PAEPAE PUKA
WAHI: MŌʻILIʻILI
Iʻm, the only person that lives in this cramped studio right off of Date street. No one else but me, a few roaches now and again but mainly myself in this confined space.
Every night about two in the morning is when my kidneys give me the signal that the time has come to drain the lizard. I roll off of my couch, and as I stand up and head to the bathroom, I stop dead in my tracks. The door is closed, and I hear the lock turn on the doorknob. The light goes on because I can see it creeping from under the door. Suddenly, the lock on the inside doorknob clicks and the door creaks open very slowly.
Itʻs quiet.
It feels like someone or something in my bathroom is waiting for me to go inside. I opt to walk out my front door and take a piss on the date palm trees near the drive-way. When I get back to my studio, all the lights are on, and my door is wide open. From where Iʻm standing, I can see footprints coming out of my bathroom and walking on my carpet and out the front door.
After that, nothing.
At first glance, the footprints looked like dirt, but upon closer inspection, it was excrement. When I built up the nerve to look in my bathroom, I saw clumps of shit on my toilet seat, and then on the floor. The cluster of shit nearest the sink had an impression of one foot in it, the left. From the bathroom to the front door, it became the usual right and left footprints. I slept in my car that night and told the landlord the next morning that I was terminating my contract and that I was moving out immediately. After I explained why he said, "I can just have your studio blessed."
"Nah," I replied. "Iʻm leaving."
"I thought she would leave you alone, but I guess not," the landlord said out loud.
"What are you talking about?" I asked.
"The lady who used to live in your studio," he began, "she tried to poison herself while she was sitting on the toilet. Something happened that made her shit real bad, she started choking and she tried running outside, and she got her own shit all over her feet. She only made it out of your front door, then she collapsed and died. It was because of her boyfriend, who was an older guy. I thought she wouldnʻt bug you because youʻre a young one."
"I only look young because Iʻm Filipino," I replied. "Iʻm forty-nine."
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