Monstrilio

by Gerardo Sámano Córdova

We didn’t so much exist as much as we haunted, and with no one else to haunt, we haunted each other.

He asked me to cry with him, but his sadness was his and I couldn’t steal it.

To wither is not the same as to break; to break is to have pieces to put back together, and to wither is to dry up, to wilt, to lose bone, to die, and death is the most boring.

My mother thought I was a monster and didn’t love me because of it. This thing, an actual fucking monster, was loved.

I was jealous of the monster, how it didn’t care what it was or did. No shame. It held itself up with a certain pride. But mostly I was jealous of the way Magos cared for it despite it being a monster.

My nose is long like Papi’s, but its shape is wider, like Mami’s. I’ve surveyed my face a thousand times to make sure these traits are real. Not details I invented to be their son.