aqui (1) : 33

towards the margins, friday everything’s fine. i met miss m for a beer. we chose el 33. tiny red tables and royal blue walls. the ceiling is covered with leftover balloons and mixed christmas poinsettas / saint valentine’s paper hearts. a woman with a deep voice singing an old bolero on the jukebox: podrás cambiar de nombre, de patria de todo, modificar tu rostro tu historia tu modo, pero por más que borres, que limpies, que cambies…la huella de mis besos tendrás en la cara… thalía poster and pictures of this guy called rafaello with a mullet and a bow tie. red saloon doors, red chairs. the windows are barred with wrought-iron fish. a sad place, home to 12 o’clock drunkards. a guy comes up to us, his name is octavio, starts bragging about being a hustler and sleeping with his cousin and killing a man. he showed us the scars on his belly from when he was stabbed once. miss m danced to a doors song. octavio told me i look very fresita, that i probably got charged double for the beer. i said i got charged $15 for the beer like everyone else, that its one thing if people want to think i’m a fresita, but another if they want to think i’m an asshole. he seems smart. i felt sad for him. he said i’m cute, but not that cute. he said i could make some money there, like him. he was picking on this old queen with curly hair. miss m called him el niurka. el niurka offered us some of his pink goey drink in a cognac glass, a conejo, he said. el niurka told octavio he loved him. octavio told el niurka to keep his stinky breath away.

:: as far as i know, this is all that's left of el 33