SWNOVELS Chapter Memory Lane
I’ve walked up and down this end of the street and can’t find a single spot to stand and discreetly watch. Except the house that’s directly across the street from my childhood home. It seems like the best option, but it’s vacant and my presence, like the former tenants, may raise suspicion. Though, at this point in time the house has been empty for a while.
The property across the street from where I grew up used to belong to a man named Mr. Smith. He never used his first name when he introduced himself. The running neighborhood joke was that Mister was his first name. He was a strange guy. My friends and I were convinced he was a secret government agent. He was single and lived alone in a three-bedroom house, which made him a source of gossip. His place looked exactly like the one I grew up in across the street, except the exterior color was different. Mine was white with blue trim and his was—is—two-tone brown. He lived in that place as long as I can remember, always alone. He barely spoke to anyone and nobody ever came to visit. Not even on Holidays. Every single time I saw him he was wearing a suit and tie, sunglasses—no matter how gloomy the sky was—and always carrying a beat up briefcase. He didn’t have a car so he walked everywhere though I never saw him out around town. He left the house everyday at seven-thirty in the morning, even on Sundays.
Once, me and a couple friends followed him, even though it made us late for school. We saw him walk past several bus stops until he reached one over a mile away. About five minutes after he arrived, a plain white Sedan picked him up. We were worked up over that one the whole summer after sixth grade. Even after he moved, we still kept a close eye on his place.
I’m staring at his house, with the same row of shrubs in front. Since it’s been vacant, they’ve grown up over the sides of the porch. The spot’s not as inconspicuous as I would like but it does offer the clearest view. From my place on the porch I can look out at the large front window of the house where I grew up. I wonder what the people inside are doing right now.
Off to one side of the opposing driveway, separated from the house by a gated walkway that leads to the backyard, is the dilapidated out building. Technically it was my dad’s detached garage, but he never used it as one. My dad disabled the rolling door in front because the perpendicular angle to the driveway made it difficult to get the cars in and out.
Staring at the bright blue and silver tarps spread out over the leaky roof, I recall how he and my mother used to fight over how much money he spent on home improvement stuff because he never finished any job he started. He owned nearly every power tool known to mankind.
Once upon a time Dad decided to take up painting. Since he went balls-out in all of his pursuits, he invested in hundreds of dollars worth of supplies in the beginning. During the first few months he was obsessed with that public access show, the one where the guy with the afro and beard teaches you how to paint. Dad actually got pretty good with landscapes. One day he ran out of canvas and started painting on circular saw blades. Soon enough, the paints dried up along with his passion and everything ended up inside the garage—storage space for old toys. I bet there were dozens of snowy country sides and spring colored blades scattered throughout when the bank seized the house.
My house. The only home my father ever owned. Not long after my sister’s accident, Mom left and the loss of income forced us to move. Life happened in apartments after that. After a while, I forgot what it was like to have souvenirs and a yard.
The last house on the left side of the dead end street is set next to a giant fourteen foot cinderblock wall, a partition between the back yards of these last two houses on either side of my street and a shopping center where the empty field used to be. We used to ride our bikes through it, make ramps and stuff to jump over. It was a lot of fun. The city literally took paradise and put up a parking lot. What was once a frequently used loop that served as a shortcut through the neighborhood became a blind alley.
It was supposed to be a good thing, supposed to improve property value, but my mother, who was a Realtor, objected along with most residents in the subdivision. What we actually got were a lot of people using the cages around my mother’s tomato plants as foot holds to climb the cinderblock wall and the use of our driveway as the preferable spot for u-turns since the one and only sign posted by the city, about three blocks up the winding road, is currently obscured by a weeping willow tree that the same city has neglected to have trimmed.
After Carrie’s accident, they put in speed bumps. I cringe at the reminder and look away from the white and blue aluminum siding.
An aged boat makes its’ way up the street. The sight has me caught in a fit of reluctant delight. From behind the shrubs, I watch the opposite driveway as it disappears beneath the body of my mother’s black El Dorado. The engine sputters to a stop. Wearing the same dark business attire I remember so well—an essential part of my childhood memories—my mother hops out. Her straight sandy hair, cut in the same style as Carrie’s, sways with the breeze.
I lean to one side, hoping to be obscured by enough of the foliage to escape the notice of eagle-eyed Mary as she accompanies my little sister down the front steps. Carrie runs straight to her mother, stretching her arms up over her head, lips forming her favorite word, mommy. I can’t hear her angel voice, but I know what she wants. My mother lifts her from the ground, kissing both round cheeks in gratuitous welcome while Mary goes straight to the trunk to retrieve the grocery bags. They divvy up the spoils and walk inside, giggling together as they often did, and musing at Carrie’s comic struggle with a multi-pack of paper towels.
When my family goes inside, the laughter disappears. It’s replaced by the distinct feeling of a taut string pulling mercilessly at my insides. The farther they go, the tighter it pulls. Its’ grip cuts through my flesh until the urge to follow, to lay eyes on them one more time, is so strong I think it might turn me inside out.
But I’ve got to wait. The moment has to be just right or I might end up back in jail.
After what seems like hours, the babysitter finally leaves. I watch her wave goodbye from the doorway and march down the front steps. She adjusts her mini-backpack before starting down the street, passing two houses before turning at the first corner to head for home.
I bound from the stoop, following my hearts’ string across the darkening road. Just as I step onto the sidewalk, a light comes on. Since missions of a spying nature are supposed to be covert, I jump into the thick row of Azaleas lining the front gate. From the safety of my cover I notice the thick beam of light is actually coming from a street lamp.
Once I’m sure all of the leaves are out of my clothes and back pack, I make my silent way over the short front gate and into the side yard. The fig trees are young again, still planted in faded blue barrels beside the porch. In the deep evening shade, the white curtains in the window behind the trees help to make out the familiar shapes of the plump, purple fruit. Soft to the touch, they’re very ripe. I pick some as I pass, following the long side of the house, stalking low beneath the windows with open curtains.
Home was shaped like a giant rectangle and before long I’m at the back corner. Here everything is always dark no matter the time of day. What’s left of the daylight is blocked by the long brick wall whose edge stands high above the fence line. But here in the back, the two enormous apple trees make the shade. The grass under them is so sparse that the slightest bit of rain turns the ground into mud.
As I’m slogging through the muck another light clicks on. This time it’s from inside. I duck beneath the high-framed window just as the curtains to my old bedroom are thrown back. A scraping plunk tells me the window has just been opened. Once the shadow moves from the sill, all I want to do is look inside. The idea has me practically panicking with curiosity.
How much harm could a quick peep do?
Will I know me? What does it mean if I do?
What if I don’t?
Would I call the cops on me? Could I do that to myself?
Probably. But maybe younger me would know who I am looking at.
My dubious deliberations are cut short by unbridled need as I slowly stretch up.
The first glimpse reveals nothing that makes me think there’s an eminent threat, so I continue raising my head, straightening until I am completely upright and looking through my old bedroom window.
My so-called quick glance becomes a full-on gawk as everything I ever thought I knew about myself is shattered.
They say—I have said it myself on several occasions—that hindsight is 20/20. But standing here, virtually face to face with my younger self, me at sixteen, all I can say is hindsight needs glasses.
My pride is crushed staring at this boy wearing baggy green pants with an oversized, bright blue Cross Colors hoodie. I, I mean him—he has a patch of acne across his forehead which could be easily hidden by his horrible hair if it weren’t styled up into a short pomp. He stares into the mirror on top of the dresser practicing bad dance moves I haven’t seen since the eighth grade. The whole scene is reminiscent of a poor Vanilla Ice imitation.
Without thinking, my own hand comes up to feel the smooth skin of my forehead. Examining his ridiculous outfit all I can think is, I must not have discovered flannel yet. I try to imagine him, me, in something more contemporary and still look nothing like what I expected. I always thought I was a pretty good dancer but this kids’ off-beat kicks, the thrusting and flailing around like he’s being electrocuted—embarrassment turns my face red hot and I have to look away.
There’s nothing else to do but chalk up the discrepancies to projected feelings of self-loathing and carry on. I didn’t come here to pick myself apart, I came to see her.
At the next corner, lights from the shopping center parking lot pour over the wall just behind our fence, casting a brighter path to follow. I can see the unfinished tree house high in the giant maple in the far corner of the back yard. Not far from that is Carrie’s metal swing set.
A thin beam of light stretches across the back porch. A beam that I’m ninety-nine percent sure was not there a second ago. Instinctively I step to the base of the great tree, sinking into deeper shadow. My heart sputters and picks up as the beam grows wider, brighter, until it extends the length of the cement.
A dark figure emerges from the lighted doorway, driving me into a pile of weather-beaten two by fours hidden in the black beneath the shade tree. The tip of my shoe catches the corner of a short board and flips it. Noise rips through the quiet like thunder.
My mother is standing in the doorway. The line of her figure is traced in light as she steps out of the house and onto the porch, wiping her hands on a dishtowel. My heart stops as she peers into the dark. Right. At. Me.
“Gerry?” She calls, “What are you doing?”
I need to run. Far, far away. But my feet won’t budge.
She steps closer to the edge of the porch, calling out again, and my mind scrambles. What made me think I could do this? Good or bad, there’s no way to explain.
I’m trying to calculate whether the wooden planks nailed to the tree trunk are strong enough to hold me, when I’m unnerved by the sound of another voice.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
The quality is rough and full of force, though still a murmur, and coming from a different direction. Off to one side. A long shape reaches out from the black and grabs the front of my shirt, twisting it around a clenched fist and jerking me from under the shade tree, into the mud-covered ground beneath the apple trees.
“Gerry, I know you’re home. I see your car on the driveway!” My mother calls from the back porch.
“Shut up and play along.” The hoarse whisper comes from above the fist in the same quiet reprimand. He moves away and speaks, this time in a soothing tone. “I’m right back here, honey.” He steps over, toward the corner of the house. With the free hand, he waves one arm into the light. “I’m just talking with an old friend of mine. I’ll be inside in a minute.”
“Is he staying for dinner?” Her voice carries, sounding much closer than before.
He takes another step away, pressing himself against the corner of the house to peek around it. His hand, still crumpling my shirt, presses me against the outside wall, forcing me to hide behind him.
“I’ll ask,” there’s a pause while they whisper. “I don’t know. I haven’t seen him in a long time and I didn’t know he was coming.” His voice pauses. “Okay, I will. What are we having?”
“Spaghetti.”
I hear light footfalls as she walks away.
He relaxes against the side of the house, loosening his grip. When he turns, his face in the dim becomes visible from a back light that suddenly switches on. I look up at the lamp, deliberating on the simple act of my mother turning on the outside light. It feels like a small thing, this little courtesy given to someone you share your life with, but it also feels kind of big. It’s been so long since I’ve been in a room with my mother; I’ve forgotten what she was like.
Everything in this place feels so real, I forget it isn’t. That is, until something like looking into the face of the man beside me happens, then this place becomes so bizarre, I have to believe I’m dreaming to keep from losing my mind.
The image before me is like something out of an old memory I never knew I had. That is how I must treat it, like the living, breathing embodiment of the long forgotten moments only known to my subconscious mind. Like living déjà vu or walking inside a photograph. Because if I were to actually believe that I am standing here, staring into the face of my aged father who is at this very moment in his mid-forties, I would have to demand a straight jacket and check myself back into the loony bin.
“What are you doing here?” His voice is like his face, softer and younger.
“I don’t know.” I shake my head.
“How do I look?” He steps back, looking up into the light and spreading his arms.
I feel my jaw go slack. The bald head I’m so used to seeing is no longer thinned with age, but covered with thick, wavy, brown hair. There are only traces of gray around the temples. His shoulders are higher, younger, and upright with the vigor I remember. He looks strong. His skin is free of liver spots, bearing only laugh lines. His eyes, set beneath a neat brow, hold the same unyielding look they always did, except the expression appears more curious that heated.
I tug at my rumpled dress shirt, smoothing out the wrinkles his fist left behind.
He waves me forward after a cautious look around. “Step into the light.”
Obedience is automatic. I move just as if my father were really speaking to me. As I step into the lighted area he’s designated, lifting my face the same way he did, my young father moves closer to inspect me.
“Well, damn! It really is you! Don’t get upset, I remember what you said, but . . .” His brow creases.
“You know me.”
“Of course. Nothing could make me forget.” A million questions spring up as he raises a pointed finger. “Now’s not the time. Not with the family around.”
It stands to reason that I would make some type of subconscious mental preparation to receive myself. Doesn’t it? I nod, “alright then. What now?”
He stares in puzzled meditation. After a moment, he slaps me on the shoulder. “Are you hungry?”
I’m overwhelmed by the very idea—a dinner invitation—but I’m also starving. I haven’t had a bite since breakfast—bland prison food served to me in my holding cell before my hearing this morning.
I grin like an idiot, following him through the yard. Past the swing set, the small jogging trampoline I missed on my first inspection, and then up the steps to the white, aluminum paneled back door.
He pauses on the top step and looks back to me with wide, seemingly worried eyes. “He hasn’t found us has he? Is that why you’re here?”
“No,” I answer, though I have no clue what he’s talking about.
“They don’t know. So keep it quiet.” He turns the doorknob and stops again. “And don’t swear in front of the kids.”
“Got it.” My head nods in anxious agreement.
An invitation to dinner.
The experience I was so desperately avoiding feels like an adventure now that he’s here, leading the way. Beyond the doorway is a completely different world. Outside, I am a spectator. In there, I’ll be a participant.
Pausing on a deep breath, I shake off the strange feeling that I’m doing something wrong. And then step over the threshold.