Niko + Changchang

After Nutella died during our weekend in Budapest, you never forgave me.  I’m not sure what absurd heroic principle I was operating under back then.  All I know is that I thought I was strong enough to suffer the pain and the anguish and the anger and the disbelief about his death all by myself.  I thought I was sparing you the pain of his tragic death, which is what you do for the people you love.  I thought I was strong enough to bury him by myself.  But I wasn’t.  I know I REALLY FUCKED THAT ONE UP.  In case you’re curious, I asked Pistá, our delayed neighbor with the monk cut, to bury Nutella under the apple tree in back you’d loved so much while you were out shopping for stained glass trinkets and the last organic chocolate bars in Hungary.  I asked to bury him and then I cried for both of us.  Later on once I’d had my own kids, I realized I denied you the right to mourn for him, which was fucked up I know.  One day as I was walking through Unter den Linden on one of those life-changing Berlin spring days, I realized that Nutella was our furry kid and that like so many other couples that split up after they lost their only child, we became defined by our sadness and fragmentation. I’m sorry, Chänglein.  Bitte, verzeih mir.