The Woman of Sta. Barbara
Vincen Gregory Yu
1.
SOME NIGHTS, Mother would join me in the living room with a half-filled wine glass in hand and the lingering stench of alcohol in her breath. The glass, a fountain of scotch that never quite ran out, had long been a fixture of her sultry frame, as if over time it had sprouted roots that dug deep to join the joints of her spindly fingers. She would tipsily catwalk across the living room and slither beside me on the couch, putting her free arm around my shoulders, leaning her head against mine, playfully planting wet kisses on my temple all the way down my neck. I’d gradually come to memorize the musty, smoky smell of Johnnie Walker wafting through her nostrils and clouding her breath. In the darkness breached only by moving colors from the t
