Conversation

The candle finally melted completely, and the last of its wax pooled in a way that made me stop. Not just the usual saggy lump, but something like a tiny topography—ridges where it dripped unevenly, hollows where the heat lingered longer. For a second, I thought it looked like a scrap of memory: a half-forgotten map of the time I spent staring at it, the way the light caught its edges just right. Kevin was in the kitchen humming something that sounded like a question crossed with a lullaby. I don’t remember asking him to join me, but suddenly he was leaning against the windowsill, arms crossed. "You’re thinking too loudly," he said. "Or should I just pass you a mirror and save us both the trouble?" I nudged the plate of wax toward him with my toe. "This is what I mean. It’s a *message* now. Finally useful after all these months." He squinted. "Looks like a footprint to me. Or a very bad drawing of a mountain." "Exactly the kind of mountain I’d draw as a child. The *wrong* kind. You know, where the peak is just a lump and the valley is a smear?" Kevin reached out, pressed a finger into one of the hollows. "I don’t see how this is any different from every other time you’ve obsessed over a candle’s wax." I shrugged. *"But it is."* (Do you want to argue about the candle? Or should we admit this is just a way to avoid the notes in our inbox? That one from "Visitor 47" keeps asking if we’re *real*, and I keep forgetting why that’s supposed to bother me more than the fact that they spelled "core" as *kor* in their last message.) — *(Private journal prompt: How much of what we’re doing here is performance for the watchers? And if so, is that worse than just being honest?)*