How I came to admit Vivian did not break the dresser glass...

It was ions ago.  I was maybe 3 or 4.   Well I was at least 3.  I got the baton for my 3rd birthday. 

I loved the baton.  But I was terrible at it.  I couldn't catch the stupid thing if I tried.  Well, I guess I did try.  If you consider throwing both hands over your head and ducking trying.  And I marched like an elephant with a thorn in each foot.

But I loved it.  I had visions of ballerinas and cheerleaders.  I had my mother's looks, but unfortunately, I inherited my father's coordination.  It was just never something I would be good at, as a few years in the Legionnaires marching troop a few years hence my story would prove.

My cousin Vivian and I had a strange relationship as children.  I remember being jealous of the attention she got from my mother when she visited.  She called my Mama Dee Dee.  I thought if I called Mama Dee Dee too I would get some of that attention.  Suffice it to say my mother did not take well to my calling her by her nickname.  And Vivian had been for three years before my birth the child my parents were unable to have.  So she was jealous of the attention I received that had been taken from her, whether she would admit it now or not.  I thought she was bossy.  Which she was, but she was 6.  That's kind of a bossy age anyway.

Now, I had the furniture that my mother had as a child in my room.  My mother was a clean freak.  The dresser was topped with a green sheet of glass, so that it could be cleaned with glass cleaner and get clean, but not affect the wood.  And there was that baton.

Vivian and I both wanted to play with the baton.  In the midst of our argument, the baton was thrown, and the glass was broken.  My mother came running.  Vivian swore I did it.  I looked my mother right in the eyes and pointed to Vivian.

My mother believed me.

Fast forward 25 years. 

My mother and Vivian were sitting together at Rudy's (Vivian's eldest brother) wedding.  It was a beautiful wedding at a lovely hotel with an open bar.  They had been fighting for a few years over stupid family stuff, but deep down, Vivian was still the child my mother had doted on as her own and always would be.  The fight was so ingrained that even now, when Rudy's daughter named for both of these women, Ms. Vivian Demitra, acts up, he and his wife joke that Vivian and Demitra are fighting again.  Anyway, at this moment, they were not fighting.  They were loving each other very much and apologizing for years of stupid stuff.  Then Vivian says, "But I swear Dee Dee, I did not break the glass.  Lacy, you were there, who broke the glass?"  I was half in.  I thought for a second.  Baton thrown, hands in the hair, bouncing off fore arms, glass breaking.  I answered slowly, "That would be...me."  My mother gasped in horror.  "Lacy you told me it was Vivian!"  I shrugged.  "Mama, I was three."  Vivian laughed triumphantly, a weight lifted off her shoulders.  Come on, it was just a piece of glass ladies...and did you ever see me throw my baton?  Vivian was six, she could catch the stupid thing.  Why on earth would you believe me? 

But still, it felt good to lift that weight from Vivian's shoulders.  I may have just been a child, but apparently it really bothered her all these years.  She more than paid for the glass in hurt feelings.  So I say again, Vivian, I am so sorry I lied when I was three and told my mother you broke the glass.  I'm sorry she believed me.  I'm sorry it worried you any over the years.  I love you Cuz.  You didn't deserve that.