Speech Tag

A MEMORY. I’m fast asleep in the primary room I’ve rented in Mexico City. I’m 23. I’ve been gathering my mettle after my first cataclysmic break-up, newly wading into the tide pools of hedonism and the shells that may slice your feet there. I’ve been comforted by the presence, secured by probability on the web, of a delicate roommate and his great galumphing pewter-colored dog, Pechuga (“chicken breast,” if you have to know). I’m jolted awake before dawn by a thunderous noise, the floorboards shuddering. Mexico City is a seismic zone and I’ll soon make the acquaintance of several earthquakes, but that is something else, I discover after I stumble off the bed and over to the window: it’s a...