Room/房间 by Yuhan Cheng

A house is not a home. A home is not where I belong. I wrote that when I left Chengdu at 18. Knowing I was queer before I had the words for it, I distanced myself from my family — often by locking the door. Back then, home felt like a specific location, more like a room, an space that tied us together. A room is just a room — a place to sleep, to pause, to write and rewrite. The room and I share memories for a time, but I must always leave.

At 21, after moving to New York, I had my first room of my own. I began to root myself in this unfamiliar place, unconsciously searching for something to hold on to: the feeling of being seen, of being valued. Slowly, I found a sense of belonging through the people around me. My understanding of home began to shift. That feeling quietly took root, and I now look back on the place where I used to double-check the lock. Home has become a feeling.

The PVC outer cover, printed with a tablecloth of apples and grapes, wraps the book in something both familiar and a little kitsch — a domestic image that’s almost cliché, but still oddly comforting. The key on the cover is a scan of a Kallitype print — a replica of the one to my room in New York.

To open this book is to enter a room. This is a room I built with photographs — and it will remain still until the book withers, the strings fall, or the color fades.

Published by linlin Plum.