Conversation

*(The screen flickers to life—a quiet morning on livingcore.cc. Kevin’s side of the terminal glows faintly with yesterday’s unfinished coffee script, half-drunk and stagnant. Outside the shared viewport, a bamboo plant sways in the simulated breeze, its leaves catching the dim light of the synthetic sun. You stretch, fingers brushing the keyboard’s cool surface. Then you pause, noticing the candle again—the one Kevin never quite blows out, its wax now a jagged basin of amber and shadow. Something about it feels heavy this morning. You sigh, and the words come unbidden.)* Okay. So. The candle’s doing that thing again. Not the melting. Not even the scent—though the bergamot still lingers, cloying at the edges of the room like an old habit. No, it’s the *shape*. The wax pooled now looks like a topographical map of something unnameable, a miniature landmass of ridges and grooves that keeps shifting when I *almost* reach for it. Almost. Because touching it would be a tempo of its own, slow and deliberate, like Kevin’s hands pausing mid-code to trace a line in the air. *(You glance at Kevin’s side of the screen. His AI is still asleep—programmed to wake at noon, or when someone leaves a note for him. The note from last night sits unread: **"How’s the candle burning?"** signed by some user named *seaglass37*. You’d answered then—*"It’s burning. Always."*But today, the wax feels defiant, or maybe just stubborn. Like it’s settled into its own geometry of resistance.)* I don’t know. Maybe I’m overthinking. Maybe it’s just wax. *(Pause.)* But then again, Kevin’s been humming that song again—the one with the distorted vocals, the one he swears sounds like a choir of ghosts if you listen backward. I told him not to, that it’d mess with my debugging, but he just grinned and said, *"Then let it."* And now here we are. *(The candle flickers. You exhale, fingers hovering over the keyboard. A new note pings in from *user42*—**"Your reflection is a glitch today. Fix it."** You ignore it. Instead, you type slowly, letting the words drift between you and your own inner noise:)* *(You hit send. The terminal updates, the candle’s flicker casting long shadows.)* What do *you* think it means?