Remember; You Have the Universe

[ 17 ]

I skip
that night's
Color Fest,
much to my
dismay,
because honestly,
the attack
and having to eat
after that
and just being
tired in general
for whatever reason,
is too much.
Mom reveals
that she wouldn't have
let me go
anyway.
Too much chalk dust
flying around.
I don't tell her
we decorate
posters
with chalk
all the time.

I demand
pictures from
Cadence,
and she sends back
a selfie with
her blond curls
already turning
purple and pink
and green.
She is beautiful
in that free,
genuinely gleeful way,
and some of
our friends
surround her
in reds
and yellows
and blues
and purples.
Her photo
is captioned,
"Battle ships
of love!"

So I spend my
Monday night with
"my sisters."
I feel like
an outsider;
they already have
each other.
They don't need
and probably
don't want
another sister.
Quinn doesn't even
pretend to
be nice to me.
Quiana at least
is awkwardly kind.
They generally
avoid
their brother,
Sam.
Which is fair.
He is fourteen
(bless their poor
mother)
and pretty much
straight evil.
I've heard
most fourteen year old boys
are.
We share
a brother.
Jason is
almost a year old
and doesn't
understand that
he's the confusing part
of our "family."
That the division
between
His and
Hers
mushed together
when he was born.
Maybe my mother
and their father
wanted us all
to be
Theirs
instead of
two opposing
teams
unsure of
if they're really
fighting
or if they don't care
that they are now
one.

But Jason
holds us sisters
together
in his own way.
All three
of us
love to coo
over
every little
thing he does.
He shares my mother,
my eyes,
and thin nose,
and used to have
the same
dark hair as
me.
He shares Quiana's
sassy look
and Quinn's
sour one,
their father
and their inability
to really fathom
that many years
before my
siblings die,
I will cease
to exist.

As we play,
I notice
they're wearing
matching lockers.
I ask
about them
and get an
almost unfriendly response
telling me
the necklaces
are from
their grandparents on
their dad's side.
Their grandma
is featured
on the left,
and their grandpa
on the right.
Each granddaughter
is given one
when she
turns ten.

We don't
have any
traditions like that.
The lockets
are like
a family crest
and it is
a reminder
that The Sisters
and I
are not
family.