A bit of blue

A bit of blue. I peep through the car window, trying to find the sky, but only a tiny tid-bit is available for me to see. Blocking my view is the make-shift curtain mum has created with my brothers dark blue pillow case. The sun had been hurting my eyes and causing pains in my head, headaches mum called them. Which made sense to me, an ache in your head.

I was tall enough to see out the window, but all I could see was the sky, even without the pillowcase curtain. I knew there was a road somewhere, with a bright yellow line on it. The line was endless and made the road seem to never end. I could see it when I sat in brothers lap, or if i propped up blankets beneath me, to make me tall enough. But right now I wasnt, and I just imagined how that line looked and where it was leading me. Me and everyone else on this hot black road.

So hot in fact, that sometimes it looked slick and wet, as if it had rained on the road alone, leaving the trace of water on it, but we and everything else is left untouched.

I had always noticed the bright yellow signs on the side of the road, the little pictures depicting scenes of trucks and dogs and people doing funny things.

When I learned to read, traveling took on a whole new dimension. I read every sign and road marker I could see, usually aloud. This annoyed my brother immensely, causing me great joy, and a new insentive to read them out loud all the more.

 

Today we were traveling across the state, to a city on the opposite side where aunt Marsha lived, daddys sister. She wasnt married and didnt have any children, even though she was the oldest lady Id ever seen, which seemed very strange to me. Brother agreed with me. Daddy tried to convince her to move closer to us, but she didnt want to leave her house she had grown up in. The same house Daddy grew up in.

She was often lonely and we visited her a few times a year. I didnt like, neither did brother. There was abosolutely nothing to do at her old A frame, perfumed filled house. Her parrot, Geraldo, repeated horrid words I had only heard on tv. He screamed and hollered with glee. Aunt Marsha didnt seem to mind.

Her cats would have been the most fun, had we been able to play with them. They were strictly off limits to us. "Utterly forbidden" aunt Marsha said every time we visited. She locked them in a room and kept the key in her pocket the whole time we were there. Daddy said it was because they were her only friends, and if we got a chance to play with them, they might decide we were more fun, and want to go home with us. We didnt want Aunt Marsha to lose her only friends, did we? It seemed like the saddest thing I had ever heard...But I steered clear of that room.