My dads friends

I went to my dads snobby friends house

My dad knocked up a gold digger

Now they hang out with the gossip geese

Yeah

I mean the women by the pool

That laugh at the recently divorced when they’re sporting knock off michael kors

The women who turn their nose up to box wine

And snicker beneath their breath when they see a single mother fumble her keys with a baby on her hip

Their birds, even worse, a gaggle of geese

And they talk about the kids I’ve befriended like juvenile delinquents..

Their 3 daughters, mousey girls, are all adding comments

Saying yeah their no older than 7 and zip through the neighborhood goin 50 on this mini dirt bike

The red faced round man, the new boyfriend of Jody

Who once was the head chair of the home owner association laughs

When he says

“I mean it could be bad Carly could be texting and hit him or even worse, I could crack a beer and hit these fucks and spend the rest of my life in jail”

I lean to my younger sister

“Or you could kill two innocent children that have their whole lives ahead of them”

The most recent case of their misbehavior

Occurred right there in the

Backyard of the family my father for some reason Takes too.

The kids

Net in hand

Fully loaded

Were chasing, ruthlessly as described, the ducks

Including the babies

“I dont even want to think what they would’ve done if they had caught them” squaked Carly before the rest began in.

The chatty women including my step mother and the other women’s daughters

Talk about how “ratchet” the mom is

How they confront her

And she is overwhelmed and ignores them

And how they found her passed out

Head on steering wheel

Children riding donuts on the dirt bike around the car

And the geese laugh

They find it funny

To them

It’s just another story

Another bit of gossip for them to talk about

More entertainment so they can avoid any awkward silences

That might just divert the conversation

To the fucked little world behind their own door

Behind their own addiction

Behind their own meaningless little lies

And the thing is

They talk about these children like their hell bent

Devilish

And I met them a few weeks back

And have been spending time with them each day on my walks through

The neighborhood

And when I met them i was baffled

They were flipping rocks

Sun kissed, bare foot

A boy and a girl

The boy was in swim trucks

The girl, an over sized t shirt

And they were both covered in bites of all kinds ones they were quite proud of and boasted on jubilantly

Apparently they’ve been “tormenting” the neighborhood

But

When I met them

We began looking amongst the rocks for snakes together

They knew so much about nature

More than me

And I got a degree in ecology

They were smart

Articulate

Kind

I said my name is Addison

The boy spoke, being the oldest at 7,

He said

“My name is mosseo, it’s very nice to meet u, addison” and he reached out to shake my hand

And I Thought to myself I hope one day I have children like these.

The night went on amongst the geese as they cackled about these “idiotic” “ridiculous” “horrible” kids and I looked across the room at their daughters

Blank faced

Empty

Full of longing

To be anything

But a worthless

Goose

But they didn’t even know it was longing that kept them going

They didn’t even know they were empty

They just went on to the next

Target

Completely

Neglecting

Themselves.

(And on that night, I decided those kids were mine and mine to love and grow)

Because they were bigger than anyone in that god damn room.

They were better people than any of those geese could ever be