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Fifty-Two:
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House of Sighs Fifty-One
FIFTY-ONETen-year-old Jack in his backyard. An airplane carved a long, white streak through the orange sky. His senses were alive with the smells of barbecue and the apple tree.He heard a scream. It echoed across the yard.It came from inside his house, which towered above him, its mass a jagged silhouette against the sunset. The back door opened. He remembered the sound of it crashing against the wall. Kimba, the family cat, ran ahead of his father’s feet and scuttled under the stairs. His dad was a hulking, whiskered mammoth lurching and wheezing as he ran.The screams belonged to a boy, although the wails were high-pitched. It made him laugh, despite the fire in his father’s eyes as he approached.Jack felt the heaviness in his hand.He looked down. The sky, the airplane, the house and his dad tilted away until he saw his shaking fingers, and what he held in his grasp.Scissors.
House of Sighs Fifty:
FIFTY:OutsideThe memory left Jack spent, weak. His hands were covered in blue blotches, and tingled. Fuck me, he thought, where did that come from?Jack felt the eyes of the passengers on him, and in a flash, he was back in the classroom, his teacher towering over him. Spitting questions.“But I don’t know the answer,” he mumbled.“What?” Sarah asked, leaning in close. “You okay there, Jack?” The others huddled behind her. Even Michael turned.He couldn’t handle the silence anymore, or their eyes burning into him.“Don’t,” he said.“What?” Sarah was holding on to a handlebar to keep herself steady.Say something, cunt, Jack told himself. Say something, you dumb shit. Open your mouth and make some fucking noise!He took a breath and focused. “What if we busted out one of the windows on the right-hand side and got out and ran?”A gust of wind shook the bus. Dust pelted the windows and the hub filled with a soft, quiet hiss.Anger crept up on Sarah, and she had to hold herse
House of Sighs Forty-Nine:
FORTY-NINE:BangkokBangkok was everything the travel agent said it would be. Michael fought through congested traffic, laughed at the total disregard for rules and the polite sensibilities of the Western world. Going to Thailand was the best thing he’d ever done, perhaps an even greater achievement than losing weight.Nobody knew him there. He could swish when he wanted to and nobody called him names. Michael didn’t mind the looks he got from some of the guys in the streets. In fact, it excited him.He saw a live sex show in the red-light district. Watched a woman tug a birdcage from her vagina, then live birds. Another pulled a transistor radio out. Hotel California played through the speakers.Later in the week, he stumbled into the gay district. Effeminate staff beckoned to him as he passed.“Sexy white boy, where you from? Want to see cabaret show?”Flashing lights inside and bland, though not entirely unappealing music. Rows of chairs faced a stage where velvet curtains we
House of Sighs Forty-Eight
FORTY-EIGHTLiz stood. When did I take my shoes off? I don’t remember doing that.She didn’t remember a lot of things anymore. It was good to be numb—it was like “getting wet”.Her mother rifled through bags in the study.Where am I? Liz glanced around. If that’s the study, then I must be in the living room. I know I’ve seen that sofa before. It’s comfy. I’ve wrapped my legs over the arm of that chair before.Reggie doubled over in the small room, surrounded by torn-open garbage bags bleeding Christmas tinsel. In her hands were two handmade tree ornaments. Little, worn Santas, their faces bent inwards.A memory of the family at Christmastime. It was one of the years that her father hadn’t been there. He came and went. Sometimes he said he needed a holiday from them. In this memory, Liz and Jed put those ornaments on the plastic tree. Everything smelled of mothballs. They weren’t happy, but at least they weren’t crying or bleeding. This was the children’s barometer: the yardstick
House of Sighs Forty-Seven:
FORTY-SEVEN:Bled WhiteSantorini was white, as though an artist scraped away Fira’s colors to rediscover the canvas underneath. Empty streets and not even the sea made a sound.Diana fell in love with the city on her travels before landing in Australia. It soothed her, made her whole again after her mother’s death. Now, she felt like Dorothy coming back to the Emerald City only to find it home to vandals and all her friends turned to stone. There was no queen with a hundred heads here though. Only silence.She wove through the narrow streets. At the bottom of an incline, she turned and looked up a thin, cobblestone street. Diana saw him then.Him.The brother.The one with the eagle tattoo on his back.He walked towards her, his pace steady. Face contorted. She couldn’t tell if he smiled or screamed. Terror gripped her.The ground underneath their feet shook and the brother stopped.Behind him, there came a gigantic tide of blood, meat, and paint. It rushed towards her. He b
House of Sighs Forty-Six
FORTY-SIXDiana opened her eyes. The smell awoke her. Next to her Michael pressed his face towards the sliding window, sucking air into his lungs.“Ooof. He’s getting bad,” Julia said.Michael closed the window again.“Why don’t you leave it open?” Diana asked, sitting upright. Her body ached, bones cracked. Her bladder felt at bursting point.Sarah held a handkerchief to her nose and inhaled the eucalyptus oil in its fibers. The scent reminded her of home. “There’s about a billion fucking flies wanting to get in here, best to keep them shut, methinks.”“You know, for an old woman you swear like a sailor,” Julia said. They smiled at each other.“Oh, my God!” Michael said.Everyone whipped their heads to the house.The father stood in the side yard, having come out the back door without them noticing. His stillness sent a universal chill through their bodies. They waited for him to move, or to maybe draw an axe from the shadows and run at them. But there was none of that, just
House of Sighs Forty-Five
FORTY-FIVEAs Michael neared the deformed bus door, he thanked a God he wasn’t sure he believed in for air that didn’t reek of septic tanks and abattoirs. He sucked in a hot breath and thought, Man, that feels better.He had an issue, and it was a big one considering their circumstances. Michael needed to pee. He’d contemplated using the corner next to the driver’s upturned chair. Only no, that wasn’t an option. The bus was on a slant and the stream would run across the floor and down the steps. It seemed undignified, like a dog. He almost laughed. This isn’t the time to be coy, he said to himself. You’re not a prisoner by choice, you know? A shake of the head, decided. The corner just wasn’t going to cut it; he would piss out the door instead.Before going to the front of the bus, he told the others what he was going to do. They tried to talk him out of it, explaining the risks of being seen. He convinced them that he could manage to do it without drawing any attention.“Can’t you
House of Sighs Forty-Four
FORTY-FOURJulia’s heartbeat quickened. “The things we’ve seen today,” she whispered. “The things we’ve seen.” Flicked hair behind an ear.Diana didn’t reply, deciding instead to let the observation fester in the air.They held each other for a long time. Their humming soothed those about them like icy water on a burn. It eased into melody.Sarah lifted her haggard face.The sound of the ocean withdrew from Michael’s ears, replaced now by that soft, sweet singing. A sigh fled his mouth with mocking ease. He listened to the women and rocked along in his seat. It wasn’t a song, rather undulations of pitch similar to trees blowing in the wind, sometimes in sync, sometimes creaking together, but beautiful all the while. Oh, to be outside, Michael couldn’t help thinking. To be free from this fucking place. Running happily through the bush he loved yet which refused to love him back. The Australian scrub was like that, he knew—as they all did. You could chart it, photograph it, romantic
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