If Summer Never Ends

Chapter 15

Chapter 15:

"Son of a bitch!" I yelped as I let go of the lighter and yanked my hand away from the smoke bomb. Of course I would burn myself while trying to indulge in an American tradition of blowing things up and setting things on fire. Happy Fourth of July to me.

"Gabriella!" Aunt Julia shouted sternly. "Do not use that type of language!" I didn't understand why she didn't want me to. She swore up a storm whenever she got hurt.

Shortly after, Evelyn asked, "What's a bitch?"

That's why. "A female dog," I replied, trying to be funny but Aunt Julia was less than amused, although I had my grandpa cracking up in his lawn chair.

She walked up to my grandparents' dog Lucy and said, "You're a bitch."

Everyone else busted out laughing but Aunt Julia gave me a I- would- totally- slap- you- right- now –but- since- we're -in front- of- people- right- now- you'll- get- away- with- it face.

Ultimately, Aunt Julia achieved her goal of making me feel crap-tastic by a single look, so I went to the kitchen to ice my hand and cool down with a drink. My grandma made her signature punch, which was basically a blend of fruit juices, Hawain Punch, sherbert, and ice. It tasted pretty damn good, though.

As I pressed the cold pack onto my burned skin, I grimaced and wondered why it was considered a tradition to light things up on Independence Day. I'm pretty sure our founding fathers didn't celebrate by going around and shooting things, although you never know. The year 1776 could've been a wild one.

But contrary to explosives, I indulged in the holiday quite patriotically. I decked myself out in red, white, and blue, had a barbeque with my family in the backyard, ate more than my weight in cheeseburgers and hotdogs, and not to mention, I was strongly looking forward to the fireworks later in the evening: the epitome of all things American.

The Fourth of July was pretty much the only holiday in the summer, besides Labor Day which was just a reason for people to pester about not wearing white the day after, to not have school, and to stuff my face with yet, more burgers and hotdogs.

Even with my distaste for politics and government corruption, I couldn't help but feel the patriotism flowing in my veins. And as much as I learned how our country slowly grew to an imperialistic and narssistic superpower in history class, I could not help but admire the journey of the past four-hundred years.

The screen door screeched open and in walked Aunt Julia. I had to say: the shade of anger on her face had complimented her skin tone very well.

"Go ahead. Yell at me on how I'm such a bad role model for today's youth, etcetera," I sighed, stirring around the sherbert in my punch.

"I'm not mad at you," she replied. "I'm just disappointed."

Dammit. She had to pull that card. She just had to. That was even worse than her actually being mad at me. I would've rather had her beat me than tell me she was disappointed in me.

"I'm sorry," I said with a whiny tone in my voice. It was quite childish of me to do. A child thinks that if they say sorry, it makes up for all of the bad things they did, but it doesn't.