Hug-it-out

 I                I had something for her. Finally, something to give. Kayla was waiting for me when I got home. I started handing out presents: a fuzzy hat for mom, a leather cap for dad, a knitted Spiderman beanie for Brandon—authentic sheep’s wool—and then Kayla. The glass turtle was beautiful. She had collected turtles for as long as I could remember, and this one would top them all. Hand crafted in Colombia, and proof that I had thought of her on this trip. Proof that I cared.

            I began unraveling the carefully stored present, but then I saw it, the prefect glass turtle slipping from its packaging. It fell to the ground and shattered at Kayla’s feet. We just stared at it for a solid minute. We both knew what it was. It was a peace offering. It was a way of forgetting the past and moving on, trying to become friends again. She almost cried. She just looked down at the pieces—I saw her heart breaking. And I felt my own do the same.

a.      [Second Try, Same exercise] Kayla is my little sister by two years. When we were kids, she’d follow me around everywhere, watch Batman with me instead of Barney, be my side-kick on neighborhood adventures. And she was my backbone. I would stick up for a bug’s right to live on the playground, but I wouldn’t stick up for my own right to not get beat up. That’s when Kayla came out swinging for me. When I came home crying because I’d try to sell our garden tomatoes to the neighbor for a dollar a piece and he’d taken the whole lot for that dollar, it was Kayla who went with mom to get them back.

      Kayla was stubborn, sassy, and sarcastic. She was blunt. You wouldn’t want to be anywhere near her when she came home from work. She was mean sometimes. I couldn’t stand mean people, so slowly, we edged out of each others’ lives. But now I had a gift. I wanted our relationship back. It would start with this gift: the glass turtle handcrafted in Colombia. We would hug-it-out like we did when we were four and six.

      I walked in my door, and she was there waiting for me. I started handing out gifts: a wool hat for mom, a leather hat for dad, a Spiderman beanie for Brandon. As I was unwrapping Kayla’s turtle, her eyes got wide. She would love it. Then it fell—plummeted to the ground right in between my feet and hers. We both watched it shatter. We just stared at it for a minute. I felt like crying. Kayla’s eyes betrayed her for the first time, showed her devastation. I went upstairs to try to fix it. We never hugged-it-out.