9. BAD JUJU
The house is small and dumpy, one of the worst in the tiny little town of Geneva, Alabama. I had demanded that they take me back before I would help them. Rory was certain my father's house was as far back as everything went. In fact, he was insistent we come here. Now I'm not so sure. I glance at Rory skeptically. "You sure?"
He nods. "This was your dad's house. You brought me here once, drove past it. Your dad had just died, terrible way to go. You refused to go to the funeral but drove me past the house." His words feel like lies. Why wouldn't I have gone to the funeral? He was my father, even if he was a sucky one.
I climb out of the SUV, closing the door quietly, I think so I won't stir the ghosts sleeping here. I get the distinct feeling this house is haunted.
My footsteps sound like they echo as I approach the dirty little house. It's pale blue, with only one window in the front by the door. There's been a "For Sale" sign in the window for years, but it's never sold. I still own it, technically. I have for seven years.
My fingers clutch the filmy, rusted handle on the porch door, holding it back so Rory can insert the key. The real estate office has been the caretaker for it since I was gone. The lock clinks like an old chain, and when he gets the door open I nearly gag on the smell. "No wonder it never sold. It's dank and musty in there."
He glances back at me with a story playing out in his eyes, but I don't know it. I just recognize the look of it. We enter the small living room, and instantly something bad happens to my body. Something crippling and suffocating. There are ghosts here, memories that haunt the house, and I know now I don't want them back. There is something here that made me the girl I was. The girl with the cherry in her mouth, the bleached-blonde hair, and the haunted eyes-she is a product of this dank and haunted house. I take as many steps backward as I had taken forward until I am again on the stoop.
He looks back at me, tilting his head. "Still a no then?" He sounds annoyed with me.
I nod, backing up even farther. I would never have hidden any answers in this place. I wouldn't have come here. I can feel that truth pumping through my blood and body. When we get back in the car he doesn't speak, but I know he plays out an entire conversation in his mind. There is something I'm missing. "Where does my aunt Pat live?"
He glances at me. "North Carolina. She's still there, but you never saw her, ever."
I nod. "I want to see her."
"It's going to take all day to get to Charlotte."
"I don't care. I want to go."
He sighs, nodding. "Fine, but you're driving at least some of the way. I'm exhausted."
"Fine." It dawns on me that we sound like an old married couple. I have some level of comfort that's subconscious with him. I see it now. I don't act on my best behavior, and I say far more than I ever would with anyone else. Maybe even with Derek.
The drive isn't as long as he said it would be; it's just less than seven hours. We stop and get coffee twice and gas once, but it isn't so long that I'm dying or twitchy from sitting.
I worry more about meeting my aunt than anything.
"Does she know my memory is gone?" I ask, after letting it all plague me for hours. He stirs, not opening his eyes, but answers. He's been trying to sleep since I started driving at the halfway point.
"No. She thinks you died."
"WHAT!"
He nods sleepily and stretches. "We told her you had been in an accident."
"She thinks I'm dead, and you didn't tell me?"
He opens one dark-blue eye like a cat might. "Ya didn't ask."
I swat him. It's a knee-jerk reaction, and I regret doing it the moment my hand makes contact with his arm. But he laughs like I've hit him a thousand times. "I can't believe you were going to let me go there and not tell me."
He nods at the road, adjusting himself in his seat. "I woulda said something down the road a little ways. She's going to be excited to see ya. She loved ya something fierce."
When we drive into Charlotte he points. "This road, take a right, and drive to the end." The road is long and straight through an industrial section and then leads us through an older section of town. "Left at the stop sign." The moment we are sitting at the stop sign at the end of South Mint Street, my mouth goes dry. Woodcrest Avenue rings so familiar in my head that I glance up the road, knowing I can see the house.
"Second house on the right."
It's small and green with broken front steps and a small porch out front. I park on the road in front of the house, not sure if I should move or not. The broken planters in the grass make me sad. "She must be depressed to let it look this way."
He nods. "I imagine she has been sad for years." I leave the car running and climb out. I hurry to the front door, skipping the first step like always. I know what her face will look like. Her lips are puckered from smoking. She's the lady who sang in the car. She's the only real memory I have from before. I knock, not worrying if she will be angry with me.
I know she will understand. It's who she is.
There's movement in the tiny house, and the door cracks slowly, as if she's nervous about who might be there. Her eyes are the same as I recall, dark blue and light like mine. She and my mother both had it.
She looks confused at first, lost in the face she sees. But the moment she realizes what is happening she steps back, clutching at her own throat. She gasps and pushes the door open, jumping at me like a crazy person would. She hugs me so hard it stings. It doesn't hurt as much as the instant expansion of my heart. We tremble and shake, clinging to each other. She mutters things I don't comprehend, and I die a little inside, realizing how much she has aged. I have aged her. She feels frail in my arms, and I know that's not the truth of it. She was strong once. Strong for me. I may not remember anything, but I know that. It's just a fact that sits inside me, like the sky is blue and the grass is green. My aunt Pat was strong for me.
She pulls me back, shaking her head. "They said-"
"I know. It doesn't matter."
Anger replaces the worry and excitement on her face. "Where was you?" she asks in her thick Alabama accent, but more bitterly than I recall it being-like I might have controlled the circumstances in which I have been gone.
I swallow hard. "Injured in an accident. I don't remember anything from before. Everyone thought I was dead."
She sniffles, gasping for air as slight whimpers leave her parted lips. The dramatic cry she isn't releasing seems stuck in her throat, lodged. We hug again, just standing on the porch, attached to each other. Finally, she pulls me inside, closing the door. "How far does your memory go back?"
"Three years."
She winces. "How do you remember me?"
"You're all I remember."
A smile crosses her thin lips, spreading the crease lines from her cigarettes. She sits, lighting up a smoke. "Sit; ignore the mess. I want to know everything."
I sit across from her on the smoke-coated floral couch and nod. "There isn't much. I've been in Seattle. I didn't know I wasn't from the West Coast all this time." I sigh, finding my strength. "I need to know some things about me, from before."
Her eyes narrow. I can see her not wanting to go back there. "There ain't nothing in the past worth finding, my love."
My love.
My love was her pet name for me.
"I still need to know. Even the bad stuff."
She butts the smoke out and leans forward. "He's dead, so it don't matter none now anyway."
"How did he die?"
"He took a stroke. It was real slow, they figure. Paralyzed in his house, slowly dying of thirst and hunger and eventually fading away." Her fierceness weakens, but there is a grim smile on her face when she speaks. The story burns inside us both, but I still need to know it. "When your father was found, his cats had-well, it was real nasty."
I don't know if I have words for something so horrific. He died slowly and in agony over the course of days and then was eaten by his cats. Did they even wait for him to die? I remember reading something that said they wouldn't even wait-if given the chance, they'd eat you now. She seems content in the knowledge too. Obviously, that's creepy.
She stirs in her seat. "How have you been?"
I shake my head. "I hardly know. I've been lost, I guess, so not so good. But my life was great. I worked in a little shop and dated a loving man. I had a best friend and a cat. It was good." I still want it back.
She looks wounded. "That's real nice, I guess."
"The minute I found out who I was, I came here."
"I'm glad you came. It's been real hard thinking you was dead."