(A Yard Sale For Books: 1)

originally posted on march 14, 2019

Hi, Mr. Blue-light.

I bet you think I'm in some coolly-lit room somewhere typing away frantically at my keyboard: half-caffeinated, fully crazy, like some deluded, self-important businessman who's lost sight of his priorities. Sure, last time we met, I must have seemed the type: haphazardly dressed, heavy bags under my eyes, in a rush somewhere that's probably unimportant to me now. And in fact, I was that boy not so long ago, a boy who was doing just one too many things for comfort, and a few too many things for a reason already forgotten. I can remember the sleepy afternoons and the sleepless nights just fine, and I'm sure such days aren't over. But right now, that's unimportant. Those days are behind me for the time being.

So I bet you're going to ask me, "Well, where are you now? I mean, all I've ever known you to do is rush from one place to the next... is it really true that you're sitting down somewhere, relaxing, not really busy about anything?" To that — yes, you're correct. I'm very much at leisure right now, and so I'm taking the time to write this letter to you. Well, what I really wanted to be doing was continuing on the novel, but this letter will suffice for the time being. It's all okay with me, so as long as I get to spill my thoughts somewhere.

Anyway, I've been getting along fine. Not that you care, but I'll tell you anyway. The last two weeks have been quite cloudy and also cold, not at all what I'd hoped for in HK's March, but that didn't stop me. I still keep myself quite occupied: walking down to the Plaza most mornings, going to the beach, catching up on some personal reading. I'm in the middle of a Murakami book right now, and I have to say that his imagination is truly something. Wow. You think you've read the best writing after the likes of ___ and then — bam. You fall into in a six-hundred page novel about odd women and evil men and birds that only specific people hear.

So anyway, I've been riding the bus a lot, especially when necessity drives me out of Stanley. Mostly to get to Central, in which there are a multitude of things for me to be doing, like seeing Mami at work, or going to meet Nathan, or transferring to buses or trains going somewhere else. Many things to be done. But I don't mind. I really like taking the bus. I always go to the second deck and take the first seat on the left (or if that seat is taken, then the one second-to-last on the left), because the view is always the best from there, especially since you get the best view of the lush, rolling hills of Stanley and the quaint, little houses of Chung Hum Kok and then the vast blueness of the Repulse Bay sea. I always pass by this one house right before the bus reaches South Bay that I've always wanted to live in. It has this little pool that you can see that looks out onto the whole Repulse Bay beach and the water that surrounds it, and I've always thought that that was probably the most beautiful place in the entire world.

On days in which there is not much to do, though, I curl myself up at home, reading, sleeping, and the like. And a thousand times a day, I'd think, I want to see Mr. Blue-light. Wouldn't it be perfect if Mr. Blue-light was here with me? You could take the seat next to me on the sofa, or even take my seat; I wouldn't mind giving it up if it meant you could be here. Or if you couldn't make it that far, I'd come and see you. I'd call a taxi, maybe to somewhere close, like Repulse Bay, or maybe to somewhere super far, like the airport, from which I'd take a flight to who knows where? Yeah, on one of these days, I'd probably be at home asking myself all such questions. What's Mr. Blue-light doing now? Is he out at work or is he watching a movie at home? Is he out with his girlfriend or best friends? Where is he? When do I get to meet him? When do I get to know him?

Honestly, whoever you end up becoming, all I'd really care about is having a nice long talk with you. It could be summer, a hot day warranting some sunbathing and perhaps a lemonade and book and nap... or it could be winter, in the snow (but still under a blue sky, hopefully).

Sometimes, if I think about it hard enough, I can almost feel myself living in those days already, Mr. Blue-light. "Those days." And what's more, I think if you'd think about it hard enough, you'd probably be able to live in those days too! All you have to do is find a quiet place, close your eyes so that you see nothing, clear your head, then picture yourself in that spot. After a while, you'll finally figure out where you are, who you're with, that kind of thing. Still closing your eyes, if you breathe real slowly, you'd probably be able to smell the air of the imaginary place you're inhabiting. At first, you wouldn't smell a difference, but then, gradually, the aroma of this place will reveal itself, and then you would find that it actually smells quite different in this new place. And if you look around, you will catch little details of where you are. Perhaps you are in a hotel room on Cheung Chau, and you are looking vaguely at a view of the night sky, and maybe some paintings on the wall. You catch some heavy tones, some warm lighting, some soft reds and dark purples. It's picturesque. Don't try to focus on one particular thing, though; you won't be able to see any one thing crystal-clear. It's just one large vision, one large fantasy land. Oh, I've been meaning to ask: am I anywhere in there?

In case you're wondering where I am when I think about myself in "those days," I'll tell you right now that you probably already know where I am. Or if not, I bet you'd be able to find the answer somewhere in your brain. Just go searching through the bookshelves of memories you have with me. It'll be there somewhere. (Hint #1) It's a place you can figure out if you really concentrate and think about our history. (Hint #2) It has something to do with a very pleasant, somewhat light shade of blue. Okay, I'm not going to give away any more than that.

To be totally honest with you, I woke up this morning from a dream about you, Mr. Blue-light. And the two mornings before that. And I don't really know what to think about these dreams. In the first two of these dreams, you were just sort of there, hovering in the background while I was preoccupied. You were there little more than to indicate that you were there. But in the third dream, the dream I woke up from this morning, I was at some sort of desolate yard sale for books that you were at too. You were reading a book, but not really reading it, more like looking at the pages so as to appear as if reading the book. Your eyes weren't actually sweeping the lines of the pages. I got the impression that you were doing all of this to catch my attention, probably because you know I notice when people do things like read books. That's sort of flattering. Anyway, to cut a long story short, I ran up to you in the dream and gave you a hug, and that's when the dreamlogue cuts to the next part (which takes place in the Aberdeen tunnel). You're not there for that next part.

I don't really know if it was you I saw in the dream. I mean, I think it was you. You were wearing glasses, I think, and you were standing in a certain way that only you stand. You know how you can recognize someone based purely off of how they walk? Yeah, it's sort of like that. I don't really have much proof that it was you I saw last night, but I'm pretty sure it was you. Anyway, not long after I saw you, I woke up to the dawn pouring through the gaps of the blinds, casting their little silhouettes on the white wall next to me. I lay there for a while under my gray sheets, not really knowing how to react, not really knowing how to process much of what I had seen. Why were you in my dream?

These days, I've been waking up very confused in general — almost as if right before waking up, my soul/consciousness/being comes back from wherever it was and plugs itself back into my body so that I wake up feeling as if I've just come from another world, sort of like a parallel universe. My soul travels in the night-time, I suppose. And I've been thinking. Are there more worlds than the one in which we currently live? Worlds where it's always daytime, worlds where things like money and English don't exist, worlds where blue lights are much more than just little flickers of sodium against a backdrop of black paint? I mean, who's to say that these worlds don't exist? Just because we've never been to them or just because we can't prove that they exist doesn't really say anything about whether these places are actually real.

If I'd try to explain all of this to anyone but you, they'd think this all to be incredibly strange. Who cares about some boy's dreams? Everyone has those. Dreaming is part of being human. But see, this is why I am writing you this letter, Mr. Blue-light. You, of all people, should be able to understand. I mean, you were in my dream, so you (the real you) must be connected to all this in some way. I hope this all becomes clear to you, and to me also.

Bye-bye, Mr. Blue-light. I don't quite know how I would phrase this, but basically, I hope everything falls into place. If anything happens to you, you know where to find me.

DN