A breezeless night. Deep in my vision, I can see one of those currents, a spiral sucking me in, shimmering lights, little sparks that are arms and uncoil themselves. My head turns, physically turns? I can’t be sure. I don’t want to move from this chair, I hear noises, but I don’t want to move, don’t want anything to tug me from this moment.

I follow the current, sink down among the waves that shift and whirl, more spirals among tunnels and voids. My parents are with me, I see them for an instant at the dining room table and they’re gone. They too repeated it’s best to leave and never come back. I see the first thing I remember about the city, the wan early morning light, the murky gaze of the crouching drifter. Then the streetwalkers, some tattered and others high-heeled and lavishly made up, waiting in shifts with the hills in the background and the fat clouds above. I’m cold. I go deeper in, spiralling down. An arm loses control and doesn’t react as it should, the car lurches off the road, I answer the phone, my throat closes up. Everything blurry towards the ceiling. I faint. Needles, blood, cotton swabs like walls. My voice asks me something. When you finally remember someone you mourned, what do you see? Do you see their entire body? Their face? Do you recreate a scene? Do you hear a sentence in their voice? They’re a wandering idea, they’re zombies.

Something hazy appears; it’s Roberto. Our trip to Miami, sunny days in Guanajuato, the town’s neat cobblestone streets, concerts and conversations, my childlike smile. Statues and totems open their mouths and arms, stone and bronze crumble, Tláloc, god of rain, truncated pyramids. I hear the tragicomic flute of music boxes, I see this house, my magnetic white cube, pulling me in. I see the island, a sounding board, my thoughts coming to life.