Page 133 of Undefined Terms

The wet goes, the chest settles.

I pick the phone up. Open the text. Type: told mum

Three dots, ten seconds.

and?

she said bring them to dinner

them?

them

The dots again. Longer this time. Twenty seconds, thirty.

she asked what you do. I said horror. she said like my films

did she sound horrified

she sounded like she was already planning to fatten you up

I love her already

Like my films. She’s anchoring it, making it ordinary. My mum, who sits with cups of tea and counts the stairs and worries about me eating enough, already building the frame where Celyn fits. Already has the space ready.

Then, after a pause:

Ron

yeah

you did it on a Thursday

yeah

not a Sunday

no

because Sundays are too easy to hide in

I stare at the screen. Celyn knows. Knows because I told them once, half-asleep, face in the pillow. Said: I can’t do it on a Sunday. Sundays are too easy. And Celyn kept it.

you remembered that

I remember everything you tell me at 2 a.m. It’s when you say the real things.

Then, after a pause, a heart emoji.

One heart. Red. From someone who writes for a living and chose one red heart.

And the thing that catches in my ribs is home. The door’s open, the kitchen’s warm. There’s a place at the table being set right now, in my head, in my mother’s head, the place where Celyn belongs.

I hold the phone for a moment. Then the bed, the ceiling. The stain from the leak the landlord hasn’t fixed. The stars in the packet on the windowsill. Sealed, waiting.

Tomorrow. I’ll put them up tomorrow. Celyn’s going to say they’re in the wrong place and I’m going to say I don’t know where Orion goes and Celyn’s going to do the face.

Thursday night, not Sunday.