Carl's Floridian Thanksgiving

Carl's Floridian Thanksgiving
a short story by
by D.L. Morrese

Some people have great singing voices. Others can write moving poems or play several musical instruments. Some have great memories or a gift for math. Carl's talent was a vivid imagination, but he wasn't sure he should feel thankful for it. In fact, it was becoming quite annoying.

His most severe imaginative episode so far had occurred only a month ago when a Halloween decoration that wasn't there spoke to him. This didn't disturb him as much as it might have at the time because the strange encounter had turned out all right. It may have even saved his friend's life. Or maybe it was the squirrel or, more likely, simply an odd coincidence. That's what he tried to convince himself of afterward, anyway. It helped him get to sleep that night.

He still wasn't sure what to make of the vampire.

He looked up from his book. He could read the words, but their meaning wasn't sticking.

"What's bothering you?" Granty Rose asked from her perch on the corner of his bed.

Her sudden presence in his room startled him. She hadn't been there a moment before, and she shouldn't be there now. This was his room, for one thing. His private place. Even his mother hesitated to come in without knocking. Granty Rose was his mother's aunt, his grandmother's older sister, which made her his great-aunt, which he had shortened to 'Granty' at some point. It was what he had called her for as long as he could remember. She used to babysit for him while his parents were at work. After he started school, she would pick him up each afternoon and bring him to her little house in a Detroit suburb. It had once been considered middle-class, even though rows of identical small, brick houses formed an aesthetically uninspired grid of tiny, square plots and held no rooms larger than walk-in closets. The area had rapidly decayed as factories closed and good-paying union jobs disappeared. Shabby as it was, he had fond memories of the place and of his walks with her along the cracked sidewalks to the little park with rusty swings, bent monkey bars, and a baseball field with a graffiti-covered backstop.

His favorite memory of Granty Rose was of her reading him stories. She was a big believer in stories because, as she put it: They let you visit places your body can't get to. She had read him all kinds of stories—funny, sad, exciting, mysterious.... Most of the books came from the public library. One of his earliest memories was of her turning pages of short, rhyming sentences and colorful pictures. As he got older, the books she read to him grew longer, with scenes painted only in words. For those, he had to imagine how the things in the story would look, which might be part of the cause of his far too real imagination.

"Carl?" Granty Rose prompted. Her voice was just as it had always been, a bit raspy but kind, understanding, and far more patient than he felt he deserved at times.

He glanced at her sitting there, her calm, wrinkled face telling him that whatever the problem was, everything would turn out all right. He took a deep breath and sighed. Her sweet, flowery perfume was part of his memory of her tiny house. The faded blue, button-up sweater she was wearing was probably too warm for the weather today, but he knew it was one of her favorites.

"It's nothing, really," he answered, even though he knew she wasn't really there. She couldn't be. She had died the year before his family moved to Florida. But she was there for him now, just as she always had been. He appreciated that, probably more than when she had been alive. He felt a bit guilty about this.

"Come on, Carl. I know you better than that. What is it?"

Her understanding smile encouraged him to reply.

"It really is nothing. It's just that it'll be Thanksgiving this Thursday."

"Ah, I see," she said knowingly. "The family gathering, right?"