Mary woke up suddenly and the daylight stabbed her eyes hard, she had to close them again, she wanted to sit up but did not succeed. She began to become aware of herself, her whole body ached and she felt an enormous weight in her head. She swallowed saliva and felt the taste of blood invading her mouth, her throat was dry and it hurt as if she was swallowing razors. She slowly opened her eyes, this time more carefully to adapt to the light, she realized that she was on the ground, around her everything seemed to be ravaged by a hurricane, she saw that her arm was covered with dried blood, that confused her even more.
When she was able to stand up she slowly approached the door of the room, she felt that everything was spinning around her. She crossed the door and found herself face to face with her father, he looked at her tenderly and smiled - Good morning my child - added the old Cat, as they used to call her father in the small community where they lived. He continued on his way leaving her alone in the hallway, she went to the kitchen where she heard her mother's voice, a smell of dark coffee permeated the house.
She entered the kitchen and bluntly asked her mother what had happened the night before, but her mother ignored her. There were several knocks on the door, no one came to open it, so Mary got up as best she could and went to answer it. When she opened the door, her two children, Marcos and Andrea, were there with a neighbor.
-What did they do now? - Mary asked the children stubbornly.
-Nothing, honey," answered her colorful neighbor immediately, "they ran to the house after the little party last night," she added as she laughed.
Mary asked her children to come in and closed the door in the kind woman's face. Her little daughter was terrified, the boy who was a little older seemed excited. He said to his mother:
-Mommy, last night was amazing, you hit my aunt in the face, she hit you too, but in the end you won.
The boy's voice penetrated her ears like a drill, she asked him to close his mouth and concentrated to try to remember. He looked at the dried blood on his arm and ran his hand over it looking for the wound.
-That's my aunt's blood," her son said proudly and with a mischievous face, "take his little sister's hand and they ran away.
The memories came to Mary's mind like a painful stampede. Weeks before, because of the economic crisis in her country and tired of the monotony of Christmas, her family had agreed to celebrate the festivus, instead of the traditional Christmas. Mary began to laugh out loud as she recalled the ridiculous evening. For her family's attempt to celebrate something different had been in vain, that December 23rd had been just like any other Christmas with her family.
Her younger sister had discovered that Mary and her husband were having intimate relations behind her back, it was definitely a miracle of the festivus that she noticed as the two had been doing it for several years. The sister was not amused and the fight started, she hit Mary in the face several times, Mary defended herself but as her sister did not give up Mary hit her in the face with a machete.
The mother screamed, although the loud music dulled her screams, she lifted her daughter from the floor to take her to the hospital and shouted to Mary that she was giving up being her mother. Before leaving she took two bottles that were on the table, she threw one at Old Cat, Mary's father, who was laughing and singing from his chair where he was watching the whole show, of course the lady was not a good shot so the bottle missed him. The other one was thrown at Mary, another miracle of Festivus this time hitting her in the head, Mary collapsed on the floor.
She woke up when she felt someone was lifting her up, when she opened her eyes she found her sister's husband smiling at her with that perverted face. He helped her to her feet and led her stumbling all over the house, he dropped her several times, Mary couldn't even stand up with herself. When they got to the bedroom her good brother-in-law started kissing her, they struggled a bit, the guy was squeezing her hard, he wanted to have some more intimacy but they were both too drunk so he gave up and left. He left Mary lying in the corner of the room where she woke up the next day.
-"Great festivus," shouted Mary in the kitchen as she laughed and uncorked another beer.
It had been much like last Christmas when her mother discovered Old Cat with a mistress. It seemed incredible to her that her family had the power to ruin every celebration in existence. Just then her mom and sister came into the kitchen looking for some coffee, Mary saw her sister's patched cheek, she had just come from the hospital. Mary thought maybe she had overdone it a little and promised herself to be less harsh next year.
She asked her mother for some coffee, that intense aroma had hypnotized her since she entered the kitchen. The mother looked at her angrily and emptied the pot of coffee into the sink, took the wounded girl by the arm and left the kitchen. Mary was upset for a few seconds, but when she took a good look at how much coffee was left in the pot, she felt a great sense of satisfaction.
-Another miracle from Festivus," Mary said aloud as she poured her coffee and laughed out loud.
Original content by the author.
Resources: Tablet ZTE E10Q
Manipulated images from Pixabay
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Translated with Deepl.com
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