“What happened?” I asked, watching her sop up the spill.
She squeezed out a waterfall into the bucket, thrust her mop at the floor as if it had caused the mess, then with a fixed smile replied, “It’s just a little water.”
I edged past her to peer inside the tub. A towel was stuffed down the drain, so far that we had to call a plumber to get it out. Apparently, my father had had a disagreement with the man taking up residency there.
After the plumber left, I showed the towel to my mother.
“I wonder how that happened,” was her reply, with a forced expression of vacant surprise.
Business as usual.
Deny, deny, deny.
It was more of the same when we started finding our family photos turned facedown in the living room. In robotic fashion, my mother would set them back up. After finding the pictures flipped over again, she’d simply start the process all over. But while she did her level best not to show it, I could see the cracks beginning to form, her facade of normalcy breaking down.
One evening while setting the dinner table, I looked inside the silverware drawer, then at my mother. “Where are the knives?”
“In the dishwasher, dear,” she replied, not bothering to spare me a glance. “Where they always are when they’re dirty and someone forgets to run the machine.”
I opened the door, looked inside, looked back at her. “Not there, either.”
She walked over and checked the washer herself. “Then they must all be upstairs where you left them. Even though I’ve asked you not to bring food to your bedroom.”
“But I don’t—”
“Because everything always piles up there.” She flashed the smile of a cynic. “Honestly, Christopher, did you actually believe they’d just get up and walk their way back here?”
Not once had I ever brought food to my room. Not that it mattered. Reality wasn’t up for discussion in our home.
Case in point: for dinner the next evening, she simply ordered out for pizza.
Problem solved.
At least in her mind.
The next day, my mother went for a different strategy, sending me into the basement to retrieve the fancy wedding silverware stored there. I flicked on the switch, looked at my father’s workshop corner, and stopped in my tracks.
Intricately woven into a mangled tower of metal were all the missing kitchen knives, points protruding in every direction and at every angle, a series of colored wires looping in and out between them. And at the very top, a large serving knife aimed directly at me.
It was the strangest thing I’d ever seen.
I edged closer and found pages and pages of notes, drawings, and diagrams—all in my father’s haphazard handwriting. Blueprints for his metal monstrosity. Barely legible maps of our house with arrows pointing to every door and window. Some kind of bizarre and frightening electrical device he’d apparently designed with steel clamps and sharp teeth.
“Take it down.”
I wheeled around and found my mother standing at the bottom of the staircase, her expression so sober that I barely recognized it.
“I said, take it down.” She pointed to a pail in the corner. “And when you’re done, bring the silverware upstairs to the dishwasher.”
Then she marched up the steps, hard and fast footfalls speaking what she would never dare say.
A day later, when I tried to bring up my concerns, she said, “It didn’t happen.”
“But you saw it.”
“I didn’t, and neither did you. End of story.”
And just like that, with a wave of her wand, she made reality vanish.
But this was one rabbit that wasn’t going to stay put. Mom had at last met her match. My father’s insanity was gaining frightening momentum, and it was about to blow down the walls.
Both hers and the ones around us.
25
I wake up in a chair.
Wait. What chair?
I look around.
The family room?
I rub my bleary eyes, try to find a sense of balance—or something like it.
An infomercial plays on the TV, hawking a contraption that promises to shed ten pounds in ten days. Looks more like a medieval torture device.
My sleepy fog lifts, but beneath it I find only another layer of wavering disarray. Moments ago, I was walking into my son’s room, but I’ve got no memory of what occurred after, no idea how I ended up here. Or is it actually a memory? Did the trip to my son’s room even happen?
I don’t know . . . I just don’t know . . .
My headache is raging.
I check the clock.
Wait. Moments ago?
It’s after midnight. Not only don’t I know how I got here, I also have no idea where the last several hours have gone.
Losing track of time is a problem. Drastic mood shifts are a problem. Violent and uncharacteristic outbursts . . . those aren’t so great, either. Any one of these symptoms on its own would be cause for worry, but combined— That sleep of death, Christopher.
I startle, spin, and look around. Then I realize I’m now standing in the center of the room. I don’t remember getting here. Another problem, but right now I’m more concerned about the voice I just heard inside my head. While it seemed so real, I know it wasn’t.
My mind is getting worse.
I lean forward, bury my face in my hands, and search for clarity in a place where there seems to be none. Adam said I was fine, but what if I’ve suffered a potentially serious brain injury? If that’s the case, I’m now at a significantly higher risk for secondary trauma, the effects of which could be even more serious. I can’t afford that. Ultimately, these symptoms could affect my ability to work, and then I’ll really be in trouble.
Now, there’s this voice I keep hearing, which could point to another possibility—one far worse.
It can’t be that. It will not be.
I refuse to surrender to my past. To my father’s past. I’ve made it this far, fought for years to recover from the damage his mental illness caused me. I’ll be damned if I’m going to let him win now.