The first thing that most people notice when they enter this house—that is, of course, when people used to come here—is the darkness.
All the blinds and curtains are drawn. Despite the sunny day outside, inside our home it feels like the middle of the night. The only room where the curtains are always open is mine. I suppose it’s my own little form of rebellion.
It’s a way of saying that we didn’t all die that night six years ago. There’s a musty smell that comes from the windows not having been opened and that just contributes to the feeling that you’re walking through a mausoleum. I’d given up trying to throw open the curtains and open up the windows a while ago now.
There were a lot of things that I’d given up on a long time ago, and having anything resembling a normal life was one of them.
My mom hadn’t left the house since my father had died. She hadn’t even gone to the funeral. We had thought that she was in shock—that’s what the doctors had said anyway. That she was suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.
I remember asking the kindly but ultimately useless doctor if that wasn’t just something that soldiers got when they came home from places like Afghanistan. I remember that Doctor Moyes had been impressed at my knowledge. He had explained that sometimes the shock of something is so great it sends us somewhere else, and sometimes it can take a long time for us to find our way back. He told me that’s what had happened to my mother—that she was somewhere else, trying to find her way home to me.
I had clung to that hope the way a drowning man clings to a life-preserver for days—days that had turned into weeks, weeks that had turned into months, and months that had eventually turned into years that passed with no discernible change in my mother.
It was only recently that I’d finally begun to realize that Doctor Moyes had left out a vital piece of information when he’d explained the diagnosis to me. He hadn’t told me that the patient has to want to come back in order to find their way, and I don’t think that my mother has any inclination to rejoin the real world.
The world where her husband is dead and she’s living in a nightmarish town that seems like something out of Mad Max. I don’t blame her for wanting to check out of this place. If I were her I would probably figure that there wasn’t much of anything to come back for.
Except for me, I guess. Except for her daughter.
“Mom, I’m home,” I shout as I drop my keys onto the table by the door.
Silence is my only reply. This is no great surprise, I don’t even feel disappointed anymore, or at least I try not to. After all, it really is just a waste of time. I had only recently noticed that I stopped holding my breath as I walk into the house, hopeful that I would find my mother in the kitchen making up a batch of her famous cookies and that she would ask me about my day.
But that never happened, and there came a point when you had to stop expecting a miracle. It just made you feel like an idiot when it never came to pass.
I find her in the armchair where she’d pretty much taken up residence since dad had gone. She slept down in the lounge, presumably because she couldn’t bear to sleep in the bedroom that she had once shared with the love of her life.
Her once lush, thick, beautiful red hair that made her look like a force of nature is now thin, dirty, and flecked with grey. She had always been slim, but the slightness of her frame has turned into boniness.
She is a shadow of her former self, but when I think about her I still manage to remember the person that she used to be even if it’s getting harder and harder. She was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen, so full of life and love. She loved our family. She and my dad had been together since they were kids, and they used to say that they were soul mates and I had completed their family.
That’s what made it so hard when everything changed after dad died. It was like a piece of my mother died that day as well—the piece that made her who she was. All the neighbors and friends had pitched in to help when it became clear that my mother wasn’t able to cope.
They would bring food for dinner, make me hot chocolate, make sure that I did my homework, and that I had medicine when I was sick. All while my mother shrank further and further away from real life.
After a while, the well-meaning members of Painted Rock had slowly drifted away, leaving me alone with the woman that had once been my mother. Sally and Bill Summers were the only people that had stuck around for the duration.
I had become a pretty permanent fixture in their house, after all—it felt way more like a home than the old house did. I used to pray and pray, night after night, that my mom would come back to me. I don’t do that anymore. After years of unanswered prayers, I started to realize that God had left Painted Rock a long time ago and there was no sign that he ever planned to come back.
“Momma,” I say quietly, gently placing my hand on her shoulder, but she barely even reacts and just continues staring straight ahead of her, at the armchair that was my dad’s customary place. “Momma, I’ve gotta go back to work soon, but I’ll fix you something to eat first, okay? What are you hungry for?” I ask, trying to keep my voice as even and calm as I can.
I had learned the hard way that the slightest hint of tension or pressure would send her into a spin that would end up with her screaming and crying. The good Dr. Moyes has told me that her illness would “last as long as it lasted”. I hadn’t told him that the diagnosis wasn’t a lot of comfort to a fourteen-year-old girl who was now essentially alone in the world.
“Momma?” I ask again, giving her a little nudge to make sure she knows that I’m there.
“Hmmm,” is the only reply I get as she breathes out and the rattle in her chest sounds like a creaky door. I wonder when the last time she’d had any water was—probably early this morning, when I’d managed to get her to take a few sips before I’d left for work.
“How you feeling today Mom?” I ask, walking around the chair to look at her. Although our eyes meet it’s like she isn’t really there, not in any way that counts.
There’s no response and I try to remind myself that there’s no point in feeling disappointed, that it didn’t make sense to expect something would suddenly change as if by magic after so long. “It’s Jake’s birthday soon—you remember Jake Summers?” I ask, kneeling down beside her and holding her dry, scrawny hand in mind.
She doesn’t reply or make any sign that she has the first clue of what I’m talking about. I’d been doing this since the beginning, since her phases of hysteria had stopped and she had lapsed into this state of near coma. I would come home and tell her about my day, talk about the funny things that had happened in class, or the A that I had gotten for my science project.
Of course, she never replied, never laughed at the joke I would tell, or congratulate me on my academic achievements. But even so, it was nice to tell her about it all. It was nice for me to be able to share things with her, even if she didn’t know that’s what was going on.
“There’s so much happening,” I say to her in nothing more than a whisper. “There’s so much I want to talk to you about. Everything is changing, Mom, and I need you.” I try to keep the tearfulness out of my voice.
When there’s no response, I stay there for a few more minutes, wishing that I could feel the comfort I so desperately need from her, but sitting here with someone who isn’t really there just makes me feel even more alone and lost than I already do.
“I’ll go fix you something to eat,” I finally say, and wander into the kitchen, squeezing my eyes shut against the feeling of loneliness that is threatening to overtake me.