Isn't it ironic? How we dance perfectly, you with your deranged mind, and me with my broken soul. 

You may have no idea but you're no stranger to me. I have seen you countless of times from my windows exiting the other side of the building. You always make a good impression to everyone you meet or maybe even for spectators as you fascinated me the first time I saw you from the very same windows of my room. For the past six months of your daily visits, I memorized your schedules. Thursday, 7:00 am and Sunday at 4:00 pm. I swear I did not stalk you, it was just me and my boredom.

No, I lied. It was actually my sudden breathlessness and persistent fatigue so I have nothing better to do than watch people who are as helpless as me or those few that are blessed that they won't have to come back here.

Even if I did it on a daily basis, I have never looked forward to see anyone else aside from you.

I often find myself wonder what are you thinking after you greet people you've become familiar with in this place with your warm good mornings and good afternoons. Your smiles would falter right away after you pass by, were you really genuine?

You have been regularly coming here, are you not feeling well yet? Aren't you tired riding the train twice a week to cure yourself? Do you still believe that you are curable, tell me stranger. I'm curious of how was the therapy after months of trying, but I guess I know the answer.

I do not intend to pry much but you seem gloomy and pale as you look up in the sky every time you exit the facility, I heard your silent pleas as you call whoever is up there, 'make me feel' said your empty honey colored eyes, you are almost as pale as me. Maybe you should get some sleep at night instead of wondering about things and oh your fantasies, dear stranger when will you quit those? I shouldn't meddle with your businesses but I couldn't help but to get worried, you seem like you couldn't grasp the reality.

But visions do lie. My observations are not always accurate and most of the time I perceive people and things the way I want them to be.

For all the times I have seen you, I couldn't help but wonder, who are you?

It never crossed my mind that I would be able to have a glimpse of you and your secrets.

That morning, which I still couldn't distinguish if fateful or not. The day when I have to absorb sunlight that those doctors instructed. They said it would somehow help to ease the sudden pains I would experience from time to time. It was on a Thursday morning, the flowers are on full bloom bursting their colors as they sway ever so light and slow. It was a perfect day to go outside, maybe in a park where the surroundings are mostly painted in green in its brightest form. You finished your daily session which I highly doubt would ever help you.

You have seen me looking at you while you pluck some flowers in the garden, sniffling their scents as you look at me with curiosity in your eyes, mirroring mine. Taking light steps that got me pondering if you are as soft as the way you walk and if you usually talk to strangers like what you did back then. Your eyes sparkled like those stars you wait to show up every Sunday night after your long sessions. As you asked me to break your heart I noticed how every breath you take and waste are through your mouth. your lips once in a while. We really develop habits because we adjust. 

When is your birthday? 

I never got to ask the moment you showed up at my doorstep, bringing nothing but a thick blanket dyed just like the color of the night as we escape the hospital at 2 in the morning. That night I was proven right that you don't sleep at all as we trail a path that seemed to be carved on your mind. You knew when the trees were buried deep into the ground, you knew who planted them as you tell me a funny story but your laughs came out forced and your smiles did not reach your eyes.

Weird enough, your eyes still held an unusual sparkle.

Was I the one who made you excited? Or it was the feeling of breaking rules as you snuck me out every single night. Were you aware that I shouldn't exhaust myself and I should be in a slumber before the clock strikes at 10? You weren't. And as I look back, you're not supposed to.

Do you remember when you held my wrist at the hallway even when we are not supposed to know each other after dawn up until midnight? Were you out of your mind or you were just ready to risk it all? Because I can't. You see dear stranger, my parents wouldn't be so proud to know that I kiss a person with cold lips and cold hands under the celestial body after sneaking out even when I'm not supposed to.

I think you are the same age as me, just a little free.

Who are your parents?

I never asked but the expensive time attached on your skin is enough to tell where they stand. I also never got to tell you but I despised your watch, tick tock tick tock, the continuous ticking of it reminds me of the thing I have been running away. For all the times I was with you, your annoying clock never failed to remind the borrowed moments that we had.

I realized that maybe your parents aren't proud of you when you called for the nth time but no one picked up. But that could have just been my assumption, they could be afraid of you or they were just extremely busy and occupied to attend you at that moment. 

Your parents, I bet they wouldn't be so proud to know that you kiss someone with trembling hands and bleeding nose. I hope you didn't mind every time I stained your shirts, but I figured out that you actually liked it as you paraded your shirt as white as snow with my blood in it, secretly enjoying the attention thrown at you.  

Where do you live?

The neighborhood of high status individuals is far far away from here, is that the reason why you always seem to be in hurry every time you enter the other side of the building? Or you don't have a sense of time and your parents never liked you so you live all by yourself. I can never blame them, I wouldn't like it when my daughter is close to perfection. However, you lack emotions...how would they like someone like you. You and your practiced sweet smile, you and your empty dark eyes that held your menacing reveries.

Once again, I may or may not be wrong but I once saw a key card buried deep inside one of the pockets of your worn out jeans. Sadly, I was quite proven that your parents are not proud. 

I did not ask you how you feel about it, knowing you could never answer such questions.

What did you do for a living?

You never asked but since young I've always wanted to be a nursery teacher. I'd like to see purity every time and I wanted the same thing for a lifetime job. Kids will always be the purest. The question randomly came to my mind when I watched you burn an entire house at three in the morning. Your usually empty eyes held the very same sparkle the first night we snuck out. Or maybe it was just the glowing fire as we wait for the whole neighborhood to see what you've done.

That night I recalled you saying that you're an artist, an artist that the world would never appreciate. Dragging me away to somewhere you feel secured in a hush manner when you heard the distant wailing of the firetruck, I was never sure, maybe it was the police or maybe an ambulance as my heart was the only thing I heard and you were the only thing I saw. You were excited as we ran far far away, your calloused hand with bruises in it, with pecks and dots of burns, and veins wanting to break free from your pale skin is clutching me tightly. Holding me tight as if you were afraid that if you loosen a little bit you may lose me and you would never have the time to get back to me.

What job would demand such thing?

The thought of kids and their innocent and refreshing smiles long forgotten.

You are a good dancer. 

No you are better, oh yes, you are best at it. You did not let me question if you are into art. As you move with the music I was almost convinced that you are the art itself. The day we met, in the garden, I observed you right. Your footsteps are indeed light just like the way you dance. But never your heart. It was never once soft. When you dance, you become a great deceptor, no I am only fooling myself, you have been a deceptor all your life— but when you danced, I was almost convinced you were full of sorrow like the notes of Gaspard de la Nuit inside your studio.

Who would have thought that you find peace and solace at such place where you see your disoriented self. Like the  of the classical music you played when you danced for me, I felt passion, sorrow, regret, and my numbered days as you reach the last move together with the fading notes of the piano.

How can you make me want to stay?

It was a question that was meant to just float around, untouched. I asked myself, I was not given the answer. In my subconscious, however, I knew the answer.

We had lots of memories inside the room with mirrors from the floor that reached the ceiling. There you saw me at my rawness. Your cold and pale hands trailing the purple bruises I can hide no more. Your name feels bizarre when I called you out a million times. How do I stay.... but only the sad notes of the very same piece was all I heard.

I wanted to tell you something from what I heard the other night. Inside your empty studio, we were both panting, desperately chasing our breath as I lay down while you were looking down at me. Eyes were still empty, I weighed up if I would tell it to you because you were looking at me like that. I felt powerless and small, but I still wanted to stay— here, with you. So I said it to you in a whisper, it sounded like I was only telling it to myself. But I know you heard me, "I'm dying, Xu Jiaqi."

Then I heard the mirror cracked and you were quick to look back but I still met your gaze through the reflection.

I may have heard one of your properties break, but there was no crack in your heart even if the music died down long time ago. Your breathing through your mouth, I heard it loud and clear, stable and definitely not broken.

Time was catching up but I was faraway from the point I wanted to prove to myself.

When can I see you again?

After this lifetime, will we ever meet each other or I will be dust for infinity and you will still be right there, in the usual spot you first brought me, waiting for the stars to come out and to disappear. 

My windows cracked, or it was just my heart.

Let us meet in our next life, when I do not suffer from Leukemia and when you already have a heart. 

*

The last time I saw you, we were running in the hallways at dawn. I did not care if we get caught as I feel my soul get away from my flesh. You did not care because you are you.

In front of my hospital room, with an artificial light that reflects your eyes, bright and still sparkling. You kissed me, the most passionate we ever had, it left me wondering if it was you who took away my life. The kiss was heartfelt and consuming, something I never expected from someone like you. Pouring out imaginary feelings as we get breathless in each other's presence.

The last words I heard from you were, "Sleep tight, angel." If not for the weakness I felt I would have retorted with, 'Take care, devil.' But my eyes were heavy and I felt so tired from the rendezvous that we did for the whole day or maybe for the whole month, I did not know, I never really liked calendars and your golden watch, so instead I offered a smile before closing the door with the energy left in my body, pushing myself desperately towards the bed to finally take a deep slumber. 

After some hours of panting and chasing my breath, the lively light the sun always carries was already glazing my windows. That exact moment, I knew we wouldn't see each other for quite some time.

As I breathe in the last oxygen, I only had one question in my mind.

Stranger, did I break your heart?