Evil's Enemy

Meet my mom

My Chuck Taylors crunch over the gravel driveway as I make my way to the front door. Mom and Oscar are already inside. It might be August, but that doesn't stop Ridgemont from being cold, colder than Austin is at Christmas time, and unfortunately I'm still wearing the ripped-up denim shorts I put on before we left our motel in Boise, Idaho, this morning. The brightly colored mustang on Mom's old high school T-shirt-my favourite shirt these days-looks out of place in the fog, the opposite of camouflage.I hover in the doorway. "Mom!" I shout. No answer. Just the squeak of the screen door on its hinges while I hold it open, then the whistle of a gust of wind from behind me like it's trying to push me inside."Mom!" I repeat. Finally I shout her full name: "Katherine Marie Griffith!" She hates when I call her by her first name,though she claims it has nothing to do with the fact that I'madopted. We've never made a big deal about it-never had somebig talk where my mother, like, revealed the news to me. Thetruth is, I don't remember a time when I didn't know. There aremoments when I wonder who my birth parents are and whythey gave me up, but even Mom doesn't know those details.She was a pediatric nurse at the hospital in Austin where I wasfound-left swaddled in the emergency room: no parents, no paperwork,no nothing-and once she got her hands on me, shesays, she knew she was never going to let me go. We were meantfor each other, she'd say, simple as that.Mom and I giggle when strangers comment on how much welook alike, because we don't. We just act alike-sometimes toomuch alike. But unlike me, Mom is a redhead with light skin,almost-gray eyes, pale skin, and freckles. I have long brown hair with green eyes-like I said nothing like her.Most people have eyes that change colour but not me- my eyes are creepy green and stay the same color.I guess you could call me a witch.