#prose #fiction Broken Home From the analog Crows Quill Writing Group, where the prompt was, Homeless Holiday. .............. The old house looked tired, the roof sagging towards the middle after so many winters of neglect. The shingles had begun to curl in a few spots, now showing through the light snow which fringed parts of all the rooftops in the neighborhood. Wet, dark-gray, oblong absences showed through where the snow had melted over the rooms frequently used. Each looked like the top of a balding man’s head, he thought to himself. Moss and mold grew on the north side of the asbestos siding, and the front door didn’t close properly, always leaving a gap at the top and down the side. It was the type of thing you don’t notice unless you’ve been away for a while or were seeing for the first time; to the family who lived there, it was just home, broken, but not yet completely fallen. Children across the street and down the hill from where he stood watching made snowballs from the morning snow on the cars parked in front of the small houses. The street around them told the story of their battle, all the snowballs which had missed their mark having exploded in futility on the wet asphalt. Through the windows, and dusty screens, lights twinkled in a few of the homes, Christmas trees sparkling with children’s hopefulness. He’d wanted to call out to the boys who were still laughing and throwing snowballs as they hid behind the cars, and he almost did, having to stop himself as the memory returned, holding him back like a chained dog. He couldn’t bring himself to cry that day in court, when told not return. The tears never did come, instead drowning him slowly from inside. Nearly three years ago now, nearly a thousand banging hangovers ago, she had also told him to leave, and not return. His last memory of her stirred in the still blowing snow. She wore a pale-blue housedress, her shape beneath silhouetted by the kitchen light shining into the front hallway, dark hair failing over one shoulder, her head held to slightly to one side with the weight of regret; a smear of blood traced her lips and the olive skin around her mouth. As he turned around to retreat down the wooded path he’d often traveled to reach this place, and to again leave this small vantage point, he whispered the same words he’d always muttered, sometimes in silence. They’d been the last words spoken, never graced with a reply. Winter’s indifference shrouded his breath as the words fell to the snowy ground like the boy’s snowballs which had missed their mark. “I’m sorry.”
Posted on: Sun, 14 Dec 2014 14:12:55 +0000
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