There Are No Stars in Tokyo

In Tokyo everyone knows which side of the road to walk on and no one looks lost. No one looks out of place. Everything is perfectly uniform in the day time, dark pants and crisp white shirts.

Every step looks as if it’s taken in tandem.

The next thing I notice is that everyone is staring at me. Their gazes aren’t fleeting, aren’t quick. They linger in the light and the dark. Old women stop walking to better observe me as I’m going past, whispering to their companions about how I look. Businessmen follow me as I get off the train, eyes as heavy as their hands.

Everyone is watching when my partner leaves me after three weeks. He kisses me goodbye when the train arrives and tries to linger, but everything here is like clockwork so I urge him to go. I leave before the train departs.

I return to my new apartment which is in the dodgy side of Ikebukuro. Each room is smaller than a bathroom and mine is no exception. There is a desk under the bed and little else. The air conditioner has to service two rooms, so there is a big hole in the wall for it to join me and my neighbour. When I roll over in bed I can see her through the hole and she looks at me for long moments before forcing a pillow into the gap. We never speak.

Most days when I go to work I get mistaken for a prostitute. I’m heading to the…