Fiddle Sticks and Random Bits

A Change in the Tides: Part One

Looking up at the chalk covered board I blurt out, "I never knew coffee had so many options."

"Yea, there's a lot of them. Someone must have been bored and thought them all up one day," he said laughing a bit. "What can I get you?"

"Um... Coffee?"

"Okay, we've got raspberry, blueberry, hazelnut, chocolate glazed donut flavored, hot, cold, mocha, with or without whipped cream, no sugar, sugar, extra sugar, and with or without milk, I could continue?"

The guy looks at me with a slight smirk on his face; you can tell he must think he is so funny.

My head feels worse, "Water, I'll just have ice water," I say.

The guy disappears around back for a moment and then comes back with a tall glass.

"Here's your order of coffee with water, minus the coffee. Free of charge for the lovely lady."

"Thanks," I say as I look at the guy, he must be new to the area. His facial features are too different to forget.

A part of me is glad that I didn't have to help fund the establishment that I so greatly despise. Defiance at its finest.

The rest of the baby shower goes by in a blur of excited women pinning diapers on the baby and opening sparkling boxes containing unbelievably small people clothes. There has never been much desire in me to have kids, the crying and pooping alone is enough to make me unsteady with just the thought.

As the baby shower was ending, I see my cousin Claire walk towards me with a big smile on her face. She had chosen to ignore me for the majority of the party, but she must have seen me staring at her a bit. Her stomach looks like a basketball wrapped in pink and purple floral print cloth and her feet are a bit too swollen for the ballet flats that she is wearing. It's hard not to gawk.

"Hey you, I wasn't sure if you would end up coming."

Claire has a strange way of talking without fully opening her mouth so that she can maintain her unbelievably fake smile.

"Oh, you know, couldn't miss all of this," I gesture to everything, including her round stomach.

"You never were one for babies, were you? I think it was the only child syndrome that did it."

When Claire and I were younger my uncle Caleb would watch the two of us during the summers. Her parents worked and Justin, Claire's older brother, had joined the army, leaving her to us. I hated it, not because I wanted to be the center of attention, in truth I had always wanted another sibling, but because Claire was in my eyes the devil in child form.

 We would walk every day to the library to pick out books, and on the way back I would listen to Claire state how much better her books were than mine. Hers filled with princesses, ponies, and magical kingdoms while mine were about history, oceanography, or any book that didn't sparkle on the cover. We would fill out reading charts and get prizes from the librarian, stickers, pencil erasers, book marks.

 To this day I still swear she would look at my chart, which usually said ten to twelve hours a week, and she would double it. There was never a moment when she was not trying to be better than I was in every way. Even now with her husband, new car, manicure, and unborn baby it is easy to tell she still thinks she is better than me.

"So, I need you to give this letter to uncle Caleb for me, it's about the house. I would give it to him, but I mean you live there, it's just much easier," She said while handing me a little white envelope.

This was the real reason for her coming over, not a surprise really. People always have some sort of motive.

"Yea, sure I can give it to him. Did you say house?"

Claire is a desk attendant at some plastic surgeon's office and her husband John works at a lumber yard measuring planks of wood. They have always lived in this dinky little apartment since the two of them moved in together after high school. I never thought they had enough money to buy a house.

"John and I just signed the papers on the house and uncle Caleb had helped us out a bit, of course we plan to pay him back once things calm down with the baby and all."

"Oh of course, like how you paid me back for the down payment on your first car?"

"Really, you want to go there now? Honestly, I think you should leave," Claire said as she started pushing me towards the door.

"Yea, I wouldn't want you to go into early labor or anything."

Before I knew it, I was out the door and on the sidewalk; the air hot and humid compared to the coffee shop. I better not look toward the window, I can only imagine all the women watching me, commenting on how awful it was for me to say such things to my cousin during a time of happiness and joy. As usual, I am the problem in the family.