This House is Ours, Chapter 4 (Patreon)

(Table of Contents)

Chapter 4.

Sometimes, Simon and I can hear them. Our uncle Frank, our grandmother, visitors we don't even know, standing outside our mother's door. They all say the same words. You have to pull it together. You have to come back to us. You have to eat. You have to bathe. You have to be a person again. For your children.

They need you.

They lost their father.

All they have left is you.

They're wrong. We lost our father, yes. But she lost more. Why won't they let her grieve. Why are they using us against her? I am not someone else's weapon. I am not a chain around my mother's ankle.

But then one night, after the rest had gone, our uncle Jonah's voice stayed in the hallway, quieter than the others had been. We had to open our door to hear what he was saying. To see him. He was leaning against the wall beside our mother's room.

"I could not live without Frank," he said. His Haitian accent, his warm voice, his sincerity, it all felt quieter when he spoke slowly. "I could not and I would not live without him. Kids or not. Friends and family or not." He slid down, so he was sitting on the carpet.

"You don't have to come out," he said. "You don't have to come out for the world to keep going. You don't have to come out for your children to be okay. You don't have to eat for your children to be okay. You don't have to be a person again. You don't have to take a bath. They are safe. Frank would die for them. You know that. If you go away…" He stopped. "I know what it's like to feel empty and alone when there are people all around you."

"People always say they can't imagine what you're going through. But of course they can imagine it. They just don't want to. They want everything to be alright again."

Frank coughed in their bedroom, but Jonah didn't even look up.

"Nothing will ever be alright again," he said.

There was a long pause.

"Maybe a bath isn't the worst idea though."

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