[2026-06-07] guest room
When I was little, my favorite thing was to fall asleep to the sounds of crickets in the summer and wake up late to the sounds of birds and light streaming in through the cracks in the curtains. In my weirdly shaped room, my twin bed was pushed against the wall of the hallway and my head laid next to the jack and jill bathroom I shared with my cousin. On weekdays, my dad would knock on my door and wipe a warm wet towel over my face to wake me up for school before sunrise and I'd hear my cousin groan as my dad drew the curtains in his room.
Some weekends, I woke up to yelling from the guest room across the hall. I bury my head back under the covers, under my pillow. Some days, I cover my ears with my hands. Some days, I cry. Most days, I wait. The yelling never ends, but sometimes it does, and there's one less person in the house when I tiptoe down for breakfast where my dad is reading the New Yorker at the table and my mom is making scrambled eggs the way I like them. My grandma has a toothpick in her mouth and my aunt is everywhere and nowhere. My elementary school Chinese isn't strong enough to comprehend what the three matriarchs of the family are at each others' throats about, but I know my aunt doesn't have a job and my mom does and my cousin sleeps in a room in my house on the other side of our jack and jill bathroom and there is no uncle and my dad is always silent.
My mom's tone is harsh and bitter but she makes scrambled eggs just the way I like them and my grandma used to hold my used tissues on the drive back from strawberry picking and my aunt always smiles at me with her permed red hair and nails done and she tells me in her saccharine way that I'm so beautiful today and she likes my outfit.
I'm a light sleeper, but sometimes I fall back asleep to yelling and when I wake up again, sweaty from under-the-covers, I hear the silence and the sounds of birds and wonder if I dreamt it all.