The next morning I woke up to Gus Gus laying on my chest, meowing at me to wake up. I noticed a second body was laying next to me in my bed. Olivia’s little figure lay sound asleep next to me.
Gus finally moved, once he saw that I was awake.
“Of course.” I mumbled, and sat up.
I left her in my bed, while I went down to get coffee, and to feed Gus.
The clock read six AM. No wonder I was tired. I started the coffee maker, and scooped big heaps of the coffee into the bowl. I liked my coffee stronger than my mom makes it. They’d have to live with it.
Gus was fed, and I moved to the living room, with my cup of coffee, and turned on the tv. I found nothing on, so I clicked it back off, and sat in silence. A few minutes later, I heard the patter of little feet running into the room. Nora, and William’s voice could be heard coming closer.
Little Carter and Liam came running into the the room.
“Auntie Vi, can we watch tv?” Liam asked me, and pushed his glasses up his little nose.
“Only if Auntie Vi can have a big hug from each of you.” I replied.
Both boys jumped on me, and gave me hugs simultaneously. When they were done, I handed the remote over to them.
Nora and William came into the room soon after, and Jessalyn followed close by. She sat by me, and read a book rather than watched TV like her brothers.
Gus happily hopped on the couch and curled up on top of my feet. He purred intensely as I gave him a rub down.
Mom came into the living room, fulling dressed and babbling to Olivia who groggily followed close behind her.
Nora was handed a piece of yellow tablet paper. A grocery list, most likely. Mom then instructed Olivia and I to get dressed, and help Nora get the last things that we needed from the store.
“Fancy seeing you here.” I said to the brunette boy who was examining the shelves of salad dressing.
Sam turned and smiled at me. “Hello there.” He put his arm around my waist, and pulled me close to him, and kissed me. He let go of me.616Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBrJvtgx877
“Any plans for today?” I asked him.
“Aside from my sister, my grandparents are coming over, and my Aunt Judy.” He put his hands in his pockets. “You?”
“We’re going over to my sister Sara’s later.” I looked at my feet, an overwhelming sense of sadness came over me, as I remembered that this was going to be her last Thanksgiving.
“Was she the one who was always yelling at us when we played?” He asked me.
I looked back up. “You remember that?” I was surprised.
“Is she still mean?”
“No.” I said quietly. “She’s not.”
Sam took my hand. “You okay?”
“I’m… Fine. Why do you ask?” I replied.
“You just look like you’re about to cry.” Sam put his arm around me again.
“Can I tell you something?” I asked, and traced one of the buttons on his shirt.
“You can tell me anything, Violet.” He replied.
“These next few months are going to be really hard for not only me, but for my family.” I replied.
“What’s going on?”
“Sara’s dying.”
His eyes widened. “If I took any time away from you being with your family-”
I shook my head. “No, you haven’t, Sam. Don’t worry. I just wanted you to know that things are very hard for me right now.”
“Okay.” He said to me.
“Okay? You’re not going to run away screaming?” I became confused.
He shook his head. “Violet, why would I do that?”
I shrugged “Everyone else I have dated has ran away at the first sign of trouble.”
“Well, I’m not ‘everyone else’, am I?”
“I suppose not.” I replied.
There was a clearing of a throat behind me.
We both looked over to see who was standing there. Olivia.
Sam and I let go of each other.
“Sam,” She nodded to him, then she looked at me. “Look, now I want you two kids to know that while I am happy that you two can embrace each other, anywhere without cares, and whatnot. However, I don’t think the other patrons in the store will care too much for your public displays of affection. Now, if you’ll excuse me, Violet. Nora is looking for you.”
“Okay, mom.” I replied to her with a smile. “I’ll meet you guys up front.”
Olivia came up behind Sam, grabbed a bottle of dressing, and continued to walk to the front of the store.
I kissed Sam on the lips, and he told me that he would give me a call tomorrow.
We arrived at Sara’s house promptly at noon. Mom hated to be late to anything.
Sara was laying on the couch when we came into the house.
I offered to be of help to my mom, but she told me to go into the other room. I had brought several of my photography portfolios from home to show her. One was from my travels, the others were just photo’s that I had taken since I had left high school.
Olivia gave Nora some of her poetry that she could read. Olivia was an incredible writer, and she had won the High School state poetry contest the past two years. I was always certain she would be published one day.
After she read a few of her works aloud, I went to the kitchen to brew a pot of coffee. To my surprise (though not really), a pot had been freshly brewed.
“Just for you, mo chroi.” Mom said to me.
“You know me so well.” I replied, and poured a glass.
She smiled. “I hope I do, I gave birth to you, you know. 20 hours of labor.
“Tá grá agam duit.” I said to her. It was gaelic for ‘I love you’.
“Tá grá agam duitse freisin.” Mom replied, as she once again shooed me out of the kitchen.
Everyone in the living room was watching a cartoon movie. It was one that I watched every day when I was a child. It involved dancing cats.
Sara motioned for me to come sit by her. She was flipping through one of my portfolios. I sat on the floor next to her.
“So, tell me about these places.” She smiled.
I told her of my journeys from Ireland, to Germany, to Finland, and everywhere in between. The pictures of the various cities - Paris, Madrid, Berlin - did a better job of telling her what it was like to be there.
“Which was your favorite place?” Sara asked me.
“See, that I don’t know. Every place I went was beautiful. If I could list my top five though, they’d be Italy, Scotland, Norway, Switzerland, and Ireland.”
I continued to tell her about my backpacking trip across America until it was time to eat.
Sara’s favorite foods included (but certainly wasn’t limited to)ham, soda bread, my mother’s famous shepherd's pie, and your standard pasta dishes. Dessert was a chocolate orange cake, and apple pie a la mode.
I was so completely stuffed after I ate, that I couldn’t move. I fell asleep sometime after dinner, and I woke up on the floor, covered with a blanket.
It was still light outside, so I knew that I hadn’t slept terribly long. The movie was still going, and all of the adults had vacated the room, including Sara.
I followed the laughter to the kitchen. Photo albums from our childhood were sprawled out on the table.
Each of my older sisters, and Olivia were flipping through.
I looked at the pictures that Olivia was looking at.
“I remember this.” I said, examining a picture of us. It was at Christmas years ago. Nora, Sara, Cait, and I stood in a line. I had to be about four in the photo. Santa had brought Cait a present that I had wanted, so I was with my arms crossed, crying in the photo.
“I can’t remember for the life of me what you got that I started crying over.” I said to Cait, with a laugh.
“You were crying because I was given a doll, and you wanted the same one.” She said to me as she looked at the photo.
“I remember how mad you were at Santa.” My mom laughed. “He had gotten many angry letters from you that following year. I think I have them in your memory box.”
“Oh my.” I heard Sara say with a laugh.
We reminisced about our childhood until it was late. Olivia, Lena, and myself cleaned up the kitchen before we left.
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The ride home was quiet. My thoughts were of Sara, and all of the memories that my sisters and I shared together. I thought about the coming month, and how much smaller our family would be. I was learning to love the person that I big sister had become.
Tears swelled in my eyes, and I cried in silence until I fell soundlessly asleep for the night.
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