i try and i try to keep my girlfriend and father from having to interact, but sometimes there's holidays, you know?
like last time, i'm at a picnic on a grassy hillside, catching up with a younger cousin—she hasn't seen me since before i got my first dress (she stares at me in disgust, i smile back)—and i completely forget i was supposed to keep an eye on both of them.
i hear shouting. heads turn. i shift my weight onto my cane. my girlfriend is away down the hill, she's barely like armslength from my father, grinning. he's taller, leaning in, making fists.
she looks up at me, blows me a kiss and follows it up with a leash-tug gesture that makes me whine and stagger forward onto my knees in front of my extended family. my dress settles onto the grass.
that does it for my father. he swings, she swats it down and swings over it, and like that he's on his back on the grass. his brothers are running to him, shouting, and i'm breathless and blushing;
she practically steps over him to get to me. the hem of her skirt brushes by his cheek. i can see in her smug smile—it's the sun to me—that she considered kicking him in the head.
my mother steps in front of me. her shadow falls across me. "'scuse me ma'am," says my girlfriend, and "no you don't," says my mother, crossing her arms. "we won't be letting you make our son any worse."
"chelsea?" asks my girlfriend, and i answer to my name by bowing my head and stammering "yours, owner" far louder than i meant to.
my mother stiffens. i feel them staring each other down. at the top of my vision i see my girlfriend silently but firmly repeat the leash tug gesture and i whine the words again, unmistakable to all present.
mother, voice clipped, growls something about getting her good-for-nothing husband some ice, and stalks past my girlfriend.
i look up at my sun. she's smiling down, elated, bloodthirsty. i look around at my cousins. several are laughing. a couple have their phones up, consumed by the all-hungry urge to record everything for clout—not that i have a leg to stand on, here—
i feel her scratching behind my ears. i gasp and relax into her. people are still shouting, but none of my uncles seem to want to be the one to approach us to pick a fresh fight.
"heyyy," she says sweetly, like i'm the dumbest thing alive. "hey chelsea. hey girl. wanna get out of here? wanna go somewhere else?" i'm nodding stupidly into her words.
and you know, i was always so scared of the day i'd try to cut them all off, and the thousand ways they'd try to force themselves back into my life—shouldn't have been! not one of them will speak to me since!
