wasn’t always comfortable talking to her aunt anyway. There weren’t very many people she did feel comfortable talking to. She always felt so shy and struggled to know what to say. At least Lily could tell her best friend, Malaya, about it at school. She always told Malaya everything, especially now that she didn’t have her mom to talk to anymore. Lily used to talk to her mother about everything under the sun. Some of her favorite memories she had of her mother were the times they sat together in the garden and talked for hours. Springtime in the garden was magical. Lying on the soft, vibrant, green grass surrounded by the most beautiful flowers, they would laugh at Lily’s made-up fairy stories, and her mother would sing songs to her. When spring grew into summer they would sip homemade lemonade through swirly straws and swat at the bees who tried to steal a sip. When fall came around, Lily and her mother would make a pile of leaves into a fort and then snuggle themselves in flannel blankets to drink their hot chocolate out of pink heart patterned mugs her mother had found at a garage sale. The flowers, blankets, and swirly straws were all gone now. Almost all the contents of the house they had rented were sold to pay for the funeral and hospital bills. The heart mugs, a few family pictures, the contents of Lily’s room, and her mother’s hope chest were all that remained. At first it had bothered Lily that she couldn’t keep more of her mother’s things, but she knew there wasn’t any room for them, and they couldn’t afford to store them. After mourning all the contents of their home for a month or two, she came to realize that her memories were probably the most precious things her mother left for her.
Lily piled pancakes onto plates for everyone, still feeling bad that she had let her aunt down again. She could hear her cousins coming down the stairs as she set the plate of pancakes on the table. Lily could always tell who was coming down the stairs by their footsteps. Ten year old Jackson pounded heavily when he walked the steps. Ruthie, a spirited seven year old, bounced as she went. When her cousins reached the kitchen table, they each grabbed a plate of pancakes, and sat down at the breakfast table.
“Eww, why do you always eat them that way? It’s just gross,” Jackson said grimacing at Ruthie as she dolloped peanut butter onto her plate.
“Because it’s yummy,” she replied stuffing her mouth full of peanut butter and pancake.
“Well, it’s still gross,” he sneered.
“Well, applesauce on pancakes is even grosser,” Ruthie said out as she poked her empty fork in the direction of Jackson’s plate.
He had put a layer of applesauce on top of his pancake with some maple syrup in a tiny dipping bowl at the side of his plate.
“What do you know anyway,” Jackson snapped suddenly becoming absorbed in devouring his stack of pancakes.
Luckily Aunt Jenny had already hurried upstairs to finish getting ready, because she would have had little patience for their bickering. The three of them sat in silence eating their pancakes. Then a few minutes later Ruthie sneezed milk out her nose, and they burst out laughing. All differences of opinion were forgotten, and the siblings began a conversation on how they would convince their mother that they needed a dog. Lily listened to them quietly, and joined the conversation only when spoken to. Lily loved her cousins, and she enjoyed spending time with them. They always seemed to have a good time when they were together. She knew she would probably be going away to college in a couple years, so she had decided to enjoy this adopted family as much as she could. Jenny and the kids were all the family she had left. Jenny wasn’t anything like her mother, but they got along fairly well. Jackson and Ruthie were pretty great kids considering everything they had been through. They were typical siblings who clashed occasionally, but most of the time they were very nice to each other. She had only been living with them for a few months, and in that time Lily felt like they were almost her brother and sister. Almost.
***
Two hours later Aunt Jenny pulled out of the driveway to deliver her children to the local elementary school and Lily to Westview High School. The brick building was a