Gen 1.17 Thanksgiving

A week after they returned, Juniper packed up the rental truck with her things and she and Lupe drove down the hill to Leah's old riverside cabin. Lupe couldn't help but think back to the scared little girl who'd come to her house with all her worldly belongings in a black garbage bag. How far she'd come! She was now leaving with enough stuff to outfit a small home with housewares.

The cabin looked much the same as it had when Lupe had first seen it twenty-five years ago, maybe there was a bit more sag to the roof and more wear on the door, but it was the same small brown structure with the tiny porch and even tinier breakfast nook. Leah had always referred to it as her "grand dining room" with a sparkle in her eyes. Lupe had thought the artist's cabin quite glamorous back then, but with her new eyes, it looked small and a little shabby. She could tell that Juniper thought it quite wonderful now as she climbed the three steps to the porch and unlocked the door with an air of great importance. She held the door open for Lupe and gestured for her to enter, smiling broadly she said, "So, what do you think?" in a kind of leading way. Lupe could see that it had been given a good scrub down; the floors had been refinished and the windows replaced. There was a new sink, but the same giant gas stove and a new fridge. She couldn't bear to crush Juniper's happiness, "I think it will suit you admirably" she said and gave her a hug.

True to her word, Leah had left her old easel with its layers of paint and her sculpting stand. The two women set to work moving Junipers things in and getting everything set just so. Then they embraced crying like they would be separated for years, by continents, and not a mile and a half up a hill. Neither of them questioned it. Then it was time for Lupe to return the truck and she headed off with her bike in the back.

Hazel's friend Damaris came over most days to do homework and have dinner together. The two would set up camp at the kitchen table their dark heads close together, chattering as they worked. On days when Hazel had soccer practice, Damaris was up at the hospital visiting her mom. Lupe smiled indulgently at the girls as she prepared dinner, "How's your mom doing lately, Damaris? What are the doctors saying?" asked Lupe.

Damaris looked up frowning, for a moment, she'd forgotten she had a life outside this cozy house, "She had another surgery today, but the doctors aren't optimistic. She's fighting really hard, but it doesn't seem to be doing much. I'll go up to visit her tomorrow after school, she's really mean when she's coming out of sedation"

Lupe put down her knife, crossed to where the girls were sitting and gave Damaris a half-hug. She put up a tough front, but she was still a little girl inside who yearned for unconditional love. Lupe knew that life wasn't easy for Damaris and that she'd managed to chase away almost everyone who had tried to care for her. Jas was almost despairing about it, she'd really tried to befriend her stepdaughter, but Damaris had never let her in and there were still Jo, Rex, and Kesha to care for. Sebastian was so busy with work that he might as well live on another planet for all the time he was at home.

Lupe went back to cooking and asked Hazel, "Who did you sit with at lunch today?" She found the way that Hazel moved around fascinating and always making space for her spiky and somewhat off-putting friend. Hazel's attitude of "Love me, love my friends" was endearing.

Hazel rolled her eyes, "We sat with Drew and his new theater friends. They are just as weird as he is!"

"You know you don't have to do that, you could just sit with June and the other popular girls..." said Damaris.

"I could, D, but then I wouldn't be sitting with you! Besides, have you tried talking with them? So boring! I like variety! I like to sit with Drew Kearney and his weirdos sometimes and Jeri and Augie and the other brains and other times, just the two of us." Hazel could've sat with the popular kids, but chose not to. Damaris didn't quite understand why, but she was grateful; the other kids left her alone when Haze was around.

Usually Damaris went to the hospital a few times a week to visit her mom and tell her what she was up to. She didn't really want to, but she felt so bad because her mother had no one else and she was scared that if she didn't go she would regret it later. Her mother was the exact sort of person that she didn't want to be. The possibility that Griselda could die alone and unmourned haunted Damaris and she tried to scare up some feeling, some sentiment for the woman who bore her. Maybe her father felt something for her? He had to once, right? Otherwise she wouldn't be here.

Hazel's house was a respite for Damaris. She was over doing homework most nights and came for part of the weekend too. She tended to keep her problems to herself and tried to bathe in the comfort of Lupe and Hazel's normal relationship. Their fights and the rhythms of their life soothed Damaris in a way her own family life didn't. Sunday night dinners were her favorite. Lupe would make a big stew or pan of enchiladas enlisting the help of all children present. Juniper would come up from the cabin to do laundry and visit her family. Sometimes Maru and her family would join them and Damaris would get some bonus cousin time. Sometimes Leah and her family would come up. It was a large and jolly group.

Jeri Jones-Arzt was too cool for life. On the first day of ninth grade, someone tried making fun of her and she just gave them this disdainful look with her hands on her bony hips causing the gir to back away from her. Jeri and Hazel had been friends since they were babies. They didn't even know why anymore, but they stuck together against all comers. Hazel, puppy-like, kept trying to glue Damaris and Jeri together, but while they respected each other they were never going to have the relationship with each other that they had with Hazel, kinship or not. Hazel seemed to believe that the transitive property applied to friendship and kept getting disappointed when it didn't.

One night, Hazel vented to Juniper, "The one thing I don't understand anymore is the boys! I can't talk to Joe or Augie alone anymore or people start saying things... but I can't talk to them when we're around people either! They're boys then! Why can't they just be my friends again? I wish we were little!Then no one would be saying these things! I can't even be friendly with a boy because then if his friends go by it's all secret nods and fist bumps. The only person that's normal is Drew Kearney and then it's because 'normal' for him is different!"

Juniper was half listening as she painted, "Andrew has always been odd. Does he still want to be a magician?"

"He's gone out for drama club, but has stopped wearing a cape to school. He's taking dance classes after school, too. Some guy on the football team was gonna beat him up, but every time he tried to punch Drew, he just danced out of the way and shouted 'Toro!' For a week after that he wore a short flat hat and carried his cape around and whenever he saw the guy he'd stand like this," Hazel got up and assumed the bullfighter stance, holding an imaginary cape, "and twitch his purple lined cape at him! I saw him do it once! It was hillarious and ingenious, now none of those guys will bug him and they call the other guy 'Toro'! He'll never live it down!"

Juniper laughed and stopped painting, considering this, "He should embrace it, 'Toro' is a pretty intimidating nickname, if you don't know the story behind it. What are Joe and Augie doing that makes you say they're boys now?"

Hazel laid down on Junie's futon with her head propped up on a pillow, and then rolled over onto her belly hugging the pillow to her while she thought, "I don't know, it's like this look and then when their friends come by and see them talking to me they're like checking me out and approving or not. Plus I heard one of Joe's friends say something nasty about Damaris and how he gets it sometimes you gotta deal with the dog to get close to the goods. I feel like a vase!"

Juniper gave a her a sharp look, "And what did Joe say to that?"

"He said that Damaris was really nice once you got to know her. Then the other guy said, she better put out! Like her whole value was between her legs!" Hazel was seething with the injustice of it all over again.

Juniper sighed and said with the air of one who knew, "To some people, it is. You know about Nina. She bases her whole self-worth on men; to her, women are only valuable based on how attractive they are and how much money they have. You wouldn't believe the things she'd say about women who had things she wanted that she didn't think were better than her! And now look at her: she's forty, an alcoholic, and she's lost her looks and her brains to meth. If you ask her, she's still got 'it,' whatever 'it' is and everyone else is just jealous of her."

Hazel sat up, concern knitting her brows, "Has she been in touch lately?"

Juniper busied herself at the sink emptying her paint water and cleaning her brushes, "She got taken up in a bust for dealing. She wasted her one call on me and now her lawyer is calling me to try and get me to testify on her behalf as a character witness. He's a shit lawyer! He either did no research or took Nina's word for it! I was a mistake she had when she was twenty! She isn't quite sure who my father is and she lost custody of me at six years old. Who the hell thinks that an estranged daughter would make a good character witness!? When I pointed this out to him, he started stuttering about pushing for leniency and rehab. Like, look pal, she's been to rehab. She's a rehab drop out, what makes you think this time will be different. If you require me to testify, you will regret it. Strangely, I haven't heard from him again! I did get a nasty letter from her though. I keep them all in a file folder over there," she gestured to a drawer in the kitchen, "but I'm thinking of making copies and setting them on fire. Or sculpting a fire and decoupaging..." Hazel knew when creativity was grabbing hold of her sister and gave her a hug and kiss and left. Juniper had pulled out a large sketch book and was making notes and sketching with broad strokes.

When Hazel got home, her mom was cooking dinner and her brother was sitting at the kitchen table working on his homework. It was Wednesday, so Damaris was visiting her mother and it was just the three of them. Lupe called out, "Hi, honey, how was school? Where've you been? I thought soccer season was ending?"

Hazel settled in across from Ash and got her own homework out, "I decided to stop in at Junie's on my way home. She sends her love, by the way. She was painting, but said I could hang when I texted her. Today's Wednesday, Mom, soccer's Tuesdays and Thursdays?"

Ash watched his sister set up her books and supplies thinking about how different he looked from her. It made sense that he would look different from Juniper, after all she was adopted and they didn't share any blood at all. Hazel looked like both her parents, but also had something all her own. Ash heard all the time from everyone how he looked so much like his father that it was uncanny. He looked nothing like Hazel, shouldn't there be something that they shared? They did have the same mom, after all. He ran his fingers through his honey colored hair restlessly.

Maya said that he must be a changeling because no one else in the family looked like him. She thought highly of her aunt for raising him up anyway, because the fairies might bring her real cousin back. Ash thought that quite silly, if he were a fairy he'd have wings and could do magic. He'd scratched his shoulderblades raw trying to free his wings and nothing happened and no matter how hard he worked, he just couldn't seem to make the plants bloom faster. He'd told Maya she needed to read more sensible stories. Maya had called him a weenie and stuck her tongue out at him. So he did what any younger cousin would do and yelled, "I'm telling! Mom, Maya called me a weenie!" Lupe and Mike had responded in unison, "Don't call him a weenie!" and "Maya, no name-calling!"

Having two sisters so much older than him was kind of like having two extra mothers. There was always someone who could pay attention to him, play with him, or read with him. Lupe was pretty busy keeping the family running and working, but she always made time for him before bed. She read him books, new and old, whereever their interests lead them. For a while he was having trouble falling asleep and she read to him from bait books and home improvement manuals. Ash was beloved by his family, his teachers, and his neighbors, but had trouble making friends with children his age. He was strange to them with his large vocabulary, serious nature, and seemingly magical ability to make adults see his side.

Due to Lupe's newly brighter outlook, she decided to host Thanksgiving that year. It was ambitious, but she wanted it to be a potluck and to invite everyone she loved who had made a family for her and her children. In the days leading up to the celebration, Juniper was up at the house every day helping Lupe and Hazel cook. Since she had such a delicate touch, Junie was in charge of the pies. Lupe, Hazel, and Ash were making the tamales. Hazel had taken over Juniper's old job of assembling, wrapping, and tying the tamales. Ash was chafing over still having to do the "baby job" of making sure the corn husks were evenly soaked. Lupe was making fillings and sauces. She'd made an event on Pot-Lucky with all her guests and what she needed to make a complete meal. She hadn't checked it, but with all the people she'd invited there was bound to be more than enough.

Thanksgiving Day dawned bright and cold. Most of the trees had long ago lost their leaves and those that remained, clung grimly and determinedly adding little cheer to the dreary day. Juniper had stayed over the night before to help clean and set things up. Soon after breakfast, they shoved Ash out the door with a toy and a book and told him they'd call him back in for lunch. Wise beyond his years, he took off to the barren forest knowing that if he were to poke his head back in now, he'd be put to work. At noon, he was called inside for a hasty sandwich and hot cocoa that he bolted down before running back into the forest with a cookie in his pocket. He was up in his fort when he heard the first cars arriving, and got up to the house to see something he wasn't supposed to.

Hazel's dad and Ash's grandma pulled up to the house at the same time. Ash didn't like his grandma, so hung back in the woods as Shane helped Florita from her car, his hand lingering on her elbow. He tucked her graying hair behind her ear and leaned in to whisper something in her ear. She laughed and lay her hand on his chest. Then the two of them looked around and consciously stepped back allowing space between them before heading up to the front door holding grocery bags.

Ash came in a few minutes after them in time to hear Florita's usual passive/aggressive greeting, "It's so wonderful to see you sticking to the old traditions, mija, but your tamales are missing something... Did you add the achiote to the pork? It just doesn't smell like mi mamita's!"

Lupe sighed and kissed her mother on the cheek, "Lovely to see you too, Mom." and then turned to greet Shane after he bear-hugged Hazel, "Just as beautiful as always, Lupe, I can't believe this sprout is now a teenager when you don't look a day over twenty-five!" She hit him gently with an oven mitt while smiling ruefully, "Oh, you!"

The party proceeded normally with Shane and Sebastian circling each other like strange cats, despite the fact that Sebastian had been around for quite a while and they had three children together. The children formed packs separated by age and the parents sat together to talk, reminisce, and marvel at how much everyone had grown and changed. Ash was stuck in a no-man's-land between the little kids and the big kids at age nine and didn't much care for Maru's youngest son, Micah or cousin Maya.

That night as they were cleaning up, Ash asked Lupe about what he'd seen, "Mom, is it polite to help women out of the car?"

Lupe stopped putting away plates, giving Ash a confused look, "It can be, but it's something a man might do for a woman he liked romantically, why?"

"I saw Shane help Abuela out of her car and touch her hair. Why would you touch a girl's hair?"

The world stopped a moment for Lupe. Her mother and her ex. Her exboyfriend and her mother. The father of her child was paying court to her mother!? Florita had always been jealous and slippery, it wouldn't be the first time she tried to prove to herself she was still desirable by flirting with Lupe's boyfriends. Lupe stepped outside and before she had time to stop herself or think things through found herself on the phone with her mother smiling a deadly smile that didn't reach her eyes and making plans to have coffee the next day to "go over the event."