When I was little, I thought my ribs could swing wide, like a gate opening slow. That if I tried hard enough, I could let someone live inside. It didn’t happen, not until Mira moved in. She came with a suitcase full of tiny speakers, said she liked the sound of empty apartments.

She played recordings of breathing, laughter, quiet typing. I didn’t ask whose. The noises filled the rooms faster than air.

Sometimes, she’d stand still and ask me, “Where do you keep your fear?” I’d point to the hallway, always the hallway. She’d walk there, nod like she could see it, then return and lie down on the floor.

The tiles were cold. Her hair stuck to her cheeks. I watched her chest rise, slow, deliberate. It looked like prayer or surrender.

When she left, she didn’t take the speakers. The sounds stayed. Every night, I hear them clicking on, a low hum followed by faint laughter. The air moves differently now, like someone’s still passing through it.

I started talking back. I tell the air what groceries I bought, what I remembered about my father, how the mirror in the bathroom doesn’t show my shoulders anymore.

It answers sometimes, in its own way. The curtains move without wind. The faucet drips faster when I start crying.

I think I’ve become the place she wanted. A body that listens close, a space that keeps breathing after everyone leaves.

If she returns, I’ll leave the door open just a crack.

She might come back inside, or I might step in fully and let the apartment take me for good.

Either way, these walls remember.

Fendy S. Tulodo (he/him) stays in Malang, Indonesia. He makes art from words and sound, looking at how time moves slow for some, fast for others, and why certain bonds don’t break even when they should. By day he sells bikes. At night he writes songs, records them as Nep Kid. His work sits in the silent gap between what’s spoken and what’s really meant. Linktree