The ridge of the glass was sticky with juice; but he ran his finger over it, waiting. Although he would never admit it, he was anxious.

Occasionally, looking around the bare, cheery yellow room, he would grow self-conscious and take a swig from his cup and jitter his leg up and down. Then he would feel stupid. There was no one to watch him in here. Why did he have to be self-conscious about it?

Every so often he checked the door. He hated checking it, because he knew that nobody would be there; nothing would be changed. The door would be white and silent as ever. But there was always that little, tiny, smattering of hope, deep down, that kept him watching. And then he was frustrated at looking again; but he couldn’t seem to stop. He hated knowing nothing had changed and hated not knowing; so what was he to do?


So he sat. And looked around the room. Although. When he thought about it, really, why was he looking? He knew it would be the same yellow room; there was no chance in that changing. So why did he feel the need to continue to gaze at it, even though by now (for it had a long while) he had memorized the slant of the sun each time it altered; he knew exactly where the hole in his jeans were; he knew exactly where his hangnail was on his finger, which nail was longer or shorter.

And that got him thinking. A few songs he knew by absolute heart; he could repeat them word for word, note for note, every slight dip and fall and raise of the voice, and still have a desire to listen to it. When, really, he knew exactly how everything would go. Why did it still give him pleasure?

So many questions. So many of them, floating like invisible clouds around the room. An infinite number.


He jumped about a mile in the air and tried to look nonchalant as one eye appeared in the crack of the doorway.

“Follow me."

And he got up and walked out of the yellow room, leaving the questions to hang from invisible strings of thoughts, like silvery, glittering icicles.