She had fallen asleep an hour into the drive, snoring softly over the radio station that had started to fade. Once they began their descent, the sky opened up, fiery red and pink. It would be one of those moments where he can’t remember if they shared it or not.

His calendar is mostly a mundane schedule, but sometimes becomes a portal to the past. Recurring events can go either way, anniversaries of both joy and hurt. Today is just an all-caps curse word, with tiny text underneath: repeats every year.

The cafe door was propped open by a giant fan, blocking most of the entryway. As he shimmied around to get inside, he spotted her immediately. Sitting at a table made from a giant spool, she struggled to keep the gusts of air from flipping her magazine pages.

Reading on the loveseat, over the course of three chapters, she observed her cat rolling in slow motion. Paws in the air for the third revolution now, in perfect sync with the afternoon sunbeam.

Every morning, he scrubs the sink and stove, erasing the slightest evidence of last night’s dinner. Since the accident, cleaning is the only thing that calms his anxiety. It lets him reset things to how they were, how they’re supposed to be.

In the windstorms that blew all summer, the tree behind her building collected trash in its thicket. From her third-floor apartment she could peer into the foliage at the knotted pile of detritus, still clinging to the branches as the leaves that surrounded it turned bright red and orange.

He liked working underneath the street, amongst the pipes and steam. A grate near the crosswalk cast a sunbeam into the depths, a natural spotlight for him to stand in at the end of his shift. The commuters walking briskly overhead, lost in their headphone soundtracks, only rarely heard him singing.

Commuters were packed tight on a frigid morning train. Misery hung in the air until the toddler cried in glee at his first "choo-choo" ride.

He sidestepped the amputee beggar without slowing his pace or conversation. In that moment, his culture shock transformed into callousness.

Her father's suitcase rattled over cobblestone streets as they took in the sights. His refusal to leave the bag at the hotel was irritating.

Under the flickering stage lights he flailed and convulsed as he twisted the tiny control knobs. The music seemed unaffected by his actions.

Every Sunday they hosted a talk show in their tiny living room and interviewed their friends. It was never recorded, it was just for them.

The uniform street grid provided unlimited routes for her commute. She walked a different one each morning, a ritual to keep her city new.

The dark street was a metal tunnel of shop shutters by the time he went home. His pocketed hand gripped his phone and he quickened his pace.

He walked back to the house and knocked on her door, unsure how he would win her over. There were so few words and so much he wanted to say.

As a girl, she made paper chains to mark the days, tearing one off every night. That's when time was slow, when she still looked forward.

The heat had slowed him to a disheartened shuffle. His shirt was sweat soaked from the backpack he was now dragging. He needed a popsicle.

She sat with her dog on the bench as the bus came and went. She knew this was partly her decision to be homeless, and she had some regrets.

She watched the fuzzy lights and tried to make out sounds from her crib. Nothing made sense yet. She had no pain or happiness to draw upon.

He could be forgiven for talking about the weather, since it controlled his life. There's always sun and rain, but never at the right times.

It took three tries working with the bees before he was calm inside their swarm. Afterwards he sat on the ground, meditating to their drone.

He wished people passing over the bridge knew he was below. He loved imagining their destinations and dreaded Sunday, when all was quiet.

The scar was hidden now, but he could still feel it when he ran his fingers through his hair. It made it impossible to get back on the bike.

He watched the apartment light turn off and realized he was living out a scene from a movie. He vowed to stop himself before the next scene.

Asked how she was feeling, she couldn't decide between tired, disappointed, and bored. She settled on anticlimactic, but still said "fine".

He crumpled each page of the paper as he finished it and stuffed it into a bag. While reading, he ate a sandwich with his ink covered hands.

She adjusted the mask and breathing tube before submerging into the water. This was her treasured world of coral, jellyfish, and solitude.

He'd been in this situation before, but not in many years, and he was a very different person. He packed his bags, unsure of what he needed.

He gave the monkey a dime, got a tiny hat tip in return, and raced to the Ferris wheel. Past the games and cow barns, cotton candy in hand.

The two asteroids never even existed in the same dimension. He could see that theoretically their composition matched, but not in reality.