The first thing you see is smoke in the air. The smell of smoke, pinewood. Or maybe cedar. The purple froth of snowcovered weeds. Strange you think. But there is no you to think. You are the same as the wet ground the white moon the voices rising in the air the pain that echoes through meat and water that weighs you down.
You broke something's collarbone once. Or leg. Its bone like a bending flower stem. You remember flower stems in a slender vase, sunlight echoing through the glass like the voices chasing you across the hills. Sunlight is warm, you think. The snow is cold. Warm and cold. Or the other way around. The man's bone had broken easily, his body a small animal you wanted to crawl into and hide. It was a bad thing to do, the words whisper. They were outside you, like all voices are, even the ones in your head. You've grown tired of talking to them.
Your mother wore vanilla perfume. Mixing with the smell of flan or buttered toast. Coffee. Your mouth waters. Your eyes water too, thinking of her. You can't remember her voice. It sounds now like one of the people who touch you with soft hands. There are soft hands and harsh hands. You like soft, you think, most of the time. Sometimes the harsh ones more because there are no lies there. Just pain. Pain and pain and pain and blinding light that looks like your mama's smile when you step on her toes during your dancing lesson. Your mama's smile fades sometimes, until you pull it back with gritted teeth and a tongue bitten through. You will not lose it.
Chocolate ice cream. Baseball. The soft kittens your friend (sunlight there white teeth a crooked rueful smile small hands a heart too big for his fragile body) found in the alley. You feed them scraps of food stolen from the dinner table. The meows sharp and needful. You love them. You think. You love them. Your own voice is sharp and needful.
They are dead now. It's been years and years and they are dead. You pet the air and wonder why things die. Wonder why you can't just die.
You are here when you are not supposed to be. Sometimes things grow in the wrong places. Sometimes things land where they are not supposed to. Sometimes people die before they are dead. You think you died a long time ago.
They tell you stories in different languages. Enough for you to connect the words. They are fairytales. What are you trying to do? you ask, lips moving but silent. They lean forward to hear you so you raise your voice. You are not saying what you think you are. You are repeating numbers. You don't know what they mean. They hit you hard. Start the stories over. You are allowed to cry. And so you do.
It's getting hard to pin down memories. Connect images and sensations to moments. It's getting hard to speak using your own words. Like scratching at a wall, the cracks running from you. Laughing. They're all laughing at you. All the time.
The kittens are dead. You cry for hours. You cry until you have no strength to listen to their stories.
Your mother played the piano. You think. Played and smiled. You can't quite see it. The sunlight rebounds from the vase's water and becomes a halo around her. Her fingers move. She hums but you can't hear it. She smiles, but the light is too bright to see, makes your eyes water again. You remember her smile, though. You must remember her smile.
They make you repeat words you don't understand. Press something cold and wet into the back of your neck. You speak and the thing presses tighter. You break the man's leg again. Or another man's leg. The harsh hands are back and you laugh, seeing the moon sliding through the ceiling of your cell. Not the moon. Moons don't come inside, you tell yourself. But they smile. Right? That's what they told you in one of their stories. You think. Smiling moons.
You think. But it's getting so hard.
You tell them about the kittens. Speaking to yourself. They tell you they killed them. Stomped on them in the alley and left them on your mother's stoop. It can't be true, a voice whispers, close to your ear. You were a child. But maybe you are a child now. Who are you? Where are you?
You can't remember your mama's smile. It slides away in the night, slipping like blood across the tile of your cell, pouring down the grate that buckles the middle of the floor. Drips away into the cold sewers. With everything else.