September 2020 Winners - First Place

"Oatmeal Dinner" by Brendan Thomas

The mother watched the small army of children kick up stones in the dirt, jump over stools, and chase each other between the tents of the camp. They were happy the way children can be for an hour or day, carefree and unburdened, when they forget who they are, and where they live.

She couldn’t. Dinner would be oatmeal again, unless her husband and older son scored an avocado where they were picking. She imagined cutting it in half, dicing the flesh, and arranging the cubes on a chipped plate with sprigs of cilantro.

She corralled her youngest boy and used spittle and her sleeve to wipe dirt from his cheek. He trotted away and disappeared into the melee. She wondered when his laughter would stop.

She remembered skipping to her house from school when she was seven.

Her mother served warm milk and freshly baked bread at the dining table, the heart of their home. Her little one didn’t go to school. He had no shoes. No milk, no bread, no table. Home was a tent in a pickers camp in California's central valley.

She pushed loose hair from her eyes. Her husband used to call her beautiful.

“Your eyes dance like stars and your breasts are soft and round.” Not anymore.

“Scrawny,” her father would say. Her eyes were dull and her chest was hollow. She was skinny and old, inside, and out.

Her future was survival. She feared her son's would be migrant pickers forever.

They returned tired and hungry. She kissed their dusty foreheads, and pushed their hair behind their ears.

“I hope you know how much dad and I love you,” she said.

Her youngest laughed and squirmed away.

Her eldest asked, “What’s for dinner?”

“Oatmeal.”

“With avocado and apples,” he said, emptying his pockets.