I returned to live in the house where I spent my formative years, hoping it could help mend the hurt my dad created. However, on the very first night I slept there, my mom called me and told me through tears about a secret room behind the pantry, and everything I thought to be true about how we lost that home was about to change.
When I was thirty-one years old, I was holding a box cutter in one hand and a container of cold chow mein in the other when my mom, Catherine, said, “Astrid, please don’t tell me that you have found it.”
I stopped chewing my food. “Found what?” I asked.
After looking behind the shelves in the pantry, I saw one wall that was very smooth compared to the other walls in the kitchen.
My mom let out a little whimper before I realised she was crying. “The room that was hidden. The room your father made me promise I would never remember.”
I didn’t respond immediately to her.
Suddenly, I was sixteen again, standing in the pouring rain with no shoes on while a bunch of men moved our sofa off of the front porch.
We did not sell that house.
We lost that house.
I was told that my dad had not made his mortgage payments in too long and that he had ignored too many letters warning him about his payments. That morning when we lost our house, my mother stood at the end of the driveway with both her hands over her mouth and my brother, Asher, was standing next to a black garbage bag full of all of his trophies from school, and was asking, “Where’s Dad?” while my dad stood on the porch staring at the underneath of the floorboards that were soaking wet, trying to figure out how he could find out what was happening.As soon as Uncle Tom arrived, late, with 2 cups of coffee and no umbrella, he looked up at my father and said; “Come on, Drew!” Like he wasn’t being watched by the neighbours. “Keep your chin up.”
However, my father didn’t even look at Uncle Tom. He didn’t look at anyone!
When that happened, we then moved into a small apartment above a laundromat, with the dryers vibrating the entire building during cycles. Plus, my mom never discussed the house ever again.
But I certainly did!
Every time that I pay a bill ahead of time, every cheap take-out dinner that I eat while I use my laptop, and every savings account balance that I view before sleep, I carry the memory of my childhood home.
Everyone calls me disciplined.
But, in reality, I’m just remembering it.
So, when Mr. Walter passed away and his previously owned home was auctioned, I registered for the auction before fear would stop me.
I completed all of the paperwork that the auctioneer handed to me and he said; “Are you going to remodel and flip it, Miss?”
I wiped the tears from my face and said, “No, I’m taking my home back!”
That evening, I called Asher from the front porch before I stepped back inside.
He said, “You actually bought it?”
And I said, “Yes!”
There was silence and then he said, “Does it still look the same, Astrid?”
After looking at the cracked front steps, crooked mailbox, and empty swing on the porch, I said, “Smaller.”
He replied quietly, “That’s a childhood thing.”
Then, even softer, “You okay? Being back there again must feel weird…”
I told him no, because lying to Asher had never worked for me; “I am here.”