sweet, vulnerable, tragic

a muddled brown

I’ve been stacking hedonistic escapes as of late, folding them into the batter of some mystery cake and praying the flavor is one I will enjoy. It’s a delicate process; they need to be incorporated with the utmost care. The best I can hope for are layers, bitter-sweet-bitter-sweet-bitter-sweet, but I’m wary it’ll turn a muddled brown instead

tainted by my home turf

so I fled back to Barcelona for New Year’s Eve. Sip vermouth, lisp gracias, heat up Spanish omelets in the microwave - life was like that just a few months ago. This time, I chased my twelve grapes at midnight with an M&M logo-shaped pill, worried only briefly about what else might surface with the wave of serotine. But my mind just relaxed, I didn’t want to talk or dance or hug, I simply stood there, enjoying my synapses filling up and the squeeze from the crowd

sing-shouting along to Rosalía’s La Perla

playing it on loop for days to come. The first day of 2026 disappeared in naps and movies with lazy plots, the day a clean slice, a sweet treat of sorts. At noon I get a selfie from my parents; they celebrated New Year’s Morning instead of Eve because my mother was too tired from the chemo, unceremoniously administered on December 31^st. My parents never take selfies, but here they are, holding up a champagne glass and toasting awkwardly to the camera. They look sweet, vulnerable, tragic. Like they know it’s their last year together. I stare at it for a long time. I stare at it so long

I can still see it

get worse when I thought it couldn’t anymore. They nearly burned the house down; candles in the Christmas tree, lit not long after sending that selfie. My mother trapped upstairs by the hot smoke; my father using his old man’s body to save them both. When I come by the next day the first thing I see is a Christmas decoration, an angel, its face melted off from the heat. Then I notice the burns on my mother’s hands and her right eye swollen shut. I’m hurting, for her, but she doesn’t want me to. Says she doesn’t like to be in the center

of all of this pain

I’m supposed to make lemonade, yet I can’t even decide which lemons to squeeze. Instead, I try to determine the tear line and separate the bitter from the sweet. But I can’t unmix these muddled layers, so I go out and make new ones. Seek out places I have no business being, make friends with every bartender in town. Hide in the French Alps, then the Italian ones. Busy, busy, busy, but I return dutifully for my weekly visit. I dream up jobs abroad, or a grand tour visiting all the friends I’ve made across the globe, and my heart eases

when I scroll through the months in my calendar

I know full well I can’t plan too far ahead. Because of this impending funeral. I made this choice, to stop roaming and be by her side. It’s the one thing I feel good about, but by god, do I hate it, too. I guess it’s true after all: you really can’t have your cake and eat it too.

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