never throw anything away - totally opposite from me, who only had basic furniture and the like. The art student’s room wasn’t any cleaner this time. Indeed, there’d been even more things crammed into it. Her living room served as her atelier, so there were huge shelves along the walls with art collections and photo albums galore, as well as a huge collection of records that tightly filled all available space. On top of the shelves, cardboard boxes were piled to the ceiling, and I could only imagine the disaster a good-sized earthquake would cause. One of the walls had a French movie poster and a calendar from three years ago. One of the corners had a corkboard slotted in, with artistic photos thumb-tacked on haphazardly covering the entire surface. One of the two tables had a massive computer on top, with wornout pens and pencils scattered in front. The other table was clean and neat, with only a record player in a wooden cabinet. Sitting in the veranda chair, I looked over every line of the morning paper in the light of the setting sun. As expected, there was nothing about the accident I caused. The art student took a look at the paper from beside me. “Haven’t read the paper in a while... But I’m not really missing much, huh,” she thought aloud. “Thank you,” I told her, handing it back. “Don’t mention it. Find the article you were looking for?” “No, I didn’t.” “Huh, that’s too bad.” “No, the opposite. I’m relieved it’s not there. Um, can you let me watch your TV, too?” “You don’t even have a TV at your place?”, the art student asked, astonished. “I guess I hardly watch mine, so it’s honestly not something I need, but...” She went fishing under her bed, pulled out the remote, and turned it on.