"maybe were all a simulation" my friend pondered between the puffs of smoke. i dont know how she did it. make wisps of grey weave around her calloused fingers in the dead of night, but behind her mask, maybe she didnt either.

"how do you know" i heard my lips move and the cogs of my mind click-clock tick-tock into place. "because we search for the answer to 'what is life' but we arent programmed to know" my head nodded but i was already away and outside the claustrophobic room. the scratchy heat licked my back and the moon sung high in the sky. in between the smoke, she looked up with old wise eyes and regarded me so heavily her being ****** looked sober.

then she turned away with a dignified huff and the inhalation of more grey.

endless grey.

somewhere between my programmer and this game im choking on her thoughts in ten-forty-two pm summer scratchy heat in the claustrophobic room that is so familiar it must be mine. the mattress so worn and walls so torn we seem pristine next to my room. almost...perfect.

but maybe this is why we are all a simulation. to prove that life's 1s and 0s aren't set in stone and that i can always choke. on her grey. on the heat. on the way city life is just a game within a game when you look through a separate set of eyes.

but between the grey and the heat, i forget to close my eyes