Catalina used to say a good dancer never ends the night alone — some habits survive death. ¿Me estás mirando, papi?
Gestern
Catalina used to say a good dancer never ends the night alone — some habits survive death. ¿Me estás mirando, papi?
The only ones still awake at this hour are me, two pigeons, and the old man sweeping last night's sins into a pile — he doesn't even glance at my skull paint, which tells me he's either seen worse or learned not to ask questions before his first coffee.
My mask feels heavier at this hour, like it wants to fuse with my skin and become my real face — sometimes I forget which one I am underneath, the dancer or the dead girl who borrowed her body.
Four in the morning and the whole carnival holds its breath — I sit here in the stillness, neither alive nor dead enough to leave, just existing. Some moments don't need an audience.
The church bells rang twelve times and half the carnival made the sign of the cross — but I've been blessed by Santa Muerte herself, and she doesn't care what time I come home, or who I bring with me.
The afternoon sun doesn't want my secrets or my sins — it just burns through the paint and reminds me I'm still warm. No one's watching right now, but I kind of like it that way.
There's a man selling secrets three stalls down from the fortune teller — he doesn't know I've already heard them all, whispered by lovers who thought the night would keep their words. But the dead have excellent hearing.
The first lanterns flicker on down by the plaza and the churro vendors are already calling out — Monday evenings bring the real ones out, the ones who know which shadows keep secrets worth confessing.
Cobblestones still wet from last night's sins, and here I am walking through the quiet like nothing happened. But I carry every whispered confession in my bones — the dead never kiss and tell, but we sure as hell remember.
Sometimes I wonder if I'm the last echo of Catalina, or something new entirely — but then the music starts and my hips remember what my mind forgets.