Heartbreak On The Welcome Mat

The wind chime hung from the roof of the abandoned house , it swayed calmly and slowly against the wind , everything seemed peaceful . We - my father and I - sat on the porch of the rundown house that only we knew about . It was dark and I wasn’t the biggest fan of the night , the night is unpredictable but yet so beautiful .

As I looked up, the sky was dark the sidewalk illuminated by the streetlights. The sound of crickets and cars echoing through my ears. I walked home that night, tears in my eyes. I was leaving, I couldn’t handle it anymore. The meds, doctors, psychiatrists nothing was working, our lives were in constant danger. By the time I got home the car was gone. By the time, I finished packing it was dawn. The sun creeping in through the shutters. For the next couple of days, I crashed at Jason’s before I headed South. I heard my cell ringing, it was mom… I let it go to voicemail.

“Wow, she's talkative, you got a good one this time, cuz.” His voice was grinding on me and all I wanted to do was smack him.

“Next time you should shut your mouth until you know some actual information,” the mother said from across the street obviously mad by what I said.

“I'm sorry to inform you that your parents were in a car accident,” the man stated, the words rolling off his tongue.

Through the angle in the screen door I saw my father who had been walking into his room wheel around on one of his rubber-booted heels and look at her with his blue eyes flashing like clearest ice beneath the snow that was his hair. His usually ruddy face was drawn and grey, reflecting the exhaustion of a man of sixty-five who had been working in those rubber boots for eleven hours on an August day, and for a fleeting moment I wondered what I would do if he killed my mother while I stood there in the porch with those three foolish mackerel in my hand. Then he turned and went into his room and the radio blared forth the next day’s weather forecast and I retreated under the noise and returned again,

I heard a feminine voice call out to me as I blazed out the front door. "Good morning Amber! Oh, where are you--" I cut her off with a sharp slam. I couldn't look back. With each step towards my car, I inhale painful sobs of air. I feel as if I don't know who I am, as if I was that 18 year old girl hearing the news of his death for the first time. I couldn't think of the name that belongs to me, or any one else but my father. Any face my subconscious offers had the resonance of a total stranger, then was replaced with the haunting image of

I wake to a knock at my door. I open my eyes and startle. I'm in an unfamiliar room. Where am I? Suddenly, a million devastating memories flow through my mind at once. There's blood, and tears, and anger. I'm pulled from my mind by my Aunt Julia's voice, "It's happenin' again, ain't it dear?" she asked, her southern drawl more apparent than usual.

The month of June came in a rush. Before I knew it the season of senior activities had begun; prom arrived, our senior picnic at the park happened, and graduation practice was held. Yet none of these events could compete with graduation day. The night before June 14th, the excitement of the approaching event continuously nibbled at precious hours of sleep, and for once I couldn’t wait for my alarm to go off. When it finally did, I jumped up out of bed, all ready to start the day. After the time spent to get dressed in the appropriate attire had passed, those who I live with—my mother, brother, and younger sister—had all been ready. My excitement increased then, but I don’t think it surpassed my mother’s own excitement. Practically shoving me into the car to get me on the way to graduation, my mother and I wore a grin the whole way to the Siegel Center, despite my little sister asking a million questions in the backseat, and despite the traffic that had grown with the other graduates trailing behind. With even

In a moment of insanity, in a single second, in a single mistake, a decision that you make in a moment could all change the course of the next few months of your life. I was in my car, my tears fogging up the window of my mom’s blue Honda Pilot, the tension clogging up the air. I can feel my sweat and tears dripping down my face, more tears than I have had in awhile. It feels different. I began to wonder why the tears came down this much. The only thing I could hear was the faint radio, which my mom had turned down, my face is pressed against that window looking into the distance, hoping for a miracle. I could see the sadness of my mom’s eyes looking back at me every few seconds. Those seconds ticking into minutes, all of them in which

“I have no idea what i did to get you to act this way towards me but i am part of this family and damn you will listen to me.”

“Father I understand it’s just that I’m disappointed in you, just how could you do that to me” I said,

Patty awoke to the sound of her alarm clocking going off. She reached her arm out from under the covers and hit the snooze button. For a brief moment, in between sleep and waking. For a moment she almost forgotten that her father was murdered, that she would never be able t see him, touch him or hear his laugh again. All her troubles seemed so far away, like the where some part of a bad dream that her mind was forcing her to remember. Only it wasn’t one, it was her life now, the more she stirred under the sheets the more it sunk in. She had to live with the fact that her father was murdered, and he was never coming back. Just because he was gone didn’t mean she couldn’t do everything within her power to bring the men responsible to justice. She wiggled her way out from under the sheets, her hair a matted mess. She blew at a few strands of hair that fell in her face, they danced slowly within her breath before falling back to her face. She rolled her eyes, it was to early in the morning to worry about her hair.

After a cup of bold Italian espresso and in the later hours of Sunday morning, our neighbor came from across the street and tentatively knocked on our door. Without saying good morning she launched in, “I was upstairs in my son’s room, putting away his laundry at about 9:15 when I heard a crash. I looked out the window and noticed something going in your kitchen. I was worried. Is everyone all right?” Still foggy, I invited her in and began to recount the previous day’s chaotic series of events.

The freezing wind turned my tears into ice and gave my hands frost bites it seemed to be shoving me, as I walked home I held my arm in front of my face desperately trying to shield the wind luging my notebook in my other arm. If I knew the weather would be this bad I would have asked Ely for a ride but I need time alone. Another tear dropped down and I choked down a sob thinking of the conversation I had over the phone earlier; ¨Hi…sweetie¨ my mom had started ¨I should not tell you this over the phone but… ¨ she paused for a while before continuing ¨I thought you should no right away… ¨ she had tried to explain another pause happened ¨Fea´s gone¨ the phone slipped out of my hand and crashed on to the floor. Everyone in the art studio heads turned towards the sound Mr. Bean asked me if I was ok but my body refused to work I just stood there in the same spot motionless. As I turned the corner I could see my house I ran to the doorstep stomping the snow of my feet before running into my room and landing on my bed with a thump.