The Quarantine Diary 6
Day 6 – A Short Story Challenge
Little communities of unpublished and self-published authors have begun to form during this quarantine period. No matter which group I join via Zoom, or Skype, or I monitor via email, I notice the same thing: everyone thought this is what they wanted – all the time in the world to research, read, and write. Time to finish that novel or anthology. Time to read favorite authors and favorite genres to spark creativity.
And yet, we are all accomplishing so little along those lines. I’m not ashamed to admit I found some relief in discovering that my lack of inspiration and motivation is shared by so many others. The continuous uncertainty and total break in routine are just not conducive to concentrating on a project for long stretches. So, we got the time we all desired, just not the way we wanted it. Be careful what you wish for, they say: you just might get it.
This isn’t to say that all writers are going through an ironic slump, but enough are that we’re writing to each other about it. There’s solace in numbers.
That said, one writer, Christine Meade, published an article in Writer’s Digest with some writing prompts to help the rest of us get our juices flowing. So here’s one of those prompts and my take on it.
Prompt: Describe a childhood home from the perspective of an adult who remembers their youthful days with a rose-hued nostalgia. Next, write about that same house from the perspective of an adult who experienced some form of childhood trauma.
Here’s the nostalgic one:
It was this room, this house.
I still feel the warmth coming from its walls, and the affection and joy bouncing off of them. It was a cocoon from which a young man who was strong and ready emerged. I left this home with all the tools I would need for success, and I used them all.
My room. My house.
I wonder how the four of us lived in this place. Relative to my own size at the time, it is always much larger in my memory. In reality, the whole property could fit comfortably twice over in my current home.
Home. For us, this little collection of wood, glass, and brick was everything that word promised.
Fran left first, off to college and then marriage and a new home three states away. I was next, a few years later. I’m sure this place, which looks so small to me now, seemed quite large and empty to my parents after that.
And now they are gone, too.
Frannie and I talked about it; it’s best to let it go. It really is.
We came back and visited plenty over the years, making even more memories with our expanded family. We overlooked the fading paint, the dying lawn, the horribly outdated bathrooms, and everything else that needed attention, much the same way we overlooked the aging of Mom and Dad. Maybe overlooked is the wrong word. Accepted is better. We saw the changes, the obvious aging, and accepted it.
But neither of us would be moving back here — to this house or this town. The butterfly doesn’t return to the cocoon. Besides, the memories are ours forever, even if the house will not be.
It’s best to let it go, right?
I remember when that baseboard over there got all scuffed up after I decided to ride my tricycle in the house one rainy day. Dad threatened to make me spend the weekend painting all of the baseboards in the house before he realized it would only end up making more work for him. I used to wonder why he never painted over those marks — or had me do it when I was older. I understand now.
On that step down into the living room is where Frannie tripped and knocked out a baby tooth. I don’t really remember the blood or the screaming, but I remember Mom sitting on the step, rocking her and checking her mouth while Dad got the first aid kit. The Tooth Fairy gave her a little extra for that one, if I remember correctly.
Someone will come in here and repaint, remodel, maybe add on a room or two for their own kids, or maybe knock it all down and start fresh. It won’t be my room or my home any more, just theirs.
It’s best to let it go.
Here’s the not-so-nostalgic one:
It was this room, this house.
In spite of the space heater, it feels cold and damp to me, like the bottom of a deep, forgotten well. I can hear my own pain still echoing from these pitiless walls. The stink of my fear still drips from them like black egg yolk.
This room. This damn house.
How did three other people live here without stopping it? They knew, they had to know. And yet it went on for years. Missing years. Stolen years. I couldn’t wait to leave this madhouse and be rid of its deaf and dumb occupants forever.
Now it seems so small and insignificant.
He died young — which is the best thing I can say about him — and then I fled. I had no reason to stay here with my sister and mother, the indifferent witnesses. I didn’t so much leave this place as I did tumble out of it like a miscarriage from a diseased womb. How the hell I landed on my feet, I’ll never know.
I don’t know if I even have a sister any more. I shamelessly imagine her slowly rotting in some corner of a city where no one hears or sees her.
So they’re all gone now, and there’s no way I’m holding on to this shit hole.
It’s my first time back. Why would anyone return to a place like this? I came now only to prove that I vanquished it. I was viable after all, not inside these walls, but certainly outside of them.
I would read books and see movies in which the kids were loved and nurtured. That was never more than a fantasy for me. I thought it a million times more likely that a giant would knock down the front door and proclaim me a great wizard than ever have a home like that.
Home — ha! The word is blasphemous here.
I should let it go. All of it.
My bedroom was where I got the worst of it, but there’s not an unstained room here. That step into the living room was where I tripped as he chased me one night. I knew what was coming and ran as fast as I could, as if I had somewhere to go. The television was turned up loud to drown out the noises they knew were coming. My front tooth was knocked out from the fall. The blood flowed while the ten o’clock news anchor’s voice assaulted my ears, and something much worse assaulted the rest of me.
This place has no value to me. May the new owners level it, black yolk and all, down to the bare earth that will someday swallow me, and with me, the last nightmares of what was once here.
I would do it myself, but it’s best to let it go.