I’ve always been the curious sort and there’s nothing I will not take apart and reconstruct, even if only inside the see-saw of my mind. I find myself doing it on a lazy afternoon, lying face down against the bright orange bedspread, shivering beneath the spinning ceiling fan, too lazy to peel off the layers and snuggle under the covers. I imagine what it would be like to be me inside you, to climb into your head and watch me playing on the white screen behind your eyes. Do you catch a glimpse of the nervous and tongue-tied girl masquerading in grown-up clothes and words? Or notice my eyes change colour as the sun casts a particular hue of gold over the dust-laden fields? 

The chilli that sneaks past your lips, as you distractedly eat while speaking to someone else, tastes a lot like me. I’m inside your ears when the radio plays that song, the one you thought was for someone else but is really about me. I guide your feet each time you step onto a particular tile and every alternate crack on the floor has been placed there by me. You wonder what I will say as you wait for the ringing to be replaced with the sound of my breath. You try and predict what my hands will pick up each time I run them across the shelves. And when you notice the shade of mint green spilling out of that kid’s ice-cream cone, you wonder how it will look on my fingertips.

I crop up between the lines when you skim through the pages of an old book in search of forgotten phrases. I’m in front of you as you wait your turn to board the flight, and when you settle down into your seat, you can almost feel the spot that once housed me. The fragrance of fresh lemongrass and ginger wafting through the market streets makes you wish you’d known me in another life. The look of shock on the old woman’s face as her grandchild drops to the floor, makes you wish you hadn’t met me in this one. That piece of chocolate melting between your fingers reminds you of the drops of rain that touched my face before falling to the ground on the day you first saw me. And if you listen carefully, you can hear me saying hello even when my lips are spelling out goodbye.