keeping my lungs and holding my tongue

Martin was aware, through conversations with his cousins and general knowledge, that halo-halo was traditionally served as a street food in the Philippines, or something eaten around the time of a celebration. Where he’d grown up, though, it was always something to be eaten as a family—when you couldn’t get the ingredients anywhere else but home, when eating a dish of shaved ice and sweet beans in public was likely to get you more than a few stares. He admitted to himself, even as he poured a stream of ice cubes into the shaver and started turning the crank to transform them into small bits of ice, that this was going to be a rather lonely process.It wasn’t until he had a spoonful of mung beans and ice in his mouth, though, that the tears began to fall. The usually pleasant texture of the beans grew to become sticky and miserable in his mouth as he sat there refusing to chew, and the gentle sweetness of the condensed milk felt almost mocking. Look at you. You can’t even eat the food you’re supposed to like so much without crying like a child.