1984
There's a smack-smack on pavement that bounces between the houses. I slide my window open as wide as I can and sniff the crisp evening air.
Smack-smack.
I can see the long, narrow backyard and the chain of identical yards as they curl down Ranchero Road. Cats parole the fence tops and lawn sprinklers fan back and forth over grass. I can see in to the neighbour's house across the alley - husband and wife at the kitchen table - the room simple and bare, their clothes the colour of nothing. It's not quite dusk.
Smack-smack.
I sit at the window and tell myself stories. I tell myself stories in the bathroom before the large mirror. I tell myself stories on the front deck, lying out on the wide wood rail tanning, precariously taunting a fall to the driveway and feeling a little bit dangerous, but I know I'm not.
Smack-smack.
My sister is out tonight. Her room is quiet and the door is closed. I sneak in there sometimes and breathe in the smell of Tracy. She's musky like a teenage girl is: part cheap perfume, part hairspray, part feet and part cigarette smoke.
Her bedroom has dark brown carpet for some reason, while the rest of the house has rust. My bedroom has white carpet because we moved in here when I was a baby. She has a red bedspread mom made printed with abstracted summer hats, a red phone shaped like a sports car and a red tape player. Her table under the window has a make-up mirror on it that has double doors covering the glass. It is covered in stickers and lipstick, as is the surface it sits on.
She has a jewellery box shaped like a dresser that places "Laura's Theme" from Doctor Zhivago. I always come in and wind it up, pull out the bottom drawer and let it play. It makes me feel sad, although I don't know why. I'm only 9 and I doubt I've seen Dr. Zhivago yet, but my parents have the record so I know the song.
I'd hung everything I knew about sadness on that clanky music box.
I creep around quietly in her space even though I know she won't be home. I had heard her on the phone after school talking with her friend, she's gone to a party down the street. She's mad at our mom.
She wore a leather jacket and a pair of black boots. She does her bleached hair like Madonna.
Smack-smack.
We'd gone away a couple weeks ago on holiday and Tracy had stayed home. I was depressed that she'd stayed, I wanted so badly for us to be friends.
When we were gone she threw a party at the townhouse, we could tell because everything had been moved around. It was clear that they'd tried to put things back as they should, but things were backwards and just a bit off. I could tell right away, it was like we had been burglarized.
Smack-smack
The little clay family that our Aunt had given us at Christmas had been on the bookshelf. There was a dad and a mom and two sisters: one big and one small. When we got home the big one had been broken. I'll never forget.
Smack-smack.
Tracy had played kick the can on the front street when she was younger with the kids from the houses across from our's. Their's was public housing. I couldn't figure out how that meant anything, because their town houses were the same as our's, only with bigger front yards. There were more kids on that side though. On our side there were a lot of single women or childless couples. The neighbours on our left changed constantly and on the right was a quiet immigrant couple who worked nights as janitors. They had had a baby girl the year before.
Across the street there was always something going on. Bobby was a football star but one night they came and took him to jail. The folks next door to Bobby fought pit-bull dogs in their basement and some mornings there would be bloody carpets hosed down on the front yard.
Smack-smack.
I never played out front or knew any of the kids.
Smack-smack.
I'm back in my window and I'm waiting.
Smack-smack.
The sun went down a half-hour ago.
( )-( )
I can hear the TV downstairs.
( )-( )
It's 11:30 p.m.. MST. Longest day of the year.
( )-( )
It's quiet and still. He's gone inside. He's no longer playing basketball on his driveway.
( )-( )
It's not that late but my parent's are looking for Tracy. I'm worried about my sister. I don't really get it yet that teenagers stay out as late as they can.
She's told them she was sleeping at a friend's. She'd let me in on the lie and I had warned her against it. I lied all the time too but I didn't want to be held responsible for her.
( )-( )
There's an argument rising from downstairs. I haven't really heard a noise like this come from my family before. I stare hard at the clock in my room and it's 1 am. Their voices undulate up the stairs from the narrow hall leading to the front door. I can't make out anything but crying and agony.
My sister is yelling at dad: "fucker, fucker, fuck you", she's slurring. There's a tension that makes it under the crack of my door and into my bed; it invades my sleep and grasps my lungs. I'm scared. I can't make out the situation until mom starts to read the room back to dad: "She has puke in hair Bill...she's missing her boots.....her ear is bleeding and the lobe's split open..."
I hear the kind of thumping that people never make on purpose and I get to my feet. I don't know who I'm trying to save, dad or mom or my big sister or all of them, as I race down stairs to find my dog at the top of the stairs, petrified despite his size.
Thmp-thmp.
They don't see me as I see them.
Thmp-thmp.
Three people equally terrified.
Thmp-thmp.
I knew where Tracy had been. She said she was staying at a friend's. Mom had asked me if I knew anything when they were calling around. I had slunk away to my room for bed: "I don't know anything!"
Thmp-thmp.
I see her little white socks crusty with dirt. She has the tiniest feet I've ever seen.
Thmp-thmp.
I'm frozen where I stand and the sound is pinched off. I don't know how long the struggle carries on.
Thmp-thmp.
Dad took her to the hospital that night.
Thmp-thmp.
I get up in the morning for a softball game. I dread going (I'm the worst player on the team) but I dread staying at home.
No-one says a thing out of the ordinary.
I trudge down Ranchero Road in grey polyester uniform. It's to hot for ball.
Smack-smack.
No-one ever says a thing out of the ordinary.
Smack-smack.
Tracy left home at 17.
Smack-smack.
I can see the long, narrow backyard and the chain of identical yards as they curl down Ranchero Road. Cats parole the fence tops and lawn sprinklers fan back and forth over grass. I can see in to the neighbour's house across the alley - husband and wife at the kitchen table - the room simple and bare, their clothes the colour of nothing. It's not quite dusk.
Smack-smack.
I sit at the window and tell myself stories. I tell myself stories in the bathroom before the large mirror. I tell myself stories on the front deck, lying out on the wide wood rail tanning, precariously taunting a fall to the driveway and feeling a little bit dangerous, but I know I'm not.
Smack-smack.
My sister is out tonight. Her room is quiet and the door is closed. I sneak in there sometimes and breathe in the smell of Tracy. She's musky like a teenage girl is: part cheap perfume, part hairspray, part feet and part cigarette smoke.
Her bedroom has dark brown carpet for some reason, while the rest of the house has rust. My bedroom has white carpet because we moved in here when I was a baby. She has a red bedspread mom made printed with abstracted summer hats, a red phone shaped like a sports car and a red tape player. Her table under the window has a make-up mirror on it that has double doors covering the glass. It is covered in stickers and lipstick, as is the surface it sits on.
She has a jewellery box shaped like a dresser that places "Laura's Theme" from Doctor Zhivago. I always come in and wind it up, pull out the bottom drawer and let it play. It makes me feel sad, although I don't know why. I'm only 9 and I doubt I've seen Dr. Zhivago yet, but my parents have the record so I know the song.
I'd hung everything I knew about sadness on that clanky music box.
I creep around quietly in her space even though I know she won't be home. I had heard her on the phone after school talking with her friend, she's gone to a party down the street. She's mad at our mom.
She wore a leather jacket and a pair of black boots. She does her bleached hair like Madonna.
Smack-smack.
We'd gone away a couple weeks ago on holiday and Tracy had stayed home. I was depressed that she'd stayed, I wanted so badly for us to be friends.
When we were gone she threw a party at the townhouse, we could tell because everything had been moved around. It was clear that they'd tried to put things back as they should, but things were backwards and just a bit off. I could tell right away, it was like we had been burglarized.
Smack-smack
The little clay family that our Aunt had given us at Christmas had been on the bookshelf. There was a dad and a mom and two sisters: one big and one small. When we got home the big one had been broken. I'll never forget.
Smack-smack.
Tracy had played kick the can on the front street when she was younger with the kids from the houses across from our's. Their's was public housing. I couldn't figure out how that meant anything, because their town houses were the same as our's, only with bigger front yards. There were more kids on that side though. On our side there were a lot of single women or childless couples. The neighbours on our left changed constantly and on the right was a quiet immigrant couple who worked nights as janitors. They had had a baby girl the year before.
Across the street there was always something going on. Bobby was a football star but one night they came and took him to jail. The folks next door to Bobby fought pit-bull dogs in their basement and some mornings there would be bloody carpets hosed down on the front yard.
Smack-smack.
I never played out front or knew any of the kids.
Smack-smack.
I'm back in my window and I'm waiting.
Smack-smack.
The sun went down a half-hour ago.
( )-( )
I can hear the TV downstairs.
( )-( )
It's 11:30 p.m.. MST. Longest day of the year.
( )-( )
It's quiet and still. He's gone inside. He's no longer playing basketball on his driveway.
( )-( )
It's not that late but my parent's are looking for Tracy. I'm worried about my sister. I don't really get it yet that teenagers stay out as late as they can.
She's told them she was sleeping at a friend's. She'd let me in on the lie and I had warned her against it. I lied all the time too but I didn't want to be held responsible for her.
( )-( )
There's an argument rising from downstairs. I haven't really heard a noise like this come from my family before. I stare hard at the clock in my room and it's 1 am. Their voices undulate up the stairs from the narrow hall leading to the front door. I can't make out anything but crying and agony.
My sister is yelling at dad: "fucker, fucker, fuck you", she's slurring. There's a tension that makes it under the crack of my door and into my bed; it invades my sleep and grasps my lungs. I'm scared. I can't make out the situation until mom starts to read the room back to dad: "She has puke in hair Bill...she's missing her boots.....her ear is bleeding and the lobe's split open..."
I hear the kind of thumping that people never make on purpose and I get to my feet. I don't know who I'm trying to save, dad or mom or my big sister or all of them, as I race down stairs to find my dog at the top of the stairs, petrified despite his size.
Thmp-thmp.
They don't see me as I see them.
Thmp-thmp.
Three people equally terrified.
Thmp-thmp.
I knew where Tracy had been. She said she was staying at a friend's. Mom had asked me if I knew anything when they were calling around. I had slunk away to my room for bed: "I don't know anything!"
Thmp-thmp.
I see her little white socks crusty with dirt. She has the tiniest feet I've ever seen.
Thmp-thmp.
I'm frozen where I stand and the sound is pinched off. I don't know how long the struggle carries on.
Thmp-thmp.
Dad took her to the hospital that night.
Thmp-thmp.
I get up in the morning for a softball game. I dread going (I'm the worst player on the team) but I dread staying at home.
No-one says a thing out of the ordinary.
I trudge down Ranchero Road in grey polyester uniform. It's to hot for ball.
Smack-smack.
No-one ever says a thing out of the ordinary.
Smack-smack.
Tracy left home at 17.
posted by Francine at 6:45 p.m.
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