kai ☄ district 3 ☄ fin

k a i ;

"Ms. Bettie?"

My tiny fists balled up onto the wooden door, one, two, three -- usually she's outside. Swinging on the front porch, smelling like mint and covered in stripes and florals and every pattern; she's the pinch your cheeks kind of grandma. Gingerbread sweet and owns like, twenty dogs, she's probably my favorite. I stand awkward, taping the box in my hand gently as I watch the bees fly past, one of her dogs scratches at the door and I bet it's the fat one -- that one's the best. 

She takes my hand, creaking the door open and whispering my name-

"Kai? Kaiiiiiiiiii-"

"Yes ma'am," I smile, she fixes her robe.

"What're yu doin here?" 

And there's this awkward second of eye contact where I can't just tell this older woman to give me her money; I shake the box in my hand and smile a little more. 

"Oh- OH," she fumbles with the lock on the door, longer nails making it difficult and her dogs swarm it, "come in, Kai, give me jusssssssst amoment." Each dog sniffs my legs as I shuffle through the pack and into the living room, one by one trying to jump on me and eat my giggling face, but dogs aren't that smart, you see. I place the box on the corner of a dresser, holding my backpack even tighter -- I love Ms. Bettie's. 

It's a wall of pink scent, warm and autumn surrounded me like a hug of twenty hugs, she's like my godmother. Everything I've ever needed besides Ms. Meryl herself, "KAIIIIIIIII, are you STILL HERE," screaming from the backroom, I'm guessing trying to pin down some money. "Yes ma'am-" I shout out as I drop to the floor, letting the dogs run over me and jump on my stomach; I've always wanted a younger sister and this is kinda my fix of that. A thousand pitter patters on my chest in place of the fluttering of my heart, I would never leave if I could. 

Ms. Bettie comes back into the room, picking me up from the underworld of dogs and back into the land of humans and "I just don see no good witha havin a girl like you in witha bunch like that, Kai," my hands already fumbling the trade between fifteen dollars and the box of mints or cloves or burdock or-

"That woman'sa gone ruin yu yet." 

"Yes ma'am." 

--- ☄ ---

Whistle and peddling, the basket as empty as the sky -- she gone ruin me yet. There's a snicker, the bicycle ride through an open market, adults laughing over bread and that could be me one day. Happy, painted in my wrists and cheeks and every skin of my body, I try to peddle without thinking much of it. What's a more depressing word, happy. 

feeling or showing pleasure or contentment.

It's hard. 

Wind whistles in my ears, kissing every inch of the skin I'm in - it's hard. Red flats kicking on the peddles as hard as they can, I think I just want to be asleep. Riding against the brick pavement with each delivery's payment vibrating in my pocket -- I should be fine. Happy. A child of the earth, Ms. Meryl holding my hand as I passed fingers through fire, I should love her as much as the earth loves me.

As much as she loves me. 

I trip. 

--- ☄ ---

I remember being five -- loved. The smell of pink in my skin and my father's kisses on each of my cheeks, my mother's denim jeans scratching into my sunday best look; they loved me. A love that trampled you like twenty swarming dogs, or like the smell of autumn. He had a beard, rough and course and I put dandelions in it and he smiled and they both looked like me, just like me. In every part of me was a piece of them that I've never seen again -- freckled skin, wide eyes, every look in the mirror I see the same lips that kissed my cheeks before I tripped into the galaxy's rip. 

And I don't know how to get out. 

The house echoes, my sisters yelling and laughing and jumping and screaming and throwing and the big oak door slams behind me -- I'm fine with it. 

I remember the emptiness of the halls as my mother walked me into the house. After a week of wearing black, a week of seeing nothing but my mother and black and a heavy coffin and dandelions in my father's hands -- she saw him in my face. In every step we took together I looked like him since I was born out of a dandelion's bud and a stray bee dusted pollen on my cheeks, she couldn't love me anymore. 

For the me she loved died in that casket. 

I remember Ms. Meryl grabbing my hands as my mother walked away, I screamed and cried and she let me, I punched her leg and she let me. She was calm, a mountain and I was a hail storm, she told me I was smart for crying. That my sisters were stupid for thinking it was strong not to, and she kissed my forehead and told me, "Miss Kai," with her red lips and wide eyes,

"I love you."