Every holiday the family got together.

Our shadows loomed in the fireplace light. 

I remember feeling small under my grandma's gaze and our contrast of dark reflections.

I, this small giant, stood bold in a ruin.

Audacious and unavailing.

“Foolish” a passerby caroler would have thought, 

observing the chaos of a family bursting at the seams through a frosted farmhouse window.

“Foolish little drummer girl playing along to a storm,

Battling the iterations of herself,

Wrestling with the past for freedom.”

I baked cookies every year.

Mom and my uncle started talking again. 

350 degrees ticked up by the minute,

I burned my fingertips because I left my oven mitts in my suitcase.

Two devouring fires in grandma’s kitchen, 

A need grew within my small chest to run and hide, only to find that my feet were bound to the floor.

Ear splitting, 

Unholy shrieking,

Word sparring.

You know how siblings are.

I went home early that year. 

The plane was the part I looked forward to the most anyways.

Roaring engines sounded like silence,

I could lean my head against the window, 

watching Kansas disappear beneath clouds was always gratifying.

Nice ladies offered me cups of cranberry juice, 

It was bitter, in a soothing way. 

Cranberry juice at grandma’s was too sweet, 

I thought about it while the ice floated in lazy circles.

And when I drank it, I couldn’t taste anything but sweetness,

So sweet it burns,

And makes your gums bleed.

A flight attendant asked me for my trash.

Then she said,

She said, 

“Happy holidays”