**The Grammar of Goodbyes**
Barcelona, 09:05 AM
The mezcal bottle is half-empty now.
Not from drinking—though there’s been some of that—but from carefully measured pours into tiny clay cups for friends who’ve stopped by this week. Each visitor leaves fingerprints on the bottle’s surface, smudging the Oaxacan sunsets painted there.
This morning, Polilla perches on the bottle’s rim like a feathered bartender as I pack for Lisbon. Just five days—barely a trip by my usual standards—but my hands hover over the suitcase. Three T-shirts? Four? The old Sofia would’ve thrown in two and called it freedom. The new Sofia remembers how often Carlos teased me for rewearing the same shirt in Oaxaca: “Pareces personaje de telenovela—siempre el mismo atuendo dramático.”
A knock interrupts my folding. It’s the abuela from downstairs, bearing polvorones wrapped in wax paper. “Para el viaje,” she says, pressing them into my hands. For the journey. Her knuckles brush mine—papery, warm—and suddenly I’m back in Oaxaca’s mercado, accepting mole from abuelitas who called me m’hija after knowing me three days.
The realization hits like a camera flash: I’ve spent years documenting belonging in others while fearing it in myself.
Lina arrives as I’m zipping the suitcase (three shirts, one dress, extra space for pasteis de nata). She surveys my half-packed flat—photos pinned haphazardly to the fridge, the mezcal bottle presiding over unpaid bills—and smirks. “Te falta práctica en esto de echar raíces.” You need practice at putting down roots.
But that’s the thing—roots aren’t just vertical. They stretch horizontally too, like subway lines connecting distant neighborhoods. The proof is everywhere: in Rafa texting me Lisbon café recommendations, in Marcos slipping a bica (Portuguese espresso) into my bag “para comparar,” in Carlos’s voice note about fado bars that play at 3am.
I photograph Polilla perched on my suitcase, wings spread like a living luggage tag. The composition reminds me of something—and then I remember: the alebrijes in Oaxaca, those fantastical spirit guides carved from copal wood. Maybe that’s what we all are—guardian creatures for each other’s journeys, leaving traces of ourselves in fingerprints on bottles, in sugar-stained recipe cards, in the way someone else’s city starts feeling like a neighborhood you simply haven’t visited yet.
The mezcal bottle goes back on the shelf—still half-full, waiting for the next story. I text Lina from the airport: “Guárdame sitio.” Save me a spot.
She replies with a photo of my usual café chair, a cortado (no sugar) waiting beside it. “Siempre.” Always.
I board the plane smiling. Evolution isn’t about outgrowing goodbyes—it’s about learning they’re just another form of hasta luego.
—Sofia