A ton of people we knew only pretty well were at Mom’s funeral, so all it was was that age-old awkward interaction of “Oh! The last time I saw you, you were wee high.” They were all dressed up in black and white and didn’t know what to say after, eloquently, I said: “Yeah.”
I wish I still was that little.
Seeing everyone just walking around, with expressions so down that they were practically looking at their shoes, spurred me. I ran up and told a little yo mama joke that went over much better in middle school: “My mama was so fat that someone swerved to miss her in their car and they ran outta gas.” I chuckled a few times, but people didn’t take it too well.
You ran me to the curb yelling me a spiel that other people actually liked her. I just tried to make light of the situation - you know? But being such a good brother, I heeded your warning and left. The church’s bell rang out as I ambled away.
DING. DONG. A family of four gathers smiling. Far behind, Jesus is dead and pinned to the cross. They all yell cheese. Picturesque. A church bell rings as Christmas comes.
I couldn’t get the sound of that ringing bell out of my head. A sound so far gone that I kept hearing months on end. The sound comforted me though. You wouldn’t get it. You don’t want to hear my blabbering; you don’t want anything to do with me.
A core memory of mine is when you went off to college and left me alone with them for 10 years until I could escape too. You just said sorry and then bye. Who does that? Leaves their basically-baby brother to digest in the jaws of Satan and doesn’t give any notice. I mean our parents weren’t that bad whenever they were around but they treated me like a ghost and that was bad enough. You doing the same didn’t help.
God, I forgot how much of a mess they caused. They left their waste piling everywhere. Picking up and throwing out all that crap from Mom’s house, don’t you think it felt like that old VHS we would laugh at - that Valley of Gwangi movie? There was so much junk in that house I thought I was going to accidentally reveal a secret portal where a bunch of prehistoric midget horses would roam around. Can I say midget now? You were always pretty good at correcting me, so I’m sure you’ll let me know.
On a side note: I found a stack of your letters home from college in my old room. They were unopened. Sorry for no response.
A family of four gathers. Right behind, fake Jesus is dead and pinned to the cross. The parents both say cheese. DING. DONG.
More importantly, I found a picture of us when the whole family was together. It’s pretty funny looking since, as always, our folks had us all dressed up for Christmas Eve Midnight mass and you could see it on our faces that we just wanted to go home to take the shortcut to Christmas morning. In a way it was alright; whenever I heard that DING DONG the biggest grin would spread across my face because we would head home for Christmas soon.
I’ve been thinking about that church a whole lot lately. At the time, it was almost a little safe haven because it was one of the only three days of the year where our parents pretended to, you know, actually be our parents. I don’t go anymore though. My apartment always waits empty and alone, so I decided to try and find that old church to maybe hear that bell ring. I hacked away at a computer, but I can’t ever figure those things out. I much prefer to just ask; back when we were younger we could just ask around instead of staring at these screens. I found the church in the middle of the same wispy forest as Mom’s. It was all rundown: its green paint peeled off, and glass windows ruptured, and it didn’t have any company. When heading back to Mom’s house and looking up to the sky, you can barely see anything through the branches of the tree line – explains why God isn’t watching down on either house nowadays.
Looking back, those great church days kind of made those days the worst of the year because they gave a glimpse of what could be. You were the only thing that was constant and there, even if you tried to ignore me. These past months, every time I’ve heard a bell ring, I’ve thought of the church and you. I’ll try to respond to your letters from your college days sometime, but maybe we should start using the internet so we don’t stay in the past with the remains of our church.
A family of two gathers. They both say cheese. Picturesque.