After the Sun is the Moon

Chapter #3

       My Aunt Carry is waiting for me when I arrive at the airport in L.A. She is leaning against the wall on her phone in low wasted loose blue jeans and a white long sleeve with a grey vest. She had cut her hair shorter sense I last saw her in June. And it is mostly dark brown now with a few platinum highlights. God, if we go out in public, no one will think she is my mom. Even though we look alike, she's too young to be my mom, but too old to be my sister. 
       When I get closer to her, dragging all my suitcases with me, she looks up and her face lights up. She smiles super big and runs to me, "Hey, baby!" She take two suit cases. "How was the flight?!" She doesn't even act like her sister just died. I guess I like that about her. "It was alright." I said. "Scary because you were all by yourself?" She asked mockingly. Her light heartedness is a relief almost. She bent down to see Sugar and baby talk her. Poor Sugar was a nervous wreck; shaking like a leaf on a tree.
"We are going to live. It. Up." She continued. All I could do was smile. "Mom is thinking about coming over to see us. I don't know if she's willing to come on Christmas though." Her mom (My grandmother) lives in Chicago. But she comes to visit my aunt for long periods of time frequently. She is louder than Aunt Carry, but has a better head on her shoulders and is definitely more stable. "Oh crap! Tomorrow is Christmas Eve ain't it?!" I nodded my head. "Well, we'll have to do something REAL fun." I got excited. I could already picture it: loud music, just us, dogs running around everywhere, some fun gingerbread house and cookie making! But probably no cookies for Santa or tons of presents under the tree. We'll probably be up too late for Santa to come if he did exist. Christmas is going to be very different, that's for sure.
We put all my stuff in the trunk of her Jeep, which was already running because both of her dogs were in there. They barked their tiny heads off as me and Sugar got in. Sugar barked back, though. Soon they will be best friends like all the other times they had met. I sat in the back because Mitsy and Rosie called shotgun.
It was obviously warmer in California than Texas, but Carry had the AC blasting and I was low key freezing my butt off. She and Grammy both get hot flashes, I guess it's a hereditary thing that I didn't inherit.
Carry talks her head off about everything going on in her life. I just love how her sister dying and her only niece now living with her is only one of less interesting things in her dramatic life. She talks about how I should watch this drag race on TV with her. I have never seen a drag race before, and I had never planed on it, living in Texas with my kind of parents. Well, Aunt Carry is my new "parents" now so, I guess I will be exposed to many new things. I'm excited but kinda overwhelmed.
"And I have lost 10 pounds sense last time you saw me. Can you tell?" I did notice, but she still hasn't lost those hips. "Oh, yeah! You look great." She also started spray tanning, instead of laying in tanning beds. "So, any boyfriends you leavin behind?" She asked with a country accent. You can take a girl out of the country, but you can't take the country out of a girl. "Nope, no boys." "Really?" She asked suspiciously. I gave her a little more to chew on, "God, no. I hope there are cuter ones around here." She threw her head back laughing. "I figure you can get any boy you want, you look like me." She said as serious as possible and I couldn't disagree with her.