Deep beneath the Floor

It was 1990 in the downtrodden and dreary landscapes or rural Tennessee just outside of Nashville. My folks moved my two brothers and I during one of the most brutal winters we had ever seen. An ice storm had ravaged our homestead to the point of no return. We went weeks without power relying only on an old wood burning stove for warmth and a hot spot to cook over. We tried to brave the storm in hopes that the ice would release the stranglehold it placed on the powerlines. All the old apple trees we use to build treehouses in as tikes had fallen from the immense weight the ice had put on all the branches. The memories of eating early season sour apples got encased in newfound fear of the loss of the past and the uncertainty of our family's future. When I say we moved, I truly mean we scrambled to find family a few towns over that had been blessed enough to hang onto their electricity and who had at least a spare bedroom for all five of us to sleep in. My Aunt Cheryl was the only one willing to take on such a burden. After all she had always said, "family is family." So we packed up what few belongings and clothes we could fit into our old Toyota Corolla. As kids often are, I was almost oblivious to what we were actually going through. I tended to view most life changing events as an adventure. While my parents loaded up our important possessions and our family dog Max, I decided to take one last trip into our attic to see if there were any hidden treasures buried up there in the mounds of insulation and roof rafters. I often would venture into the attic for a quiet place to read or to imagine it was my own small home where I was already a husband tending to phantom children. Our home was built in the late 1800's of solid oak timber. When winds whipped on stormy nights the whole house creaked so loud it sounded like an ancient ship crossing the Atlantic on early American pilgrimages. As I swam through insulation as if it was waves my parents yelled for me to get into the car. It was time to set sail if we wanted to survive that winter. Before I descended the ladder to leave the attic for the last time, I tripped on an old rotted piece of ceiling panel. I had scoured nearly every inch of that attic during my adventures in the ten years since we moved there and I had never seen this crevice now exposed below the floorboards. I found a pile of dusty, aged newspapers from around the time the house was built. I was less interested in those as I was the mystery of what else might be hidden in the crevice. At the very bottom of the pile I found something wrapped tightly in an old quilt. This protective sheath struck my attention. It had to be something important if one of the former owners had taken the time to try and preserve it. I peeled back the layers like it was a Christmas gift I had begged for from my folks. When I finally exposed what I thought might be a brick by the weight of it, I discovered a decorative black notebook thicker than any bible I had ever seen. My folks began yelling for me to come to the car again. So before I could inspect this mysterious notebook further, I grabbed it and tossed it in my backpack with the rest of my important possessions along side my batman toys, baseball cards and favorite Spiderman pajamas. As my folks yelled again, I slid down our attic ladder like a frantic fireman headed for a housefire and jumped in the backseat of our car. I didn't mention my discovery to my brothers because they would've fought me for it. When we arrived at my Aunt Cheryl's, extremely grateful for the warmth and hospitality she showed us, I hid the notebook behind an antique trunk for safekeeping. Between my folks' financial struggles and the new neighborhood I had to explore, the notebook became buried in my young mind. It wasn't until my Aunt decided to sell her antique trunk to make ends meet that I resumed my curiosity for the notebook. A large thud occurred when my dad moved the trunk and if not for his struggle of grunting and instructing my older brother on how to lift it properly, they may have discovered my hidden treasure. I faked trying to help lift the trunk so I could hide what had caused the loud thud. I was only seven so my muscles really weren't helping but it was necessary to provide cover until I could retrieve and hide the notebook again. I decided to bury the notebook in a trash bag in the back yard to be rediscovered later if I was building a dirt road mini city with my Tonka trucks. Weeks passed and the snow and ice finally thawed. I was sure the melted snow had ruined my treasure, but much to my surprise, the trash bag and hard Tennessee dirt had preserved the notebook. It was meant to be. My Dr. Seuss books had began to lose their luster in my growing eyes, so I finally decided to open the notebook. It was a hand stitched notebook better than any Scholastic ringed notebook I had ever used in elementary school. I was very intrigued to see what someone had written in this treasure. Every night as my folks argued over their current life circumstances, I would retreat into the notebook. It was full of daily journals and random farming knowledge about plants and herding techniques. The varying information within kept me intrigued for months. I could hardly believe my family had already been staying with my Aunt Cheryl for almost an entire school year, but the notebook easily passed the time for my curious mind. We three kids started staying with random friends of the family after it became too much for my Aunt to deal with. My folks didn't say it, but my brothers and I began to realize that all the uncertainty and stress had my folks headed straight for a divorce. My dad would pick us up and take us to a movie or McDonald's once in a while. The burden of being out of work and practically homeless after the ice storm had taken it's toll. I knew that it might be the end of our family as it was. My folks had been married for almost twenty years so we knew they truly loved each other. It wasn't their lack of love that widened their divide, it was simply, Money. "The root of all evil," as my dad would always say. It got so bad that they even discussed putting us in a boys home for adoption. The worse it got, the more I disappeared into that magical black notebook. I feared that when the pages ended and had no more respite for me to escape to, the end of my family would eventually be real. The last few pages of the notebook were like a lifeline about to snap. My folks called my mom's best friend Audrey, where we had been bounced to, with what sounded like sad news judging from the tone of Audrey's voice as she listened to the call. I knew it in my bones. It was over. They were going to come over and break the harsh outcome of our yearlong struggle to my brothers and I. I couldn't bare it. I still had five more pages I had been saving to read on my worst days. I just kept thinking, if somehow I could help my folks or find a buried treasure I could ease their financial pain with, then I could save them. I could save us. I went to the room my brothers and I shared at Audrey's and began to read all that was left in the notebook. The final pages were detailed instructions on how to keep a garden growing. It was far too ironic given how my family seemed it was going to die. My brothers started mocking me for being a bookworm and they grabbed the notebook from me as I began to flip the final page. We all began a tug of war for the notebook that I wasn't going to lose without a fight. I pulled with all my might and as the notebook flew into the air, two sheets of what looked like loose paper came flying out. Both of my brothers began to claim the notebook, fighting amongst their selves. I just wanted to hang onto something from this notebook that had gotten me through such trying times. I grabbed the two loose papers and fled to the bathroom and locked the door behind me. I sat in the empty bathtub thinking everything was over. I'd lost my folks. They'd lost each other and possibly I'd never see any of them again. I flipped the loose pages over to reveal what was left of my treasured notebook. There were US Government emblems on the two pages. I'd never seen any documents like that before. I continued reading to see the words, "US SAVINGS BOND." I still had no clue what that meant. The numbers "$10,000" on each page I could process, but I'd only seen coins and single dollars as a seven year old, so I still wasn't sure what these two pages truly meant. Audrey knocked on the bathroom door to see if I was okay because I was in there for almost an hour trying to decipher what those pages meant. So I opened the bathroom door and handed her the papers in tears. The look on her face as she inspected the pages told me I had discovered something important, something even valuable perhaps. She rushed back to the phone and called my parents before they had left to break their bad news to us. Audrey frantically explained what I had found in my old black notebook. "Yes, I'm not lying Duane. Your son just found two $10,000 dollar US Savings Bonds from the late 1800's." My folks said they'd be right there and drove like lightning to verify my discovery. It was true. I had a treasure all along. The second my folks saw the savings bonds they began sobbing and hugging. There was hope. A miracle had happened. They apologized to each other with relentless affection and assured my brothers and I that everything was going to be alright. With the money from the savings bonds, they loaded us and our dog Max back into the old Corolla and started driving back to our old town. Their smiles didn't stop the entire trip. They just kept saying, "You guys are going to love it. Everything is going to be okay." We headed over the big hill all the town kids would sled down in the winter. On the other side of the hill was a modest farm house I was always curious about while playing in the nearby woods. It seemed like nobody had lived there in years but it was somehow still in great shape, like a time capsule. They pulled into the dusty, dirt driveway and turned the car off. They turned to us in the backseat and simply said, "We're home," with tears in their eyes. My brothers and I burst out of the old Corolla crying and started exploring what was now our new adventure. I wondered immediately what might be in the attic of this house. If not for my discovery of that black notebook at our old homestead, all might've been lost. Little did I know it, I had a treasure all along.