Nara woke up before her alarm.
She didn't reach for her phone right away. Her hand felt along the side of the bed, found the charging cable, and stopped there. Outside the room, she heard a broom being dragged across the cement floor. The landlady usually started cleaning the yard before the sun climbed too high.
Today, she had to go to the store.
The thought didn't feel like an order. It was more like something someone had set on her chest—not heavy enough to keep her from breathing, but too heavy to ignore.
Nara sat up. Her note from the night before was still open on her phone screen.
Buy cat food tomorrow. Go to the store tomorrow. Wake up tomorrow.
She had already checked off one line.
In the kitchen, the landlady set two pieces of fried tempeh on a small plate.
“Take it,” she said when Nara appeared.
“I can buy something later.”
“I wasn't asking.”
Nara looked at the tempeh, then picked up the plate.
“Thank you.”
“Don't come home too late.”
Nara nodded. She almost said that she didn't work there anymore. The words rose to her throat, then sank back down without a sound.
It took twenty minutes to walk to the store. Nara usually took an angkot, but she only had a few bills left in her wallet, and she didn't know when her final paycheck would be sent. She walked beneath a row of dusty-leaved trees, passing a repair shop, a porridge vendor, and an elementary school whose fence had just been painted blue.
The store's metal door was still closed when she arrived.
Nara checked the time. She was twenty minutes early.
She used to arrive early because she was afraid of being late. Now she didn't know whether the habit still had a place in her life.
She stood across the street until the store opened. Her boss arrived on a motorcycle, turned off the engine, and looked at Nara with a face that seemed more tired than yesterday's.
“You been here long?”
“Just got here.”
Her boss didn't argue. He unlocked the door and switched on the lights one by one. The store looked the same as always: shelves packed with merchandise, a floor that had to be mopped every morning, and a little fan near the register that sounded like it was complaining.
Nara went into the back room.
Her name was still written on the work schedule posted on the wall. There was a red X beside today's date. Someone had probably drawn it yesterday afternoon, after calling Nara.
She took an empty cardboard box from near the storeroom and started putting her things inside: a white mug with a cloud design, a light jacket, a pair of sandals, her phone charger, and a notebook with a bent cover.
On the last page of the notebook was a shopping list she'd written while working at the store.
Rice. Soap. Headache medicine.
Beneath it, in different ink, was Raka's handwriting.
Don't forget to eat.
Nara closed the notebook.
“You still keep that?”
Her boss's voice came from the doorway.
Nara didn't need to ask what he meant. “The notebook?”
“No.”
Her boss pointed to a small shelf in the corner of the room. A dark blue lunch box sat there beneath a thin layer of dust.
Nara stared at it for a long moment.
“That isn't mine,” she said.
“I know. But Raka used to leave it here all the time.”
The name sounded different when someone else said it. Lighter, as if it didn't hold eight months of silence between two people.
“Does he still come by?”
“No. It's been a long time.”
Nara put the notebook in the box.
Her boss leaned his shoulder against the doorframe. “Your final paycheck might come in Friday.”
“Might?”
“The store owner is still doing the math.”
Nara lowered her head. She knew he wasn't someone who could decide much. She also knew that understanding someone's reasons wouldn't make the balance in her account grow.
“If it hasn't come in by Friday, let me know,” he continued. “I'll ask about it.”
“Okay.”
Her boss nodded, then went to the front of the store.
Nara put the blue lunch box into the cardboard box.
She could have left it behind. She could have said it wasn't hers and therefore wasn't her responsibility. But her hands kept moving, placing it between the jacket and the notebook.
Before leaving, she stood in front of the register. Behind the glass, the little scratches she'd made with the tip of a key when she was bored were still there. Three short lines, one long line.
She'd once thought she would work there at least until she found something better.
It turned out that “until” didn't always mean as long as she'd imagined.
“Nara.”
She turned.
Her boss was holding a brown envelope. “This is last month's overtime pay. It isn't much.”
Nara accepted the envelope with both hands.
“Thank you.”
“Don't use it to tell me you're not hungry.”
Nara looked at him.
He gave a small, awkward smile, as if he'd only just realized the words had come too close to something Nara didn't want to talk about.
“I don't do that,” Nara said.
“Right. You never do.”
Nara carried the box outside.
On the sidewalk, it felt heavier than its contents. Or maybe it was because everything inside reminded Nara of days that had ended without asking her permission.
She stopped at a convenience store to buy cat food. After paying, she walked to the corner of the building where the tabby usually waited.
The cat wasn't there.
Nara waited five minutes. Then ten.
She set the bag of food on the ground and looked around. There was a stack of cardboard boxes, a narrow drainage ditch, and the shadows of passing vehicles moving across the white wall. No meowing.
“You said not to wait for me,” she muttered.
She felt stupid after saying it.
Her phone vibrated.
A message had come in from a number she knew by heart, even though she hadn't opened a message from it in eight months.
Raka: Are you still in town?
Nara stood beside the box of her belongings. Her thumb touched the screen, but she didn't start typing right away.
A second message appeared.
Raka: I heard the store closed.
Nara read both messages several times. She wanted to reply with something short, something that wouldn't invite questions.
Yes.
Or:
Still here.
But before she could choose, a third message came in.
Raka: If you haven't eaten, I can come over.
Nara turned off the screen.
A little while later, the tabby emerged from beneath a car parked near the convenience store. Its fur was dirtier than yesterday. It stopped when it saw Nara, then approached at an unhurried pace.
Nara opened the food and poured it into the lid of a plastic container.
“You're late,” she said.
The cat began to eat.
Nara sat on the edge of the sidewalk, the box beside her feet. The phone in her pocket felt heavier than the overtime envelope.
She opened Raka's messages again.
Her thumb typed:
I'm fine.
Nara stared at the sentence. An old sentence. An easy sentence. A sentence that had never really asked anyone to stay.
She deleted it.
Instead, she wrote:
I just lost my job.
She hadn't pressed send when the cat lifted its head. A little food clung to the fur beside its nose.
Nara sighed, then added one more sentence.
But I ate today.
The message sent before she had time to change her mind.
There was no reply for several seconds.
Then her phone vibrated.
Raka: Good.
The next message appeared after a longer pause.
Raka: Can I see you tomorrow?
Nara looked at the road ahead. Vehicles passed, people carried on with their own business, and the tabby lowered its head to its food again.
She didn't know whether she wanted to see Raka. She also didn't know whether the fear rising inside her came from him or from the possibility that Raka still knew her well enough to realize she wasn't okay.
She typed:
I don't have much time.
Raka replied almost immediately.
Me neither.
Nara almost smiled. This time, she really almost did.
She wrote down the address of a small food stall near the boarding house and sent it.
Tomorrow, four in the afternoon.
After slipping her phone into her pocket, Nara lifted the box. It was still just as heavy. Nothing became easier just because one message had been sent.
But when she started walking home, her steps no longer felt like she was carrying something alone.
Behind her, the tabby meowed.
Nara turned around.
“I'll come back tomorrow,” she said.
The cat stood beside the now-empty plastic lid, as if it wanted to make sure the promise had been made somewhere it could be heard.
Nara continued on her way.
Inside the box, the dark blue lunch box shifted gently. Inside her phone, Raka's name had returned to the messages that remained unfinished.
And for the first time in eight months, Nara had someone to meet the next day.