Excerpt Based on The Avocado Grove Emily - Thinking About Thanksgiving

These were originally two excerpts published November 23, 2015.  After editing them recently, I like how they combine into one short piece.

My Aunt Ally and I chatter about the mall, what to wear, and what’s big these days in elementary school lunch.  But I close my eyes for a moment so I don’t look at her smooth, perfectly colored frizz free hair.  In one crazy moment fixing my messed up mane will fix my mind.  And I want to steal some of Ally’s whipped styling goop to do something with the new highlights.  Candy cane stripes.  My whole head.

My aunt makes you think she cooks the turkey and all of those sides on Thanksgiving; but my mom, Grizzly told me once when we were eating moon pies for our feast how Ally orchestrates the whole thing.  “Like in those commercials on TV,” Grizzly said, and half of the folks she doesn’t know.  The best part of the meal is the wine.  Dry, like the rest of it.”  But I won’t be having any alcohol unless I sneak it.

I imagine a thousand things, the whole house burning down, me orbiting Jupiter, shooting hoops in Antarctica at midnight and then seeing my dad, my ghost dad.  He invites me to join him in his feast while Ally goes on about organic chicken nuggets and broccoli fries.  Dad tells me the new hair goes well with the red in the Clipper’s jersey.

A big glob of mustard squeezes out of the side of my sandwich and plops on the counter.  The mess distracts me for a moment from the words I want to say.  Sunshine streams into Aunt Ally’s kitchen like thousands of arrows from a ghost Indian tribe.  And I slide my sunglasses down to clean up and finish making lunch for Mickey and me.  Some things I say in my head and some things come out of my mouth.  I am not sure if it is what Mickey asks or what happens later with Julio or maybe both of these things combine, but I feel black and white and not sure of anything except my hunger to be a typical girl.

“At first I thought of spray paint. My plan was a rainbow on my entire head.  Grizzly didn’t understand,” I say.

Big Sister pushes her face into our conversation.  “Are you blind?  At nine I figured out your mother has problems.  Your boyfriend isn’t so brilliant.”

I turn away from my imaginary friend.

“How did you get your pink wig?” Mickey asks.

“It’s funny about my hair.”  I think about what Mickey wants to hear, and then there is the memory of what happened.

“He isn’t eating his sandwich,” Big Sister says.

Mickey leans in as if he knows what’s in my head.  My mind becomes a television we both watch.

Aunt Kelley hands me fifty dollars.  “Be outside in five minutes,” she says.  Inside there are monster masks and wigs in every size and color.  The pink wig stood out, a bright mop on the floor no one had put back.