I’m Not Me

                                                                                        January 8, 2035

Dear Diary,

Who am I? I thought I knew, but now … I feel like everything is upside down.

I didn’t want to come on this stupid camping trip anyway, and now look what happened. It’s cold up here on this stupid mountain in the middle of nowhere and I can’t even get a cell phone connection. Nobody else is up here except Uncle Eli, Aunt Makayla and my cousin DeMarcus. Now I find out I’m not even related to them, and my name probably isn’t Kwanza. And all because I forgot my shampoo.

 

“Kwanza, you open this door and let me in. Hiding in the bedroom won’t change anything so you might as well come out.”

“Aunt Makayla, I don’t want to talk to you. Not now, not ever.”

“Young lady, open this door right now or I’ll have to take off the hinges. One way or the other, it’s coming open. You know I’ll do it,” Makayla threatened.

Kwanza opened the door and, despite her anger and confusion, fell sobbing into her aunt’s arms. Makayla rocked her and smoothed her hair, her tell-all hair.

“Honey, do you want to know what happened?” Makayla asked.

“It’s about time, don’t you think?” Kwanza said, recovering her usual spunk. “Where are Uncle Eli and DeMarcus?”

“I sent them out to find more firewood. They won’t be back for a while. Now sit down and let’s talk.”

“Why is my hair blond? Who am I? I’m sure enough not Kwanza.”

Makayla smoothed the offending hair, sooty black except for the blond roots that so distressed Kwanza. “You are Kwanza. You have been since your mother and I found you during the riots. That was June 2020, and since we figured you were about six months old, we named you Kwanza, thinking you had probably been born the previous December around the Kwanza holiday. If you had another name before that, we didn’t know what it was.

“The rest of the neighborhood wanted to kill you, along with all the other whites they could find. Jayla scooped you up and hid you under her blouse until she could get you home. You were crying, but the noise from the riots was louder and no one heard you. You were scared and sopping wet from the hoses the riot police were using, but otherwise healthy and strong. Your blond hair was just starting to grow and your skin was milky white. Before we could take you outside, we had to figure out a way to darken you so you wouldn’t stand out and people would leave you alone. When things settled down and the drug stores got restocked, we found Shine, a combination shampoo and body wash that darkened skin and hair. Fortunately, you already had naturally curly hair.

“Unfortunately, you forgot to bring your bottle of Shine with you on this trip so your hair is showing blond at the roots and your skin is getting lighter every day we’re up here.”

“Why did my mother save me? She was one of the activists, at least that’s what she always told me.”

“Yes, she was, but there was something about you that struck her right in the heart and she couldn’t leave you there in the street to be trampled by the rioters and the police. Maybe it was because Jayla had miscarried several months before and she was still mourning that lost little soul. Whatever her reasons, you became part of our family. My DeMarcus was eight months old at the time, and I had plenty of milk, so I nursed you both until you could eat on your own. I felt you were mine too, every bit as much as Jayla did. So – instead of having no mother – you have two.”

Kwanza’s tears had stopped. She no longer felt that she was alone in the world, and now she knew she never had been. She even had two mothers instead of one. Maybe things wouldn’t be so bad after all. She just needed to get another bottle of Shine.