Black Water, Late Gas, and Other Small Curses
Every time I think I have nothing left to write, life proves me wrong. It does that quietly, almost politely, but always on the worst possible day. Yesterday was one of those days. Not dramatic in a cinematic way, just cursed in small, domestic details. The kind of bad luck that wears black and pretends it’s normal.
I spent the entire day working, lost between screens, tasks, and thoughts that go nowhere. When I finally looked at the clock, it was already 3 p.m. Time had slipped past me on purpose. I decided to take a shower. Not for pleasure, but for survival. Brazilian summer isn’t a season, it’s an endurance test.
I stepped into the bathroom, reached for the shower, and the faucet came off in my hand. I stood there for a moment, staring at it, trying to understand when adulthood turned into me holding broken plumbing and questioning my life choices. I’m not good at fixing things, but I grabbed a screwdriver that used to belong to my dad and tried anyway. It took a while, but somehow it worked. For a brief moment, I felt competent.
I turned the water on.
Nothing.
No sound. No drops. The water was gone.
My first thought was obvious: they cut my water. Then I thought bigger. Maybe the whole building was out. I messaged people and waited. Everyone had water. Everyone except me. I called the water company. My bills were fine. No cuts. No explanations. I checked the water tanks. All of them were full. Mine was completely empty. Isolated. Almost symbolic.
My landlady suggested that maybe some kid had shut off my water valve. I went downstairs to check. And yes, someone had turned it off. It had been closed for at least three days. Three days without water, unnoticed, because sometimes you only realize what’s missing when you desperately need it.
I went back upstairs and waited for the tank to fill. I waited the way you wait for things you can’t rush. I finally took my shower at 11:30 p.m. The water felt like forgiveness, late but necessary. I thought the day was done punishing me.
It wasn’t.
I went to make dinner and turned the stove knob.
Nothing.
The gas was out. At 11:30 at night. In a small town. Where everything closes early and inconvenience stays awake.
So there I was, standing in my dark kitchen, tired, hungry, surrounded by silence. A very aesthetically consistent moment for a goth girl having a quiet domestic breakdown.
Maybe life isn’t about big disasters. Maybe it’s just a collection of small things going wrong on the same day. A closed valve. An empty tank. A dead gas bottle. And maybe the philosophy is this: we don’t control any of it. All we can do is turn chaos into words, bad luck into narrative, and keep writing. If life insists on happening, it might as well become a post.
—Evevoss