(excerpts from Oct. 16)

What if I am actually in front of you, holding your hand and telling you stories instead of just being a hushed voice scribbled in cold paper?

I would ask if we can go for a walk.

And we would hold each other’s hand strolling on the sidewalk while smoking the pack of cigarette we’ve bought in Manila. We’d talk about friends back home and what they might be doing at this late hour. We’d talk about your first gig and imagine what you, Kakoy and Arvin would do during the set. We’d laugh at things, laugh at people, laugh at ourselves and when we have nothing more to say, I’d jump on you and ask you to carry me on your back. You’d do it even if we look so silly just like the couples in Korean chick flicks and so I would beg you to put me down after a few steps, under the pale lightshade of a lamp post.

I’d tell you I love you twice and snuggle on your neck and you’d feel that my nose is freezing.

Or maybe we could cuddle in bed.

I would tell you it is too cold for me and I feel like my bones are going to crack one after another—a partly true alibi so I could slip my freezing feet between your legs. I would ask you nonsense things like what color do you think my name is? And why do I have this idea that you’d say pink? But I’d tell you it feels more like black and you’d remind me again that black isn’t a color.

Then I’d tell you that for me, your name seems to be a tint of yellow, the same one I used to color the sun with stick rays and a smiling face when I was five. And you’d think I’m such a weirdo that because of that I’d remember you whenever I see heart-shaped sunny side ups in recipe books.

NIGHTNIGHT by DEDDY