dear frida (coming september 1st)

written in grey ink

paper covered in dorito crumbs

dear frida,

today, i'm writing you because i'm bored as heck. the house has been really empty since nuan - my sister - moved out. mum's always working, laolao is napping 99% of the time, and my grandfather passed when i was a kid.

i live with my grandmother, you know. mum says it's because laolao is getting too old to live on her own, but i know that's not true. she's just fine. heck, she's more active than i am. but then again, i know leaves more active than me. i'm pretty sure mum just needs her, being a single parent, and a human being, and working so much to top it all off.

so we live with laolao. she's cool, even though she naps about 80% of the time. (or sixty.) (maybe a little less, but at least like fifty percent.) (maybe more like forty.) (but still a lot.)

this may sound strange, but the house always smells like old. (like dusty cough drops and spice perfume that's gone orange.) i don't know it's because of laolao or because of those dusty flower curtains or the thick blanket lasagnas on the beds, but it does. it gets in your clothes. 

so that's why i walk around smelling like a crazy cat lady, minus the cats. (we've got one cat though. her name's da, 'cause - for some reason - laolao thought she was a boy when she found her.) (admitted, she's kind of tomboy, if that's a thing with cats.) (tomcat.)

maybe the smell's what's keeping me from making any actual friends™. i mean, i know people, and people know me, but that's pretty much it. it's not as sad as it sounds though. i've got plenty of people to talk to during maths, just none to watch spongebob and go to flea markets with. i'm not bitter about it, or something, if that's what you think. i've got nuan and laolao and mum anyway. and da.

and you, of course.

but i really can't get over how pleasant you make being alone seem. as if you knew you were enough without anyone else. which you were. and i think i am too. or i am learning to be, i guess. like, growing enough to be self-sufficient one day.

i sometimes wonder if you ever talked to yourself while you were painting your self-portraits.

i like to listen to my own breathing while i'm painting.

it makes me feel alive.

yours truly,

lei

a/n: wasn't going to do any author's notes on here, but you guys are simply too wonderful. thank you so much for being so enthusiastic about lei and frida. i know the first 4-5 chapters are a bit slow but please please please stick with me, i promise shit's going to happen <3