Green Acres, Camp: 11:17 PM
Kitty sat up in bed. Covered in sweat. Her dream was fading quickly. She remembered she had been in a similar bed. That someone called Winnie wasn't there. Winnie had gone with Tia Cuervas.
"Aunt Crow." Kitty said in English.
A image of a stern woman in a denim jacket, black tee-shirt and jeans came into Kitty's mind. Winnie's image as a dark skinned twelve year old with a round face and black hair. Mommy? No she couldn't remember Mommy. Nor did she want to remember the Wanagi. What he did.
Patty lay in the other bed. She snored softly. Kitty debated whether or not to wake her up. To tell her about the dream. It was silly. It could wait. Kitty went back to sleep. She had no more dreams. A figure stood over her. Her lips were moving.
"I am here. I've come back for you." She was saying, but there was no sound anyone could hear. She was no more than a dream which Kitty would forget in the morning.
November 23, 6:06 AM
Jim was making coffee when Patty got up. She pulled a can of hash from the cupboard. She opened the can and plopped the contents into the skillet. Jim took the bread, placed six slices on a pan and sprayed butter flavored food release on the top of them. He put them in the oven.
"I'm going to charge my phone at the Lost Tea Shop. Stacey said I could. It's Thanksgiving tomorrow. I'm thinking that we should watch the Thanksgiving Parade. I can download it." Patty said as she began to cook the hash.
"I'll shop for the essentials, while I'm out. Turkey, mashed potatoes, candied yams, and maybe some eggnog. I can keep that cold in my pack." Jim was thankful that they had an oven to cook that kind of meal.
"How long since you last celebrated Thanksgiving?" Patty asked.
"Not since long before I was homeless. Years."
"About eight years or so, for me."
"Why celebrate it now?" Jim poured himself some coffee.
"It's not for me or you, it's for Kitty." Patty smiled at Jim. "Who knows the last time she celebrated Thanksgiving. If ever."
"The way she eats, she should love Thanksgiving."
Green Acres, Camp: 6:10 AM
Kitty woke up and noticed that Patty had already gotten up. She lay there in her own bed for a moment. Her own bed. Not on the floor in the Casa Sombrio. Covered in mildewed, stinking bedding. She lay in a bed with sheets that smelled of lavender. Blankets that were clean and smelled like the sheets. In a room that smelled like sage and lavender. With no roaches, no bedbugs, lice, fleas.
As Kitty got out of bed she realized that she was wearing a clean tee-shirt. Pink with a couple of kittens on the front of it. No Guardia had roughly pulled her out of the bed. Calling her names and sending her too the shower where she had to stand in line with the other kids.. She didn't have to perform for someone to get this bed, even if she did something wrong, she'd still sleep in it.
Kitty grabbed a white bathrobe that had been found for her in the bathroom linen closet. Wrapping it around her she moved across the hall to the bathroom. The adults in the main room went quiet as she crossed the hall. She gave them a lazy wave as she went into the bathroom.
Kitty was aware that the adults were talking in low voices. So she couldn't overhear. They were talking about her. About what to do about her. How to find a place for her. They didn't know that she felt she had a place with them. The last few days had showed her that this was her place. In this building, with them.
Kitty let the warm water run over her. She turned up the hot water until she could barely stand it. As the water flowed over Kitty she realized that it didn't matter. No matter how much water, no matter how much body wash she used, it didn't matter. She could never be clean.
Her soul had been dirtied. Patty had said last night that they had scarred her. Kitty knew that they had dirtied her. Made her garbage. Kitty began to cry as the water flowed over her. How could she ever be cleaned after what she had done. Been made to do to other kids. No water could clean that out of her soul.
There was a soft knock on the bathroom door. "Hey kid, don't use all of the water. Remember, we have a limited supply until it starts to rain." Patty called through the door.
Kitty pulled herself together and finished up her shower.
Green Acres, Camp: 6:46 A.M.
Putting the last dish into the rack by the sink, Kitty drained and cleaned the sink. Over the last couple of days there had been an emphasis by Jim about how Kitty should do her assigned chores. At first Kitty resented the work. Now it seemed a distraction.
Jim and Patty had given Kitty a text book. Asking her to read a chapter on mathematics and do the problems that were in it. They said that they would check it when they got home to see how well Kitty had done. Jim called it homework. It turned out to be easy and Kitty was done with it in a few minutes. Kitty decided to explore another area of the house. Jim's room.
It wasn't what she expected. It felt older than the other parts of the house. There was a big bed with a patchwork quilt on it. On the floor in front of the bed was a rug that had a familiar pattern that Kitty couldn't place. What really caught her eye were the books. Jim had said that she was welcome to go in and pick any of the books to read. Kitty didn't know that the walls were covered with them.
H.P. Lovecraft, Edgar Allen Poe, Sir Arthur Dolye, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Stephen King, Jack London, H.G. Wells, Jules Verne, Mark Twain, William Shakespeare, Agatha Christie, all of whom she had never heard of. There were dictionaries, encyclopedia sets, and informational books.
Kitty went back to the room Patty and her shared. She reached under the pillow and grabbed the beaten up paperback she had for a couple of years. It was about a woman who was raped as a child and eventually became a police officer. Kitty loved the book. She had read it over and over.
Kitty fell asleep with the book laying beside her. As she drifted to sleep she remembered a book she saw on the shelf. A book with a yellow cover. American Indian Myths and Legends. She remembered Winnie.
Winnie smiled at Kitty as she read to Kitty from her book. For some reason the cover with the drawing of animals was familiar. The words didn't seem to make sense. She couldn't read the title of the book. Winnie had just read the story of the proud maiden.
"Now here's another story. In the olden days our people lived in their tents out on the prairie. A pretty winchinchala was born. She was a only child for a short time. She had all of her parents' love and attention." Winnie said. Not even looking in the book. "One day her Mommy came to her and said Pretty One, you will have a sister soon."
"The selfish winchinchala was jealous of her sister. Who would no doubt take all of the attention from her. For nine months the winchinchala waited for her sister to arrive while her Mommy got fatter and fatter. Big as a house."
"Watch it, Winchinchala." Mommy's voice came from the kitchen. "I brought you into this world and I could take you out."
"The Pretty One's mother got grouchier and grouchier." Winnie had a certain mischievous tone to her voice. "One day her mother went out into the prairie and came back with what the Winchinchala thought might be a hairless coyote."
"It was really ugly." Winnie still had the light tone. "After a while though, the Pretty One decided that the coyote was actually kind of cute. So the winchinchala let the coyote stay with her family. The coyote would grow up to turn into a cute little girl named Keyote."
Winnie was so pretty, she smiled at Keyote and touched her nose with her index finger. "That is the legend of 'The Winchinchala and Keyote'."
Key laughed.
"Come on Key, lets set the table."
Winnie wasn't there. Key remembered that Winnie's bed was empty. Key opened the door to the hall. A 'wanagi' stood in the hall. A ghost. He called Key a kitten. A mewing little kitty. He grabbed Kitty's arm and led her to the bedroom.
"Mommy?" Kitty called out.
"This is all your fault. You were supposed to stay in bed. Her blood is on your hands." The Wanagi wiped the blood on Kitty's face. "If you'd stayed in bed your Mother would still be alive."
Dirt, it was dirt. The Wanagi made Kitty dirty. Kitty was garbage. Basura. Kitty screamed. It couldn't be blood, if it was blood it meant Mommy was dead.
Kitty screamed even after she had awaken.
Tears followed. Kitty fell asleep. The mind mercifully hid the revelation from Kitty as she slept. It wasn't time for Kitty to remember all of what she had dreamed. The ghostly figure who had watched over her placed her hand on Kitty's forehead.
"I am here. I've come back for you. Keyote. Your name is Keyote."
Kitty woke up laying on her bed with her favorite book beside her. She stared up at the ceiling trying to remember her dream. She couldn't. It was frustrating. It had something to do with a key and Terri was there too. She said something about coming back for her. A word. Keyote.
Kitty didn't understand it. What did Keyote mean. What was the importance of a key?
"Yo ser hambriento." Kitty said to herself.
Leaving the main bedroom Kitty made her way to the kitchen. She made two PBJs. Kitty made sure she cleaned up everything. Putting the sandwiches on a plate she went down to the office. The stairs led to a storeroom. From there she wandered into the office. Jim had taken the board off the picture window. It allowed Kitty to look out at what they had begun to call the courtyard.
It wasn't much to look at. The broken blacktop with weeds growing in the cracks. At the end of the blacktop was a line of tall shrubs that blocked the view from the street. In that empty space a few animals would hesitantly leave the foliage. Rabbits, mice, lizards, birds. As Kitty sat there, quietly eating her sandwiches a dog came out of the bushes.
It's hair ranged from tan to dark brown. Appearing black on it's back. It turned a white muzzled head towards the window. It's dark eyes seemed mysterious to Kitty. It bared it's teeth, but it didn't seem to Kitty like a snarl, more of a smile. Kitty berated herself as silly. It was a wild animal. It saw Kitty in the window and snarled at her. That had to be it.