38. WILD ANIMALS
WILD ANIMALS
Olivia screamed in anguish inside of the altar room.
The lights in the house flickered. The back door swung open and flower petals blew in and fluttered around the house.
The ground hummed. Olivia paced back and forth while she cried in silence and then let out another scream.
Her screams went from a high- pitched screech and then pacified into a husky moan.
The squirrels, the racoons, the deer, the crows, the mockingbirds, the earthworms, the fire ants, they all heard her and didn’t flee.
They found themselves gravitating in the direction of the house.
They each took their own paths toward the house and stayed.
A kinship to the wild little thing that grew up inside.
What made them flee was the beaming lights of a small silver car blasting songs at full volume, coming in at a dangerous speed toward the house.
It was Lucia and Isabel. Isabel jumped over the picket fence and Lucia gently opened the gate.
They barged into the house and ran toward the altar room.
Olivia was on the ground, sobbing and wheezing, and then screeching again, almost howling.
Isabel dropped to her knees and gently grabbed Olivia’s hair, she pulled it back and braided it into a tail following the path down Olivia’s spine.
Lucia faced Olivia and put her forehead on her sister’s.
Tears fell down Lucia’s face. She sniffled and then placed her hands over Olivia’s cheeks.
It’s okay to cry now. It’s okay to cry. We are wild animals when people die and that’s okay.
Olivia moaned and cried again, trembling and letting out groans, her face red and glistening.
The ground pulsated and creaked, shaking the altars and the statues and the papel picado.
Lucia went in for a hug and then Isabel did too.
They held Olivia. They held each other. They cried together.
Each sister imagined themselves turning into something else.
An emerald snake. A barn owl. A cicada. Sisters in a different universe where mothers are folktales.
Sisters in a dimension where time isn’t linear and you can jump from memory to memory living in nostalgia forever.
Sisters who were never separated on purpose.
Sisters who never questioned whether or not they were loved.
Sisters who didn’t have to deal with the aftermath of a woman like their mother.