Autumn Birthday

This is my entry for the Official Kidlit #FallWritingFrenzy! Writers choose a picture from 15 different images and write a 200-word story using the picture as inspiration.

Autumn Birthday

Autumn is for homecoming, she’d said on the phone. 

Driving up the highway, I thought the foliage that year was the most beautiful ever. But my heart was empty. I dreaded seeing my mom. Why did she want me to come home for my birthday this year? My dorm mates had wanted to give me a party. It would have been my first.

It was always autumn when she’d go off the deep end. I didn’t know if she did it because of the season or to destroy my birthday. As the leaves began to turn, she became more and more depressed. By my birthday, the world was always a riot of color in reds, oranges and yellows. And she was always full-on crazy. Every year. I never had a birthday cake. Or a party. I just had a mother who couldn’t get out of bed. “I just can’t face your birthday,” she’d told me once. 

“Come on in, honey.” Was that my mother calling me “honey?”

“There’s someone you need to meet. Someone I haven’t seen since … well, since the day the two of you were born.”

Next to my smiling mother was my mirror image.

[END]

Thank you to @KaitlynLeann17 and @LydiaLukidis for this fun opportunity to connect with other writers.