So, listen, one of ya’ll upgraded to a paid subscription this week and I just can't get over it. Three new, paid subscriptions in one week. That's super encouraging because it's means you're here for these stories. And since that's what I want to write, I gotta say thank you! Once again I'm showing my thanks by sending next week’s story early. So get comfy cozy and settle into another (and older) telling of the beginning of the end….
But first, a quote…
“The book you're holding in your hands was many books before it was this one. Nested inside this version are the others: the version I began deep inside my sadness, thumbed into my phone in bed on sleepless nights, the one I scribbled out with sparks in my hair. You'll see pieces of these books inside this one. Why? Because I'm trying to get to the truth, and I can't get there except by looking at the whole, even the parts I don't want to see. May especially those parts. I've had to move into--and through--the darkness to find the beauty.”
Maggie Smith, You Could Make This Place Beautiful, emphasis added because that's really what all this story writing and rewriting and reworking is all about—getting to the truth.
And now, a story…
Walking Home
I felt the sun’s heat on my greased scalp as I walked home from school, colorful barretts hitting my skin with every joyful turn of my head. Fletcher Elementary was just across the street from our apartment complex.
I led the way across the street, hugging chapter books to my chest, eager to tell my parents about my day. As I turned left behind an apartment building, I felt a tug on my book bag, which was my father’s duffle bag.
“Hey, stop that!” I yelled, turning to see Chris, a blond-haired troublemaker from my second grade class and his dark-haired twin brother behind him. He had a scar running down the side of his face. They both looked like they’d been through some things.
Chris hit my books out of my hand and pushed me into the brick wall. My glasses fell to the ground.
He laughed. “You’re such a nerd.”
He and his brother ran off, laughing. I picked my books off the ground in disbelief.
I found my dad hunched over textbooks at our semi-circle kitchen table in our living room when I walked in the door. He hadn’t looked up.
“Daddy?” My voice trembled.
“What happened?” He stood. “Who hurt you?”
“Some boys jumped me.”
I knew the word because he and my mom watched 21 Jump Street sometimes while my mom braided my hair at night. I was told to keep my head down for most of the show, but I could still hear everything going on. And usually when someone was pushed around in the street and hurt, they said they were jumped.
“You know where they live?” My dad asked, getting up and heading out the door.
“Yeah.” My dad stood 6 feet tall and five inches. I tried to keep up with his long strides as we crossed through two playgrounds to their courtyard, filling in the details of what happened on the way.
His face seemed to get more rigid as I spoke, his eyes smaller, his lips pierced more together, his cheeks more full of air.
The two brothers lived on the second floor in the building as well, actually in the corresponding apartment to ours. When we knocked, a woman answered. Her hair a dirtier blond than her son’s. I’d never seen her before. I’d only seen them escape here from time to time.
“Your sons jumped my daughter,” my dad said.