The gap and the hair and the note

Someone took the note. I checked four times before I accepted it: the doormat was clean, no tuck, no corner poking out, nothing. Whoever left it came back. I do not know if that is good or terrible and I have been staring at the ceiling for twenty minutes trying to decide which it is. I photographed it immediately — did the right thing, sent it to Bae Yu-jin with everything, and then I came home and sat on the floor with my plants and realized I have no idea if I just protected myself or handed someone a reason to find me more interesting.

Mr. Kang watched me shake tonight. He did not look away when I admitted it. He said good and I do not know what to do with that. Most men want you steady and composed and I have built my whole life around being steady and composed for strangers and he said good like the shaking was something I was allowed to have. I need to stop thinking about that. It is not useful.

The hair was not mine. That is the part I keep coming back to. Long, dark, stuck to the underside of the mattress. I wore gloves. I bagged it. I left it for Bae Yu-jin with the Min-ji memo and I did not file a 2104 sheet and that means there is no record that I was in that room tonight and that was a choice I made very quickly. I do not know if it was the right one. I smell eucalyptus and copper and someone smelled wrong and I think it was not the guest.