Changing the Narrative

I never thought I’d find myself back here.

Even now, the weight of the past, of memories I’d known to be long gone, live on in the subtle creaking of the front porch as I pass the threshold into this tall walled fortress. Though lifetimes had come and gone, with children born and bonds anew, it was impossible to miss the still sameness of the entrance hall. It had always been empty, a show of space, of status for one who didn’t need to use it.

As I look around, I notice the thin layer of dust, lightly coating the floorboards and dangling chandelier of this previously immaculate room, but even dust does not shield me from the times before. In the distance, I hear it, a scream, a thwack, and thud. I see my mother on the ground, my father looming over her, and the child rushing in to see it all. I shake it off. That’s not why I’m here. I have moved on and can find a kind of closure in the happier moments.

It’s funny the things you remember when given even the slightest prompt.

Making my way up the stairs, I know just what to look for; the tiny mark of blood on the wall, never noticed by the adults of the time. Even after all these years, it stretches a smile across my face. It belonged to my uncle, smeared there on the New Years night he had thought it prudent to take my scooter to the stairs. I got a hiding in the morning for its banged up state, I had only received it for Christmas after all, but the way he flew as he cleared those top stairs and the tumble that followed…I won’t lie, it was hysterical. Thank goodness he got out of it without taking too much damage. A thin cut on the forehead, and graze on the arm, are acceptable injuries for one of our parties.

Moving out towards the balcony, a flood of fond memories fills my mind: singing in protest for the endangered koalas at age 9, diving from the balcony into the pool at age 11, and the tawny barn owl who made this house its home for the years we were there after. These are the things I returned for. These are the things I need to do what has to be done. After all, how can you write a eulogy when all that exists is pain or neutrality?

Now, all I need is a more targeted approach. If I can focus, if I can find the right room, surely, I will find some memories worth sharing with a crowd of those who loved him dearly. Those who didn’t know about the broken bones or the days my brothers stayed home from school, for their bodies were black and blue. Those who didn’t know about his benders, or about the small girl who tried to carry him inside as he sobbed into his own vomit on the backyard lawn. Those who didn’t know he left for weeks at a time after our mother died, leaving me to be the parent of my younger siblings and try helplessly to calm their rage. Or perhaps those who knew but didn’t want to know. Looking back now, I think they were more common.

Again, that’s not why I’m here. I’m here for the good times, the fleeting moments of brightness in the darkened world of my youth. Desperately, I shuffle from room to room, struggling to find those sparkling gems that he too was a part of. Everywhere I go, it seems, those memories were of us alone, the children of the house.

I let my head fall into my hands as I slump down onto the waning steps, returned to the porch once more. Everyone is counting on me to give this man a good send off, but the emptiness only grows. Any warmth this place brings to me is only for my brothers and he hurt them, tormented them over and over again, to the point they believed it was normal. They are counting on me too, but not to share in their pains of the past. They are counting on me to share in their mourning, or at least put on a damn good show of it. So, what can I do?

I look up to stare across the front lawn and see, again, my uncle in my mind’s eye, teaching me how to box. The vision shifts to my grandfather, holding my hand as I step into the limo as I head out for my senior formal, then again, and again, as memories of so many others play out in front of me.

I know…I know now. I’ll change the narrative. I revisit those bright, warm memories and I bring him into the fold. I put his face where it doesn’t belong. I bring him into the narrative. No one remembers every moment, and I can only hope those who are already gone don’t judge me for it.