Chapter 5 - Aunt Sarah’s Lavender House
Two weeks after the hospital visit, we moved out of the temporary shelter and into a place that didn't feel like an institution. Our maternal aunt, Sarah—Mom’s younger sister whom we had only seen twice at distant family reunions—flew in from Oregon the moment she received the emergency call from child services.
Aunt Sarah lived in a sprawling, slightly eccentric farmhouse on the outskirts of town. When our taxi pulled up into her gravel driveway, the first thing I noticed was the smell: wild lavender, damp earth, and woodsmoke drifting lazily from a stone chimney. There were no manicured, hyper-controlled lawns or heavy curtains blocking out the afternoon light. The front porch was cluttered with mismatched rocking chairs, wind chimes made of sea glass, and pots of runaway ferns.
“Welcome home, troopers,” Aunt Sarah announced, stepping out onto the porch with her arms wide open. She wore an oversized paint-splattered denim overall over a yellow sweater, and her curly brown hair was tied back with a piece of twine.
Toby hid behind my leg for a moment, still instinctively cautious of adults who spoke too loudly, but Sarah didn’t crowd him. She just crouched down, pulled two brand-new, brightly colored kites out from behind her back—one shaped like a blue dragon and the other a yellow butterfly—and laid them on the grass.
“You don’t have to talk, you don’t have to smile, and you certainly don’t have to tiptoe,” Sarah said gently, looking right into my eyes. “In this house, if you break a glass, we sweep it up together and nobody yells. Sound like a deal?”
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That first evening, Mom joined us after being discharged from a physical rehabilitation center downtown. She looked thinner, and her movements were still careful and deliberate, but she was wearing a bright turquoise shirt—a color Dad would have called “too loud” or “unbecoming.”
We sat around a massive wooden kitchen table that was scarred with knife marks, paint drops, and burn rings from decades of actual living. For dinner, Sarah made burnt grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup from a can. It wasn't gourmet, and half the sandwiches were charred black on one side, but we laughed through the entire meal. Toby even stole a potato chip from my bowl, a tiny act of rebellion that would have earned him a harsh reprimand in our old life. Here, Sarah just laughed and handed him the whole bag.
