“Look at this, they’re selling my old house!”
“Oh. Yeah, that sign’s been there for months now.”
She stares at me like I just asked her to solve a math problem.
“What? Months?”
“Yeah.”
Jessie continues to stare at me. I shrug in reply. The truth is that I drive past this place all the time. The house definitely holds some memories, but it’s hard to be sentimental about something when you’ve worked so hard to bury your past.
“Well why is it still for sale? Doesn’t anybody want it?”
Jessie spins around to look at it, as if reminding herself. It’s still a nice place, with a welcoming front porch, but the blue paint is peeling, the windows are boarded up, and the white flower boxes at the windows are overgrown with dead plants. It was one of those homes built for families who eat around the dinner table together and spend most of their time out in the yard, tossing a football or planting things in the mulch. Now, amid this built-up neighborhood of cookie-cutter McMansions, it’s just an eyesore.
“Look at it, Jessie. The place is falling apart. If anything, someone’s going to buy the property and then tear the house down so they can build a new one.”
Once upon a time the house seemed like it would stand forever, as much of a guardian as Jessie’s parents, but to look at it now, it’s hard to believe this is the same place the three of us would go on scavenger hunts or hang out in the treehouse, or just hole up and play board games on rainy days, gazing out the window at passing cars as we waited to make our move.
“How can you say that?!” Jessie shouts indignantly. “This place was my home! I thought you loved it as much as I did!”
“I did. But it’s only me and you – and probably Kyle – who feel that way. About all it’s good enough to play home to now is memories. Even your parents moved out the second they could.”
I shrug and start walking back to the car as Jessie casts one last, longing look at the weather-beaten wood siding.
Once she joins me in the car, I start to feel the tightening in my chest again. I rev the engine and drive down the road, and a few blocks away I reach the driveway of my father’s house, and slowly guide the car between the tall iron gates. As if sensing my increasing anxiety Jessie asks, “How are you feeling?”
“Like I’d prefer this to be a funeral rather than a birthday party.”
“Nate! Don’t say things like that! That’s awful!”
The mansion creeps slowly into full view, already surrounded by various oversized and overpriced cars, guests already shouting and talking loudly around it.
“Awful or not, it’s the truth.”
The foreground of the mansion is about as big as a parking lot – and just as full of vehicles. I ease my car into the nearest available space, a full forty yards from the front door. I kill the engine, grip the wheel tightly, and focus my vision on the horn, psyching myself up.
“So what’s the plan?” Jessie asks gently.
I nod a little at the question.
“We go in, and we look for either my father or my mother, whoever we find first,” I say, with the severity of someone planning a bank heist. “We don’t have to worry about my cousins or step-siblings – I’m sure they’ll notice me. I’ll have a conversation with both of them, which will probably end in an argument, and then we’ll get as far the fuck away from here as possible.” My mind whirls with ugly memories, old hurts – triggering what feels like PTSD. I don’t know whether to laugh at it all, start breaking shit, or just run.
“Okay…Nate, why are you breathing so heavily?”
“I’m not…what? I’m fine…”
“Seriously, are you alright?”
“Yeah.”
Jessie puts a hand on my shoulder and I jump a little.
“Shit, Nate. You don’t look alright. You’re about as tense as someone on trial.”
“My family is the worst kind of trial.”
“You’re going to be fine, alright? Come on.”
Jessie opens the car door and stops the second she notices I don’t do the same, shutting it again and turning to me. I look over at her, trying not to look so anxious, but the sympathetic expression she pulls tells me I’ve failed.
“Actually, you know what? You really don’t have to do this if you don’t want to. We can just leave if you want,” she says softly, pressing a hand gently on my forearm.
“That would make things even worse,” I mumble at the dashboard.
“Nate, look at me.”