She leaves the bracelet by the bed. On the side table, under the pink floral lamp that she's always had and always hated.

The bracelet reminds her that there is life beyond the pink ruffley bed shames and mauve carpeting. That there was a time when she was a student of sociology and studied interpersonal relationships and eye contact in that little café where she would sit with her notebook and write, the bracelet clanging on the marble tabletop occasionally a soundtrack to her thoughts and scribbles.

Her coffee would always get cold (she is a notoriously slow drinker) and she'd have a stale taste in her mouth.

She could sit for hours on end, remarking on behaviors, trying not to stare as she studied faces, walks, glances, gestures.

Clang, clang, softly.

There would sometimes come a point when she'd be writing so ferociously that she'd need to remove the bracelet from her wrist and set it on the table next to her notebook. It served then as a place to look, to gather ideas. It seemed, sometimes, that the hole in the center of the gold band could open up a world of possibilities and strange tangents of thought, especially on those days when she'd had too much coffee and her eyes would get stuck there.

She can taste the staleness now, smell the coffee, and hear the jazz that played.

For nearly twenty years, she didn't want to wear the bracelet. But now she chooses to put it on each morning, touching it throughout the day as a way to remember.

********************

I've been left alone for just a moment. I can't resist walking over to it.

Sitting on the window sill, a small antique green glass jar holds two paint brushes, drying in the wind. The jar is light green with thick lettering: "Milk of Magnesia." The glass is opaque and chalky. Heavy in my hand.

There's a chip on the rim of the jar and there is no lid. The lid must be long lost.

This is my favorite color: a near sage-like green-blue glass. When the sun hits it looks like cool water full of minerals. The paint brushes are old, the wood chipped and stained with colorful dots.

Standing at the window I try to imagine the history of each object. The pharmacy or apothecary where this jar sat, one of many, perhaps 100 years ago. And before and beyond the apothecary, the blown glass, the hands, the fire. Who made it? And who was the first to pick up the jar? What ailed them? How long did the jar sit in their house? And how did it get to this one?

The brushes are next. How many strokes has each taken across canvasses? How many hands? How many colors?

The most striking stain is on the smaller brush. A deep red at the very tip of the wood as if someone had dipped it in the paint and used it to create tiny full red circles. Flowers, perhaps? Blood? Or perhaps places of shadow inside of a face or the setting sun?

I touch the ends of this brush, feel the red. I want to take it with me, keep a bit of this room with me, but choose to leave it there as I hear footsteps in the hall.