Gray Days

Chapter 25: The Ninth Of January

25

Rut.

I'm sitting on my desk after another episode of My Life Before I Was Adopted, examining the only photograph I have of my birth family. I have a sister and I have a mother. Then taking a closer look, the photograph is really old and ugly and my mom and my sister's face are almost faded.

Neil O'Donnell's probably in bed but I dial him anyway. His phone rings four times before he comes through. "What?" he grouches and I almost laugh. He's totally pissed off.

"Did I ruin your beauty sleep?" I chuckle.

He yawns. "What do you want, Tony?"

"The house where you got the photograph, tell me about it." After a quick description which is not limited to cracked walls and broken windows or any other common wreckage found in Nowhere houses, I now know and sort of remember that we had an oak tree in our backyard. It's still standing until now says O'Donnell.

It takes almost an hour to get to Nowhere, then pull up when the branches of the tree glazes my eyes. Then the trespassing vines on the fractured walls and the burgled door and wrecked windows and everything else that yells ruin welcomes me as a similar un-wrecked, decent house from my memory—which is also in the photograph— flashes inside my head and I know for sure, that this barely standing, ruined house in front of me had once been my home. There's not a chance that I would bring Zoey here.

I enter the house and the dust instantly fill my lungs and I have to cough them out so I can breathe. There are shattered glass everywhere in the living room and the broken windows are nailed with planks of wood, and there are also mice squeaking over my footsteps. I'm picturing the kitchen would be as ruined as the living room but what welcomes me is a tidy room with an untouched plate of what I think is a leftover bacon the mold climbed into. Art, I think.

Upstairs, I make my way through what I believe is my room because of the name stenciled on the door. Tony. There is also a room beside mine that has the name, Ella. My sister's. In my head, I see me as a young boy getting tucked into bed by my mother. And another time when she was in my room putting up a frame on my shelf and I tried to move it to my desk and I ended up breaking it. Now that I remember it, I wonder why she didn't find out. I had put the photograph and the broken frame somewhere in one of my drawers so I rummage the place until I find it in the lowest layer of my dresser.

It was me and my family in an amusement park and my dad was carrying me and we were all smiling at the camera and we're a happy family. In my old bed, I lay everything and of all the photos I found, it was the one with the amusement park that's retained its quality. The others have faded and are worn and torn.

Back home, I catch David eating in the kitchen. We don't usually acknowledge each other's presence when we run into each other in the house, but today I walk into the kitchen to get some water and he asks, "Where have you been?" He puts his fork down and stares at me through the glass of water I'm holding up. "Betty and I aren't working our asses off just so you could fuck your life up and stick your dick wherever you want to."

"Inappropriate language, David," I cough, "And for the record, you adopted me. I didn't beg you to." I leave him in the kitchen and stride upstairs but he says something so I stop and when I turn to him, he's already on his way to the living room.

In my room, I go straight to my desk and prop my elbows up, holding the amusement park photograph and the burnt one between my hands. I'm familiarizing their faces but all I can remember is mine. I have my mother's eyes. My sister's hair. And all the while I'm recalling a picture of my father from my memories, I stop myself and look at the black screen of my laptop. One look in the mirror and I see him. Moving on which also means banging my computer close, I focus on remembering my mother and older sister. But as I do, David's words keep coming back to me. Like a broken record playing again and again.