Momma Says (part 3)
Momma says they found this home when I was still in her tummy. I was almost ready to come out, and they needed somewhere safe, somewhere that could keep a family safe. Wandering was too dangerous. The sickness lingered, and the mean people were everywhere, waiting for a chance to take.
Dad wanted a farm, a place where he could work the land and know there was food coming in. Momma wanted safety first, thick walls, hidden corners, and no neighbors for miles. They both got what they wished for when they found this house. No one was living here anymore, just a couple of mean people who thought it was theirs. Dad and Momma sent them away. They never say exactly how, but when they look at each other after telling that part, their eyes go quiet.
The house was everything they dreamed of, isolated. self-sufficient, and big enough for us to grow inside without being seen.
Momma always pulls me close when she tells me I was born in the living room, right over there, in the soft light of a lantern. “You were perfect,” she says, pressing her nose to mine. “The first perfect thing in a broken world.” She says it was the happiest moment of her life, though her voice always cracks a little when she does.
Dad didn’t smile much back then, or hold me, she says. He was too busy keeping watch. He covered every window with boards so thick no light could escape. For the first months of my life, he sat at the door every night with his hands wrapped around a weapon, listening to the silence. Momma says a baby’s cry is like a bell, ringing out into the emptiness, calling all the mean people closer, and the mean people especially like children.
When Walt was born, everything tightened again. Momma, Walt, and I lived mostly upstairs. Dad built gates at the top and bottom of the stairs, thick wooden barriers, “just in case,” he said. I didn’t ask what “just in case” meant, but I think I already knew. The mean people could come. The sickness could come. The world outside could push its way in.
We stayed locked upstairs for what felt like forever. The air grew hot and heavy, and sometimes I pressed my ear to the boards, wondering if I’d ever hear the wind again. Then, one day, Dad said it was time.
We came downstairs again.
I was older by then, old enough for chores. Old enough to stand beside Dad and learn how to carry wood, how to tend the chickens, how to listen for sounds that didn’t belong. The air outside stung my nose with cold, and the sun made me squint, but I didn’t care. I was just happy not to be trapped anymore.
Sometimes, when I’m with Dad in the yard, I see him pause and look toward the tree line, his eyes sharp, his jaw set. He doesn’t always say what he sees, or if he sees anything at all, but his hand always tightens around mine, just for a moment, before he lets go and tells me to keep working.
I know what he means, even if he doesn’t say it.
Even though we’ve taken steps to keep it out, the world still wants in.
