Not going home for the holiday, because the ticket costs too much

The holiday starts and the alley empties out one room at a time. He opens the ticket app one more time, then closes it. A few days home would cost him nearly two million in travel — not money he doesn't have, just money he'd spend the next month making back.

The rice shop he usually goes to is shut. The neighbours have all locked up. He buys a takeaway box from the one place still open, sits on the floor to eat it, and listens to the fan turn.

By the third day he realises he hasn't said a word out loud. Not out of sadness — there's simply no one to say it to. That night, around eleven, he stands up and looks out the window, and the building across the way still has four lit windows in it. He isn't the only one who stayed. Everyone on this street has a reason that sounds a lot like his.

On the afternoon of the holiday his mother calls. Her first question is whether he's eaten yet. He says he has, then turns the camera out to the balcony to show her the empty city — it's quiet, he says, but it looks nice. They talk for twenty minutes. Only near the end does he notice: she never once looked at the street. She was looking at him.

After hanging up he sits there a while, then opens his laptop. Fifteen minutes in, it's clear nobody sent him anything today — the inbox is empty. That laptop was never about work. It was just the cheapest way to fill an evening with no one in it.

If it's empty, I fill it with work. Today I'll leave it empty. That's fine too.

He closes the laptop and opens the window to let the air in. Somewhere out there the city still has a light or two burning, very far away. Are you one of the ones who stayed this week?