Mayberry Dotter had to squat to get into her bed. She also had to squat to get off it. Needless to say, Mayberry's knees were not what an almost eleven years old should be. Her knees popped as she rose out of bed this morning, then cracked as she began to get dressed. Mayberry Dotter's knees were definitely eighty-nine years old.

"Mayberry!" the screech of her Uncle's shrill voice rose up. His voice was something Mayberry Dotter was habitual to, and every morning when he screamed for her, it felt more like her alarm clock than an actual human. His voice raged again. At least for an alarm clock, it could be silenced.

"Mayberry get down here now!" The alarm clock blares again. Mayberry sighs as she squats to get out of her room. Mayberry's eighty-nine-year-old knees begin down the stairs, and with each step down the steep ladder, and then down the stairs that lead to her attic bedroom, her knees complain. Mayberry Dotter's bedroom is in the attic of a house that should not have an attic. This sad brick house on 5 Grivet Drive was built without an attic.

And yet she somehow sleeps in one.

Mayberry almost makes it to the last step. But almost is the key word, because she slips and tumbles, the thin carpet on the wood floor the only thing to break her fall.

"Mayberry now! The bacon is not going to crisp itself," her Uncle Huckleberry's warm spit just barely hits the back of her neck. The thin protruding man does not even ask if she is all right.

"I'm sorry," Mayberry whispers as she picks herself up, she doesn't check to see if she's bleeding. Mayberry knows she is, but she also knows her bandage usage is up for the week. The numerous paper cuts she got when preparing the birthday invitations really emptied her bandage box.

"Don't I'm sorry me! Get your little bum in there missy and crisp that hog!" Uncle Huckleberry points towards the kitchen, his stick of a finger longer than most humans. Mayberry hates his fingers, they are always pointing at something she should do, wagging at things she had done wrong, or picking the man's rhinoceros-sized nostril.

Mayberry nods and scuttles away. "I swear your Aunt was right, we should have just let you sleep under the staircase!" She glances her head over at the closet below the stairs. The closet that is only enough space for two brooms, a dented dustpan, and twenty-nine spiders. She hates her not-really-an-attic room, but she is pretty sure sleeping under the staircase would be worse.

"Happy Birthday my beautiful daughter, the gorgeous Beverly!" Mayberry hears the over indulgence praise to her cousin even before she feels the vibrations of the heavy footsteps. Her cousin Beverly has bigger feet than her Uncles, and to add on to that, Beverly only wears thick three-inch black riding boots.

Her cousin's feet were ginormous.

Boom. Boom. Boom.

"Mummy where are my gifts?" the brash low-pitched voice of Beverly bellows down to the pace of her footsteps. Mayberry stays quiet and turns the bacon; all by making sure each side is crisp as a sunburned college girl. Last week the bacon was only spring break crispiness, and Mayberry does not want to have any other scolding about how it should be as crisp as a Delta Kappa Beta girl at the end of summer.

"Why your gifts! Here they are my stunning Beverly," Uncle Huckleberry's voice sounds more scared than a father's voice should.

"Yes, I see those but…"

Mayberry's right-hand gets a splash of bacon grease, she cries out. But the noise is thankfully overshadowed by Beverly's newest screech, "WHERE ARE THE OTHERS!"

Mayberry wipes her hand as she listens to her Uncle and Aunt try to abate their screaming mess. Beverly is in hysterics, the forty-two presents exactly one less than last year. Mayberry tries to remember the last time she had a present. Her glasses? The stale yellow plaid shirt that sticks to her back? The new shoelace she got when the soles of her shoes ripped?

Mayberry would not count any of these like the gifts Beverly gets. Last year, Beverly got a light-up stuffed rainbow puppy, the new shiny three-inch riding boots, the extra winter coat in case her other three got too hot, and an electric scooter with red stripes. Mayberry doesn't try to think about this as she prepares the rest of the birthday breakfast. She does not try to remember the way Beverly had thrown out the light-up puppy only three days later because the left ear was not bright enough as she settles the food on the plates. Mayberry makes sure her mind does not see the sad puppy tossed in the trash with a banana peel screwed on top of it.

"Took you long enough!" Beverly huffs as Mayberry places the plates down on the table. In the amount of time it has taken Mayberry to scramble seven eggs, perfectly sorority girl crisp nine bacon strips, slice a whole watermelon, and delicately arrange it all on the four plates, Beverly has ripped open all forty-two presents, gotten tired of nine, tried on and immediately decided to return seven, and gone through exactly two and a half of her temper tantrums. Needless to say, the morning was going quite swimmingly.

"Okay Mayberry," her Uncle begins the usual day plans between a mouthful of the eggs, "the neighbor should be by in a few to babysit," Mayberry nods, it is the weekend and she accustomed to old Mr. Caleton watching her. If watching her meant watching the tube, than yes. Uncle Huckleberry's fingers reach for another watermelon slice. "Don't look so happy Mayberry, you are going to miss all the fun," her Uncle grins and nudges Beverly's arm, Beverly ignores him as she continues to ravage the food, grease making her upper lip shiny, "as we enjoy a wonderful party-filled day at the zoo!"

Mayberry nods, she did not think she was smiling or looking happy about being babysat. She would have loved to go to the zoo, even with them. There was something about animals that made Mayberry happy. It could be that most animals at the zoo did not have parents, and so like her, were alone in the world. So when Mayberry saw a giraffe or a grizzly bear relax in the sun, it made her think she could too. If these animals could be happy living in cages, then there was hope for Mayberry.

"So while we are gone having the party-of-the-year, we need you to do the three loads of laundry, all the dishes, prepare dinner for tonight, I think we have a taste for-"

Rrrrrrrrrrriiiinnnnnngg.

Her uncle pauses listing off the extensive list Mayberry will be doing for the rest of the day. And probably for the rest of her life. Uncle Huckleberry huffs as he stands and paces towards the phone.

Rrrrrrrrrrriiiinnnnnngg.

"Oh god get it already dad!" Beverly covers her ears with her hands as she somehow continues to shove impeccably crisp bacon in her mouth.

"Alright, alright," Uncle Huckleberry reaches over and picks up the phone before another eruption ensues. " 'ello? Yes, this is…okay…no but she can't…how dead is...well if you have to...yes, okay."

Click.

Uncle Huckleberry's thin face turns the color of his name. "Well, I'm sorry to ruin your busy day Mayberry but it looks like Mr. Carleton's mother died, so he will not be able to come over and watch-"

Both her Aunt and her cousin scream in shock, their voices forming into one expressed sound of extensive annoyance. Like mother like daughter.

"So that means it looks like-"

"No!" Beverly interrupts.

"I'm sorry doll but we have no choice and on such late notic-"

"But she can't!" this time it's Mayberry's Aunt who cuts Uncle Huckleberry off.

"Honey, dear," he turns to both of them, his eyebrows falling low on his face, "it looks like," he turns and looks at Mayberry, he doesn't look at her clear blue eyes, instead he looks at her forehead, "it looks like there is no other option but to bring Mayberry along to the zoo."

Mayberry does not smile, even as her cousin begins to explosively bawl for the third time this morning. No, Mayberry keeps her lips slack and her eyes forward.

"Don't worry dearest, the day will still be brilliant!" her Aunt immediately begins to comfort Beverly as Uncle Huckleberry rushes towards the kitchen.

"I think it's cake time!" Uncle Huckleberry sings, his voice sadder than it should be as the refrigerator door opens.

Mayberry stays in her stiff chair and watches as her aunt and uncle comfort, sing, and stuff-with-cake her cousin. She doesn't open her mouth to add her alto voice to happy birthday, nor does she reach for a slice of the German chocolate cake she baked yesterday.

All Mayberry does is lift her hand to lightly touch her forehead. She pushes her fingers past the wall of bangs she has managed to grow over the years until her fingers graze the tiny scar. The scar on her forehead in the shape of a wobbly star.

The scar doesn't burn or tingle.

But for some reason, Mayberry's gut is telling her it will soon.