It was 14 years today. Fourteen years since we’d got Tubby. Tubby was a puppy then. He’s a big dog now. Nothing’s changed in this house since. Nothing at all except….
The walls which were once white are now an indistinct shade of yellow still spattered with long-dried drops of blood. The plants which were once green are now a fossilized cursory reminder that they hung there. The house which was once full of a bustling population of 14 people is now a haunted shell with a ghastly aura. It was fourteen years today”, I thought to myself.
How long does it take to forget that your whole family once visualized its life here? That you once had a whole houseful of people where you were a mere non-entity? What does it feel like to be the survivor, the chosen one?
I’m Shirley, Shirley Bernstein, sorry to sound so Bond-like but I’ve always wanted to be able to say it like that. Have I been thinking aloud again? I’m sorry for blabbering on like that without telling you what I was talking about. You see it’s just this place that gets to me. I’ve lived here ever since they took me away from my house. And good riddance I’d say. They never even remembered me there. It’s nice here. Airy, warm, comfortable. You just have to press a button to let them know you want something. But there’s something I don’t like around here. They all whisper around me. I wonder why. There’s always this hushed silence. I have neighbors though. Lots of them. Twenty on this floor alone they say. I don’t know how they are though. Sometimes, when they make a lot of noise, those awful blue men have to come to make them be quiet. An unholy cacophony, my mother would’ve said. She always said Mark was a nice boy. He never made any noise or messed around like the other kids. I never paid any attention to her. There are no favourites around here. Sometimes I think they don’t like any of us. Sometimes, I think. Actually I think it’s just me. I think too much, they tell me. I should rest more often. My mother never knew that. It was always Sherry do this, Sherry do that. I hated even the sound of that name. That was the only time she ever noticed me. How I hated all of them each and every one of them. They tell me I torched 12, Cherry Tree lane. Mighty funny thing to say: torched. Humpf! What do they know about anything? I liked Nina. She was a little doll then. Only 8 months old. I would’ve liked to get her out of the inferno but those ghastly Smiths next door. They didn’t let me. Maybe it was her fate, maybe she deserved it. Maybe she’d tortured someone else somewhere.
Bang, bang! “Do you have any justification to offer in defence of your actions?”
I hadn’t said anything then. But then they knew everything. The judge was looking at me with my mother’s eyes.
“We all get what we deserve in the end. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.” That’s what my mother would’ve said.
The judge said, “Guilty!”
The walls which were once white are now an indistinct shade of yellow still spattered with long-dried drops of blood. The plants which were once green are now a fossilized cursory reminder that they hung there. The house which was once full of a bustling population of 14 people is now a haunted shell with a ghastly aura. It was fourteen years today”, I thought to myself.
How long does it take to forget that your whole family once visualized its life here? That you once had a whole houseful of people where you were a mere non-entity? What does it feel like to be the survivor, the chosen one?
I’m Shirley, Shirley Bernstein, sorry to sound so Bond-like but I’ve always wanted to be able to say it like that. Have I been thinking aloud again? I’m sorry for blabbering on like that without telling you what I was talking about. You see it’s just this place that gets to me. I’ve lived here ever since they took me away from my house. And good riddance I’d say. They never even remembered me there. It’s nice here. Airy, warm, comfortable. You just have to press a button to let them know you want something. But there’s something I don’t like around here. They all whisper around me. I wonder why. There’s always this hushed silence. I have neighbors though. Lots of them. Twenty on this floor alone they say. I don’t know how they are though. Sometimes, when they make a lot of noise, those awful blue men have to come to make them be quiet. An unholy cacophony, my mother would’ve said. She always said Mark was a nice boy. He never made any noise or messed around like the other kids. I never paid any attention to her. There are no favourites around here. Sometimes I think they don’t like any of us. Sometimes, I think. Actually I think it’s just me. I think too much, they tell me. I should rest more often. My mother never knew that. It was always Sherry do this, Sherry do that. I hated even the sound of that name. That was the only time she ever noticed me. How I hated all of them each and every one of them. They tell me I torched 12, Cherry Tree lane. Mighty funny thing to say: torched. Humpf! What do they know about anything? I liked Nina. She was a little doll then. Only 8 months old. I would’ve liked to get her out of the inferno but those ghastly Smiths next door. They didn’t let me. Maybe it was her fate, maybe she deserved it. Maybe she’d tortured someone else somewhere.
Bang, bang! “Do you have any justification to offer in defence of your actions?”
I hadn’t said anything then. But then they knew everything. The judge was looking at me with my mother’s eyes.
“We all get what we deserve in the end. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.” That’s what my mother would’ve said.
The judge said, “Guilty!”
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