Page 19 of Home to the Hollow

Ironically, this was my bedroom growing up, but once I was off to college, my folks re-did it. It stung a little that they didn’t even wait a full year after I left to get rid of my room, but I shrugged it off like I did every eccentricity my folks had. I’m sure they packed away my stuff in the basement, but that’s a project for another day.

I need to finish the upstairs today, because tomorrow I have the visit with Hottie McBabyVet at the farm and I have to take my paperwork in to Bobbi Jo. They will complete the deliveries to the studio by Saturday, and I have to head there to set up the basics and the classroom space. Monday is the first day of teacher orientation at WHFS.

Time is moving so quickly, and I’m not remotely ready.

* * *

Niecy’s grandkids are adorable,lanky teenagers with saucy wits—just like their grandmother. They loaded up the broken pieces with raised eyebrows, but their ingrained Southern manners kept them from asking what happened. I was grateful for that given that I didn’t want to share the NC-17 story of my shame with anyone—much less a bunch of teenagers and a man I think of like a grandfather.

Gene directed them while they carried out every scrap of furniture in my parents’ bedroom, leaving piles of knickknacks, clothes, and other items around the perimeter for me to sort into categories. The storage facility is two towns over, so they’ll be gone long enough for me to unbox some of my own things and use the boxes to designate what’s going to storage, what is getting donated, and what is trash. Gene wisely suggested that I make a trash pile that they will use the truck to take to the dump rather than have it sit around waiting for the garbage day I missed on Monday.

You’d think after years of gallivanting around Europe on my own, I’d be good at this adult shit, but I’m fast realizing that being a nomad meant I learned absolutely zero about what normal people do day to day. I guess living like a college/grad student for half a decade didn’t help, either. I’m lucky I have Gene and the others to help integrate me into society or I’d be in real trouble.

Who worries about this kind of stuff when they might immigrate to another country in a few weeks? Not me, that’s for sure.

I plop down in front of a pile of books, papers, and miscellaneous junk that my parents kept in their drawers in the master. I’m not ready to look at clothing yet—it feels so personal, and I have such conflicted feelings about them right now.

After stacking a bunch of correspondence in a plastic bin that held shoes, I turn my attention to an ornately carved box that sat on my mom’s vanity for as long as I can remember. The detail work is exquisite, and I wonder if it was a gift or something they had made. Squinting, I try to recall if I ever saw my mom open it, and though my memory is hazy, I can’t find a single memory of this box being anything but locked and displayed on the table.

Running my fingers over the painted teak, ivory, silver, and mother-of-pearl insets, I wrinkle my nose. The design on the top looks very familiar, but I can’t place it. I know that I’ve seen it before—in fact; I believe I’ve seen it many times. But it’s not the logo of an artisan or company or anything like that. No, this is something that I’ve seen in smoky rooms and dark meetings. The harder I try to figure it out, the more elusive it becomes in my mind.

Damnit. I have an eidetic memory about everything in the Universe except my ruddy past. I hate it.

I turn the box around in my hands, searching for clasp or keyhole, but there isn’t one. I’m certain there’s something special inside, but I’ll be fucked if I know what it is. It’s not making a sound when I shake it, but deep in my gut I know it contains important stuff. Growling, I sit the puzzle box aside, vowing to work on it more this evening when I’ve earned time to be irritated. For now, I have a shit ton of stuff to sort before Gene and the boys get back for another load.

My parents weren’t wealthy like the elite families, but I knew we weren’t average middle class, either. Investigating the jewelry boxes, rolls, and containers only confirms my suspicions, because my mother has pieces I know are worth a pretty penny. Taped to the bottom of one box is a note that says ‘Box 1989, 687626767, 565363, 492743#75, Tom/Card/PiggyWeeWee/Bell/FuckYou’ in my mom’s looping handwriting.

What. In. The. Hell.

Eloise Clara Whitleynevercursed. I never in my entire life span heard my mom utter anything worse than taking the Lord’s name in vain, even if she injured herself.

It feels like a stone has settled in my gut. I’m certain this won’t be the first odd thing I find in my parent’s belongings, and that notion makes me slightly ill. The mystery that brought me back to Whistler’s Hollow may be connected to the disconnect between what I can remember about life here and all the unusual shit I’m running into.

That does not bode well.

My experience is that if people hold secrets over decades, they won’t let go of them easily. In fact, the longer a secret remains buried, the less likely is it to be discovered. Human nature is inclined to preen under the attention of having knowledge others don’t, and the fact this is hidden as skillfully as it is makes me concerned that none of my answers will come without serious sleuthing.

Sighing, I use the tape to secure the scrap to the puzzle box, and file that under something to ponder later. I go back to sorting the jewelry into separate bins—one for items I’ll keep in some sort of armoire furniture thing once I buy it—and one that I’d feel better about storing in a safe. Once that’s done, I work my way through the bric-à-brac, carefully weighing each thing based on whether I want to keep it, sell it, or trash it.

Time flies as I methodically whittle my mother’s belongings down to a manageable selection, and I stand up to stretch when I hear the truck in the driveway again. That’s Gene and the boys, and they’ll be taking up space as they carry out the last of the furniture in here and most of the stuff in the two other bedrooms.

Grabbing a handful of the correspondence, I ponder for a moment. I don’t have to supervise removal since I used colored post-it’s marking storage items this morning, so I head downstairs to check on Jekyll and Hyde. It’s time for lunch, anyway, and I’m surprised they stayed away for as long as they have.

Their ears perk up as I come into view, and the twin cats leap towards me, flanking both sides immediately. “Hey, guys. You ready for lunch?”

“Mow!” Jekyll answers as he trots along with me.

“Yeah, I figured as much.”

As has become their routine, they jump onto the counter and sit, waiting for me to toss the various ingredients into the separate mixing bowls I’m using for their food. Humming under my breath as I get them taken care, I move to the fridge again to decide what I’ll have. After several minutes of poking, I decide on a sub sandwich and some fruit. I can use some of the fruit for a milkshake, and that would hit the spot after sitting on the floor like a cramped goblin all morning.

I plop down on a stool, munching quietly while the boys chow down. The first bundle of letters I brought seems to be college sweetheart letters between my folks. They’re oddly more emotive than I remember my parents being with one another, but everyone’s a budding poet in college, I suppose.

The next stack relates to estate stuff that may or may not have been taken care of when they passed. I assume it was since my stateside attorney was very thorough, but who knows if there are things he wouldn’t have known to look for? I’ll have to give that a thorough once over with Jackson once I get settled here. I’m sure he’d drive down from the city to look over anything I find in the next week that concerns me.

Then I hit the motherlode. I almost choke on the bite of sandwich, staring at the bundle I untied in disbelief. It’s thick and the papers that comprise the stack are of varying ages—some yellowed with age, some newer looking, and some written on paper so delicate that I’m worried about handling it. Scooting my food and drink aside, I spread the sheets out, sorting them by matching age of the paper. The oldest set appears to be in handwriting I don’t recognize, the middle set looks like it might be my dad’s, and the newest set is my mother’s.

I feel like I keep asking ‘what the fuck’ but every time I turn around, something weird happens. It’s like this town is a nesting doll full of secrets and riddles, and I keep pulling another doll off to reveal a smaller one, except this is never-ending.

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