patty

By Gabriela Vannier

There were mornings when the others weren't there. I would wake to muffled music: Tom Jones or maybe Skeeter Davis or Elvis. Sometimes it was hard to hear over the vacuum buzzing back and forth. And before I even opened my bedroom door, I could smell the sweet and pungent vapor of Mr. Clean and Clorox. In the living room all the windows and front door were open; pale sunlight poured in like bittersweet lemonade, softly illuminating everything. On those balmy mornings there was no temperature; outside the same as the inside but for an occasional curious breeze that wandered in.

Those mornings were different. On those mornings, the house exhaled.

Sometimes I’d watch her awhile–quietly before she noticed me–she was tanned like cinnamon sugar toast in her cut off jean shorts and ribbed tank top; humming along to the music, Lucky Strike dangling from her lips. I think this was her happy. On those mornings she would call me sleepyhead and tuck my messy hair behind my ear. On those mornings she asked me whether I wanted pancakes or french toast. On those mornings she warmed the maple syrup and poured me orange juice, the pulpy kind that I liked. And she sat with me while I ate.

On those mornings, I felt like the most important person in the world.

After breakfast I helped her wash the dishes and put them away. I straightened up my room; making my bed and arranged my toys and stuffed animals: Mr. Peanut, Mrs. Beasley, Winnie the Pooh, plush Hamburglar and Ronald McDonald, my fuzzy bunny, Bernard. I Pledged the coffee table and organized the magazines and photo albums on the lower shelf, took the hamper out to the garage, and picked up stray dishes, humming along to the music; humming along with her.

There was a feeling on those mornings; a gentle surrender and a sliver of promise.

It was, however, fleeting. I can count those mornings on one hand. I feel like, if left on her own, she may have had a chance. I could see it. I wanted that for her; for us. She was like the sour grass and forget-me-nots that grew in the yard. She bloomed and thrived when left alone. The trespass was poison to her. The trespass kindled doubt.

She was a feral dandelion, trampled. She would never mature into an Irish Daisy; her hopes and dreams, scattered on rocky soil. She was the eleven-year-old girl whose father died at age 56, under mysterious circumstances. She was the 13-year-old who disappeared down the fire escape of her San Francisco apartment and ran the streets, blowing bubbles and smoking cigarettes with the boys. She was the 14-year-old child bride whose mother swatted her off like an insistent mosquito, and the 15-year-old child mother who would have 4 more babies before her 23rd birthday. She was the betrayed and battered 26-year-old woman who sought comfort from a man in blue. That man was my father.