Mateo almost laughed. The cantina was full of lost souls—old men nursing grudges, a guitarist with no strings, a dog with three legs. But he understood. She didn’t mean the living dead. She meant the real lost ones. The ones who had slipped through the cracks of the world.
“You can’t take him,” Mateo said. “He’s not alive. He’s just… remembered. The moment you leave this place, he becomes the fog again.” almas perdidas
“You’ll become lost, too.”
“I know a road,” he said quietly. “But you don’t come back the same.” Mateo almost laughed
“To the place where lost souls go. To beg one to return.” She didn’t mean the living dead
She pulled out the curl of hair. “I cut this the night before you left. You were afraid of the dark. I told you, ‘The dark is just the world sleeping. I’ll be here when you wake up.’”
The woman held her son tighter. “Then I’ll stay.”