Author's Note: Urgh. This exploded into something way way longer than intended. I apologize to anyone who is following my other fic but I'm having a super hard time writing for that now that the movie is going to be out in mere days. So I'm just going to keep writing these fluffy chapters for you guys. Thanks so much for reading! You're the best!
An Impulse
Being seven years old was harder than grown-ups realized.
She had to go to school, and make her bed every morning. And do her homework. And watch her language. And she had to spend time with her friends, and at the garage. And she wanted to know more about cars but there was that stupid homework to do. She always had to listen to her Mami and Papi, and do her chores and when she talked-back she always got in trouble.
Today she didn't even get to go to the garage after school. Mami had picked her up to take her to a doctor's appointment and she hated going to the doctor's. Even if she got a lollipop she hated the weird little room with the beds that had paper on them and the jars full of tongue depressors and cotton balls. She only came to the doctor when she was sick, or when she had her yearly check-up. She especially hated check-ups because they usually came with shots. Shots were awful, torturous devices clearly thought up by evil grown-ups.
So, of course, the minute she found out she was going to the doctor she knew the shots would be coming. She'd complained loudly from her car seat, insisting that she didn't need a doctor.
"Mami I want to go to the garage! Not the doctor's!"
"We'll go to the garage afterwards. But you need to go to the doctor's," Letty replied calmly.
"But I don't like the doctor!" she cried.
Letty sighed. "It's not so bad. He always gives you a lollipop."
"But he gives me a shot," the child whined pitifully.
"I know you don't like to get them, but you need it so that you don't get the flu. Remember how awful it was when you didn't get your shot and you had the flu?"
She did remember having the flu, a little bit. With a sore throat and a fever and sleeping in her bed for days and days. She didn't have to go to school but she had felt too bad to even watch movies with Mami or be excited that Papi was staying home to take care of her. The flu sucked. Still, she only frowned silently and looked mulishly out the window.
She still didn't want a shot.
She watched out the window as they drove off the main road into the neighborhood where the doctor's office was. It was near Aunt Mia's house. She knew because she remembered how to get to Aunt Mia's house. They would turn off the same big road and drive down past the red house with the big front deck and the palm trees and the little pink house with the green shutters where the old lady sold her home made tacos at lunch time. To go to Aunt Mia's house you turned at the yellow house with the big black dog behind the fence. Now they kept going straight and she slumped in her seat with a little moan of disappointment.
Aunt Mia lived down the street from the community center where they had a big indoor pool. She would take her and Vince there, especially in the summer to play, then they'd walk down the road to the ice cream cart for cones.
Going to Aunt Mia's house was sounding better and better every minute, most especially when compared to a trip to the doctor's. She looked up when the car pulled into a parking lot, staring at the beige-colored building where the doctor's office was. Her mother parked the vehicle, and then opened the back seat to help her out of her seat. She knew how to unbuckle herself, and had for a long time, but she sat stubbornly in her seat until Letty did it for her, lifting her out of the car and setting her on her feet.
She kicked at the blacktop with sneakered feet, pouting, arms crossed in front of her chest. She didn't follow her mother when she started to walk to the building, nor obediently go after her when she was called. With an exasperated sigh Letty walked back towards her and grabbed her by the hand.
"Come on now, stop being a baby," her mother said, tugging her gently towards the building. "You're seven years old now."
"I'm not a baby," she pouted, trailing behind her reluctantly.
They walked into the building and down a corridor past several doors till her Mami stopped in front of one and opened it, taking them into the waiting room for the doctor's office. There were lots of chairs and a low table crowded with magazines and coloring books and a big plastic case full of crayons. There were some toys in one corner, which a little boy with brown curly hair was already playing with as a woman sat nearby reading a magazine. A little girl was sitting in one of the chairs crying her head off, tears all over her red face. She had red hair in messy pigtails and looked like she was only about three. A harassed looking woman with equally red hair sat beside her. A tall man stood near the front desk holding a crying baby and arguing with the receptionist while two dark-skinned boys who looked like twins sat on nearby chairs coughing and sharing a box of tissues between them.
She shrunk back behind her mother, clutching onto her leg. "I wanna go home," she whimpered.
Letty surveyed the waiting room and then spotted a chair farthest away from the sick children. "Sit down while Mami checks us in," she told her.
The girl started towards the seat, but then once her mother's back was turned she hastily said she had to use the bathroom and ducked into the nearby door labeled "ladies". She found herself in a small room with just one toilet and a sink and turned to lock the door. There was a window over the sink, wide but not tall and with frosted glass. She eyed it, then grabbed ahold of the slippery white sink and scrambled up to stand on the top of it. The window had a tiny ledge which she leaned forward against with one hand, wrenching at the latch with the other. She tugged and the window folded outwards. There wasn't a lot of room, but she wasn't big. She leaned forward to slide on her stomach through the tiny opening, finding herself staring down at the grass only a few short feet below. She rethought, pulling herself back inside, then turned to stick her feet out first.
She dropped down, wincing when she landed awkwardly and twisted her ankle. She sat down on her butt in the grass and let out a long breath before scrambling to her feet. Her mother would come to check where she was soon. She walked down to the sidewalk, looking both ways to try and get her bearings. She could see the pink taco house in the distance and smiled, heading down the block that way.
It would be nice to live at Aunt Mia's house. She could still go to the garage. But she wouldn't have to do her chores and maybe Aunt Mia wouldn't make her go to school. And she definitely wouldn't have to go to the doctor and get stupid shots and be around gross other kids with snot coming out of their noses. Aunt Mia could take her to the pool and buy her ice cream. And she could make her famous lasagna for dinner and sweet empanadas for dessert.
She was fairly skipping when she made the turn down the block to her Aunt and Uncle's house several minutes later. It did not even cross her mind that her mother would be worried about her back at the doctor's office.
When she arrived she found the driveway empty and the house dark and frowned in disappointment. Maybe Aunt Mia was working at the garage today. But the garage was way too far away to walk all the way there. Instead she walked up the driveway towards the back yard. There was the swing set that Uncle Brian and Papi had put in a few years ago. She walked towards it, sitting down in one of the swings and letting out a long sigh as she let her legs dangle.
She could go back to the doctor's. But then she'd still have to get her shot, and Mami would be really mad at her for running away. Maybe she'd just wait here until her aunt came home. Her stomach growled and she wished she'd had a snack with her. She should have made a survival kit just like the man on TV that Papi sometimes watched. But he found food out in the wild too! She looked around, spotting Aunt Mia's garden near the side of the house. Leaping off the swing she landed and hurried over to it. There were tomatoes and cucumbers, strawberries and tiny watermelons. Against the fence was a raspberry bush. She picked some of those, eating them along with some strawberries. The berries stained her fingertips pink but they tasted delicious so she ate until she was stuffed and then sprawled out in the grass.
She watched the clouds up in the sky, making shapes out of them and giving them stories in her head. One looked like a bunny, another one was a face, and another was a turtle. Scooting beneath the shade of a tree the girl yawned and curled up in the soft grass, slowly drifting off to sleep.
She started awake later at the sound of a car engine. She sat up, blinking and rubbing at her eyes. It was darker now, the sun sinking in the sky and she wondered how long she'd slept there and what time it was. She crouched behind a rose bush as the door of the car opened and then slammed shut, followed by a second door.
"Look, Dom I know you're worried but she couldn't have gone far," her aunt's voice was saying. "Brian will stay out helping you guys look for as long as you need."
There was silence and the girl peered out to see that the woman was holding a phone against her ear as she unlocked the back door to the house. Vince was standing behind her, holding his batman backpack and looking somber.
"I know, it's ridiculous that you can't report it to the police for that long," Aunt Mia continued, turning the knob and pushing open the door. "But you have lots of friends out there helping look for that little girl. Is Letty okay?"
Her voice faded as she disappeared inside with her son. The little girl watched them with wide eyes, suddenly terrified. Her parents were going to call the police? Was running away against the law? Was she going to be in lots of big trouble? She tucked her knees up against her chest, hugging them with her arms as she began to cry softly.
Now she just wanted to go home.
The back door swung open and Vince ran out. "Mom, I forgot my Nintendo in the car!" he called, then darted across the yard. He paused then, turning his head as if he'd heard something.
"Is someone there?" he asked, searching the dim twilight.
Too scared to say anything the little girl tried to make herself smaller, crouching behind the roses. Her cousin was stubborn though, and he came closer, rounding the plants until he spotted her.
His eyes went wide. "That's where you are!" He laughed then and turned his head. "Mom! Mom! I found her!"
Aunt Mia appeared at the back door just as she was being hauled out from her hiding space by Vince. She gasped and ran across the yard to them, scooping her up in a tight hug.
"Oh sweetheart," she said, her voice teary. "Are you all right? What on earth were you thinking running off like that? Your parents are so worried!"
She looked at her son. "Vince, go inside and call your Uncle and let him know we found your cousin."
Aunt Mia didn't put her down, only holding her close and smoothing her hair as she carried her into the house. She clung to her, tears running down her face. She didn't want to cry. She was a big girl now and she didn't need to cry over things.
"I'm sorry, Aunt Mia," she whimpered. "Am I in trouble?"
Mia sighed, sitting her down at the kitchen table so she could look her over. She was more than a little dirty, and her ankle was hurting again. It made her wince when Aunt Mia took off her shoe. The woman got her an ice pack and had her put her leg up, then she got her some juice and sat down across from her.
"You know you shouldn't have run away. You could have gotten lost. Or something bad could have happened to you. You're only in trouble because we were all so worried. You didn't want to worry us, did you?"
The girl shook her head, looking down at her hands. "I just didn't want to go to the doctor's. I wanted to come and live here with you."
"Oh sweetheart," Mia said, stroking her cheek and smiling gently. "You know I love you very much. But your Mom and Dad love you too. You can come and visit whenever you want, but you need to make sure that they know."
She nodded quietly. "Okay…"
"Besides, what's so bad about home huh?" Mia asked, tweaking her nose. "Vince has way more rules than you do."
"He does?" she asked, looking at her aunt dubiously.
"Your Mom and Dad, and Uncle Brian and I are different types of parents. But we're not better or worse than each other. And we all love you very much. You and Vince are lucky kids. You have a family that loves you."
She considered that, reaching for her juice to take a sip. She knew that her aunt was right. She didn't really want to run away from home. She would miss Papi reading her a bed time story every night, or hot weekends where she helped them wash their cars and they had a big water fight. She'd miss sitting out on the porch with Mami and looking for stars in the hazy night sky while they ate strawberry ice pops, or watching movies sprawled in Papi's lap with a big bowl of popcorn.
Maybe she could put up with homework and chores… and even stupid doctor's appointments now and then.
She looked up at the sound of a car pulling up and put down her juice, ready to get in trouble.
But when her parents came in through the back door they scooped her up and held her close. She clung to them, knowing for sure in that moment that her aunt had been right. She was loved.