last year, they said, they were crying. They didn’t know what they were doing, if who they were was worthwhile. I can’t imagine why. They haven’t told me yet. Last year, I was so happy that I ran instead of walked. That my feet were faster than my thoughts. Last year at this time, the boy I was trying to be in love with, he was so far away that I couldn’t sleep, knowing that we were living in the same time-zone wasn’t enough. This time last year, there was a painter. He would trace my body like a sculpture and we could never find enough to talk about. We were just tying up loose ribbons of who we used to be. It was enough. This time last year, I was up until early morning because eight hours difference was perfect. I used to watch the dawn lick the sky when I was talking in fingers. Last year was freedom before I went to L.A.

    This year, I’m going to Montreal. The play I was in has kicked me out for it. I will be gone too long, nevermind I have my lines and planned on forcing Michel and James to play parts for me to work blocking around. I understand. Time is time, and it’s unreal. It only stops in hotel rooms. (It’s like my childhood didn’t exist). This year, I’m pearlescent with the heat of events hitting me, like if I were into that sort of thing, I wouldn’t sit down for weeks. Winter is upon us, fog has eaten the city for three days. Thick ashes of potential rain billowing across every street, erasing the world in portions of thirty feet.

    I walked past a murder scene at two in the morning on Saturday(Sunday). It unfolded like the pages of a book, every increment walked giving me another details. Trees coalescing into police, all the sounds of the city being replaced by a constant quiet chattering buzz of ear-beads and car radios. No one was talking. The street was lined with officially identical cars, every one empty with a laptop glow.

    Last year, they said. Last year, what? Everyone has little stories, it’s our dream. I want to collect them all and make them matter, but I have no idea how to do that. Last year I was living, this year I haven’t been. Last year turns into this year, but when? There’s some period of time, like how August brings change. I think I’ve been partnered, but all I know is that I’ve a lover. I think I’ve found family, but instead they were tribe. I think I’ve found my friend, but I’ve been introduced by others as their significant other. Instead of meaning, I’m just watching. Hoping with a terrified heart that they still like me, that I’m not the imposition that I think myself to be.

    (secretly) I turned around (to love you)


    tinted vintage by onfinite.com
    Originally uploaded by Foxtongue.

    Start Again: Blue haired calling. Blue haired, one-eyed. Wisdom like a bitmapped earth, programming the tree to find all the answers. Breaking fast with genius, reminiscent of the night before the night before, lasting impressions of that would be really great, that would be enviable, let’s spread disease through the pommels of guns. DNA discussions, eggs on the plates, grasping for a cure to AIDS. We walk to Broadway with time still left in our pockets. We sit where I sat last Sunday. Half a million dollars at this meeting, I got to go. People walking past, strangers with bags, with different coloured jackets. It’s winter time.

    Work is a back-seat exploration into self-pity glad I don’t know how to drive.

    Start: Missed rehearsal, missed Sophie. Very simply missed my walk to the bus-stop. Missed a bit of everything. My eyes were closed. Open now, the phone rang. My directer, in a panic. Fluster and worry, flashing to life, spending the night. The telephone, answering questions, reassurances. Exhaustion trying to claim me back but now I’m awake. I’m got left-over chinese food on the stove, I’m going to be a gourmand’s nightmare. Toss it all in one pan, toss it all around with a fork, drip out the grease and call it food. I’ve got creases on my belly where my clothing pressed too tight in my sleep.

    Work is a multi-lingual dull burning drive into why am I not done yet with this?

    Start a year ago: His hair is tied in a kerchief, nothing imagined, but I like it. This is cotton street. Blue print patterns, every line a perfect curl. Cleaning, I found him in a photograph, behind me. I was so sad, corsetted and dismal. I can feel the black behind her eyes, I am surprised. I’d forgotten the day. How my love would not come to my show. Instead, this one crept behind me.

    The door opens, I am blinded.

    because I missed him

    Persepolis burnt me to the ground, dark gray marble eyes leading me like paths and stairs to a treasury trap of words. I felt bare, richly carved with splendid relief, “Five years is a rock hewn tomb, too long to be without the silk cotton of skin.” His hair curled as inscriptions do, written to ward off misfortune. “I enjoy the silence,” he said, and he laughed, lambent pearl. My heart was caught in the light of it, a hidden thing suddenly unshadowed, becoming a lantern to hold in my hand. A wet red ruby to guide me to Thoth.

    “What is the geography here?” He asked and gestured, his hands describing the arc of mythical heroes. “It is tumbled land, fit for caves and caverns. Happy alone.”

    I’m staying in tonight. I have been moving too often for sleep to find me and I wish to be claimed for decency’s sake. Whatever strange endorphin level I have arrived at, it’s not feeling anymore like home.

    hubris justified


    I approve
    Originally uploaded by Foxtongue.

    Sunday was an insane day for people. At first it seemed as if in among the thousands of people thronging Commercial Drive for Drivefest, Dominique and I were not to meet anyone we knew. It was fascinating to walk among so many and not have our names called out once. We were beginning to feel odd, in fact, as we were almost at Venables before we discovered friends. I was bolstered, however, by the unexpected pleasure of encountering David Garfinkle at the Mad Hatters Tea Party. (Matthew and I had arrived in time for tear down, missing the show entirely, but with time enough to gather up Dominique, Rowan, and Anna.)

    David is an old friend, originally an associate of my mothers, who I’ve known since I was ten or twelve. Later I met him again as one of Bill’s best friends, (he being the catalyst for my meeting Bill), and I suspect that he and I get along better than he and my mother. We lost touch when Bill and I had our common law divorce, as I have with a few people, so when we met at the park, (he played the King of Hearts), we immediately sat down with smiles that tried to touch our ears. I’ve got a number for him now and I’m going to call him after work tomorrow for tea. It will be a treat to catch up. The notes of the dial tone and number pad, they are music. They are rings in water to grasp onto and kick.

    I met another member of the Tea Party later, a girl named Burrow, who by coincidence is staying with my friend Kyle. Incestuous City Syndrome hits again. We ended up at Kyle’s place, the two of us, and he and I stayed up attempting to watch the Dr. Who that James gave me until three:thirty in the morning. (They were too badly scratched, so we only made it through one episode. We gave up when Kyle was literally losing the gift of speech.)

    I met Marc on the street as well, which was a Joy Incarnate TM moment. It’s unlikely that anyone who didn’t know me last winter could understand how giddy I am that I’ve collected again this member of the Lost People. I invited him to Korean movie night. In my life, Marc’s been missing for about a year. It took a lot of effort not to bury him in kisses. He’s brilliant. We would go for long walks and discuss too many movies. He was Placebo Cine, but some time last spring his e-mail address changed and he stopped answering midnight pebbles at his window. I’d assumed he’d moved, leaving me with his camping tent and favourite shirt. However, it seems that he hasn’t changed address, only rooms. Apparently it is no longer his window, but Paul’s. I am genius.