Monstrilio

by Gerardo Sámano Córdova

I believed that flower was my son reincarnated. One believes the stupidest things in grief. I spoke to the flower and called it my son. And then I laughed because how ridiculous—how cruel, really—it would have been if my son was reincarnated as something so ephemeral, frail, and beautiful. I killed that first bloom with one swoop of my hand. Dead again, my son could become something else: the shell of a tortoise, strong and ancient, or a hideous fanged creature deep in the sea where he’d see wonders even he could’ve never imagined.

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

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.

The anger helped me wake up in the mornings and eat and clean the house and wash myself. The anger even distracted me long enough that I would forget my loneliness, and sometimes, in short bursts, I even felt cheerful.”

Wouldn’t that have been a groundbreaking discovery, someone bringing a creature to life solely with their own grief and a prodigious unwillingness to let go?

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.

“Monstrilio is not Santiago,” I said. “You want to make him something he’s not.” “I know what Monstrilio is,” she said. “I made him.”

I pretend my time as Monstrilio is hazy. Muffled sounds and blurred colors. I say I remember warmth. But I don’t say I miss my fur. I don’t say I’m hungry because my hunger is what makes everyone scared. They are happy to believe I forgot how they maimed me.

I wade through the shadows of our living room, hoping to find monsters. Chat with them. Laugh. But there are no monsters in these shadows. Only me.

A human dreams crazy dreams. Horrible dreams. Great dreams. Like flying. Or teeth falling. Or people long forgotten who pop up as if they never left. They dream of what they were and what they could become. And the dreams seep into their meat. Like a delicious marinade.

The world lightens before me and reveals its edges. Its shapes and in-between spaces. I step forward.