The room was dark, very warm. That strange redolence in the air like nothing he’d known, pleasant and enveloping. Like the undercurrent Christie brought whenever she was near him, yet stronger, richer, headier. He tried to see the walls and objects in the room, to get a better picture of who she was, but struggled to find anything to hold on to, just vague black forms and a light from the hallway that disappeared when Christie shut the door. He thought she’d flick the switch, waited for ever for the click, the quick ache at the back of his eyes, a sudden reimagining of the formerly blank space. He felt a dip then solid warmth beside him.

‘We gonna sit in the dark then?’ His tongue felt thick. He could barely free the words. She snuggled next to him, hair tickling his ear. It bothered him that he couldn’t move. Speaking felt uncomfortable.

‘I always wanted to go Philippines.’

She giggled, kissing him beneath his ear. He closed his eyes.

‘You’re Filipino, right?’ Mumbling, barely able to free the words.

She did it again, a trail leading to his lips, turning his chin and kissing him fully. Everything inside him relaxed.

He was there again, floating in darkness he remembered, and this time it was better because of anticipation. When the free-fall came he let himself stretch and surge, be carried wherever the flow took him. This time he went deeper, a sensation like rich, soft liquid removing every physical sense of who he was until he was enveloped by it and he moved without will. He heard a low creak, similar to crickets only it sounded synthetic. Then something else came, hotter, a little searing. Later, he would think it was like steaming water being poured into a cooling bath, followed by the rapid awareness it wasn’t that at all, more like hot water being poured inside himself from the top of his head to his toes. Except there was no head, no toes, and the water was scalding, painful, and he tried to open his voiceless, mouthless lips to scream only to find it was impossible; he had to wait until the pain faded into the dark of the room.

The bed. The dark, nothing further. He tried to crawl, to find something solid he recognised by touch. When his fingers brushed objects there were only corners and right angles, rectangles and squares, flat surfaces nothing like household items or objects someone owned. Even the bed, when he went back, had no legs, just a smooth, cool material akin to plaster reaching from the mattress to the floor. He frowned. Crawled to the bedroom door. Fright built inside him as he imagined there might not be a handle, he might be trapped, until he eventually found it, opened, could stand.