We slept in the middle of the cinder block room on a carefully divided mattress, facing outward on both sides as to avoid the unpleasantries of accidentally touching. In the event that one of us rolled over in the midst of a dream and landed a body part upon the other person, the motion inevitably gave birth to a sense of guilt. At this point, one pondered whether or not retracting an arm or leg would be seen as an affront that would cause an eventual unraveling of such scrupulously orchestrated politeness, which was not only fake, but somewhat disturbing.

In the morning we parted to separate bathrooms, in which, we showered and readied ourselves and slipped out the door in increments that left each of us unnoticed by the other.

And yes, I deliberated. Perhaps, I did need a new bed. There was a spare room, I could sleep in there.

But somehow depsite the condition’s rather dispiriting constitution, it was always nice to sleep beside something warm. ANd so it was that I continued sleeping only on my left side night after night, conscience of my position, uncomfortable but safe.

And every morning, each of our alarm clocks buzzed separately, from both sides of our bed, where each of us secretly speculated as to why it was we made this bed to sleep in–in the first place.