Home Sweet Home

It's yellow. That's the first thing you notice. As you get closer, you see the tall magnolia with it's white buds just beginning to bloom, late spring. You step onto the dark green blades of grass with your bare feet and you can automatically feel the moist soil underneath because of the sprinklers that shut off a couple hours ago. You walk through the open doorway. With the weather in Southern California, air conditioners weren't an actual thing when all you really had to do was open the front and back door and let nature do its thing. You hear Magelena in the kitchen calling you in her Mexican accent that lunch was ready. She's like a big sister that your family pays for. You run up the squishy staircase into your bedroom. The ceiling is painted with circles that are identical to the bedding you picked about a few months ago at ikea. You laugh as you think back to your dad standing on a ladder in your bedroom painting the ceiling with a paintbrush trying to get in just right. As you open the windows, you can see Paul, your next door neighbor, trimming the rose bushes just over the little brick wall separating your yards. The same roses that you fell into when you were seven. Your room smells like a mixture of laundry detergent and febreeze, reminding you that Magelena is waiting for you to eat her famous kraft's macaroni and cheese. You run down the stairs and sit at the dining table. The french windows give you and open view of all eight white rose bushes your mom planted years ago for all of your siblings. You smile as you take a sip from your milk, you're home.

Four years later..

It's blue, all of it. A sort of grey blue that reminds you of the sky before it rains. As you get closer, you see your mom talking on the phone with her sister while she's watering her little magnolia she picked up at the store last week. You tip toe onto the brownish, dry grass trying to avoid the stickers and stinging weeds. You open the screen door, then the tall wooden one. As you step through the doorway you feel the rush of cool air from the ceiling fan relieving you from the humid heat that occupies the Texas air. You walk into your bedroom, which is also the bedroom of your mom and your four remaining siblings that are living at home. You look at their tired faces and decide, as the oldest at home, to go make them some lunch. Their faces light up as you hand each of them a little bowl of macaroni and cheese, you're home.