There is a man living in the flat in the building across from mine. I can hear him singing at most every hour. He keeps his windows open, letting the music flutter out across the alley into mine. It hangs over me in an invisible aroma, and I breathe it in.

As I lean out my bathroom window, taking slow drags from my cigarette that i let dangle precariously from my fingers, I listen. He pounds away ever so lightly on his piano, spilling out enchanting and hypnotic delicacies for me to sample.

I’ve never seen him, just a shadow moving about restlessly in and out from the window’s frame. I wonder who he is, what his name is, or if he likes to smoke out of his window as well. I believe he is French, for he’s always spouting out his lyrics in the charismatic, soothing language with such diligence and proficiency.

I sometimes will sit in the tub, under a mountain of shimmery bubbles, watching the prisms they create, while I listen to that beautiful sound floating through my window.