His room is low ceilinged and lit dimly, or warmly, or barely at all. The light shade is red, the comforter is red and usually this color makes me overwhelmed and nervous, but in his room I am usually sleepy and satisfied. The smells are vague and ambiguous; I cannot bring them to mind until I am presented with them, and at once they seem familiar and warm. The heat is individual to each room, and so when no one else is home we close the door and keep it so hot we sleep in out underwear, or nothing at all, and even then we are sweaty and restless. We throw off the covers, we spread out our long legs in tangles, the entire mattress possessed by our thin limbs. We spend almost all our time in this room, playing music for each other, and finding cities we would like to visit on the map that covers the wall above his bed. I have come to feel as if his room is a parallel space; as if it exists in a world where we do not have children, where we are not crazy poor, where we are not so bad at trusting someone else with our heart. I feel as if we are lovers in summer, or somewhere more equatorial. When I am there I feel tempting, interesting. I feel as if I am a woman not made up of things like my dirty car, paying for childcare, or my past-due schoolwork. I feel as if I am made up of only my flesh, and what is held inside it—my thoughts and feelings.

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