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Why am I doing this This is a terrible idea (I'm in)
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May 17, 2017 05:55
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| # ¿ Apr 25, 2024 14:58 |
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tell me about your mother < 1100 words Everybody remembers that day. Perhaps it’s more that nobody dares to forget it. My messenger bag was on my shoulder, padded by a hoodie. I’d been raised with a stalwart distrust of springtime weather. As I walked to my bus stop, my heart was in my throat. Today was the day for college acceptance decisions. I chatted with the other kids waiting for the bus. The other seniors were nervous as hell. The cute sophomore girl was nervous on my behalf. She followed me onto the bus and gave me supportive chit-chat, but I couldn’t keep my eyes away from the top of her shirt (or, rather, where the top of her shirt should have been). I’ll have you know, I like the way I bounced at the back of the school bus. It felt like being at Six Flags, and on that morning I got to share the joy with a blossoming young lady. Just as I was appreciating my day’s wardrobe—loose-cut jeans—the bus took a swerve. Something big had hit the roof. Everybody heard the thud, and everybody saw the dent in the ceiling. It was right in the middle, about a foot deep and a yard long. Amidst the commotion, our driver raised his voice for the first time ever. “Would you keep it down back there? I HAPPEN to have a HANGOVER.” We pulled into school. I swung by my locker and went to class as usual. I was preoccupied by the college entrance emails to come, but my lack of sleep was catching up to me. I took a seat towards the back for first period to compensate. My notes from that hour looked like spaghetti, but it’s impossible to forget what I saw. At some point I smacked myself awake. I shook my head, but as my glance went outside it saw the largest, strangest bird I’d ever seen. Eventually, class ended. Second period was my free period for the day, so the plan was anxious email-checking. With coffee in hand, I slid into a cafeteria table to open my laptop up. My body seized. Every movement I made, even simple clicking to open tabs, was laborious and somehow difficult. Somehow, I managed. I opened my email inbox and forced my eyes to read coherently. There it was. I got in. I got into loving Harvard. I was an unremarkably good student with a GPA of 3.8, junior varsity soccer, and Model UN under my belt. I never thought this was possible. I only even applied to Harvard to mess with my parents. They laughed when I mentioned applying to Chicago, so I applied to Harvard instead. When pigs fly, my dad had said. I didn’t put two and two together until school ended. For the way home, the bus driver always played NPR. Today, for a record-breakingly large 9-figure Powerball jackpot, over a million people had already submitted winning tickets to claim the prize. Many people who submitted not-quite-winning tickets stood to win more than the actual winners, given that there were so many of them. Somewhat baffled, I returned home to find my father weeping on the dining room table. It wasn’t what I’d planned for my afternoon, but it seemed that trying to talk to Dad was the Right Thing to Do. I sat at his corner and asked if he was okay. “Your… your mother…” Uh-oh. “What happened?” “You…you know our handyman.” “Steve, yeah.” “Well, your mother and I, we-“ For a second I was afraid he was choking. Finally, he sighed. “We used to argue. I didn’t know what to say sometimes, so I-“ Again with the choking, “I’d just run her up and down, talking about how she was looking at our handyman while she was supervising him. And she always … She always said that she would never, only if-“ “Pigs fly?” I interrupted. I’m a bad kid, but my dad’s head snapped up as soon as he heard it. They were strange words to take from his mouth. Without another word, I got up from the table, went to the den, and turned the TV on. This was the day. Pigs were in the air that day. I had to know what else had happened to peoples’ dreams and curses. The world’s sarcasm seemed to be a blessing. Trade summits had already been scheduled in Syria and the Democratic Republic of Congo for the following week. The Demilitarized Zone in Korea had been demilitarized. China had recognized the sovereignty of Tibet and Taiwan. The global capital markets, however, were in utter chaos. All of the major stock exchanges had been closed for hours, yet they were all fluctuating. It almost seemed like each flippant comment was being processed in order. I wasn’t half done catching up on what I was looking for when a sudden thud and shatter startled me upright. “What the gently caress?!” I ran up next to my dad to find a winged pig on its side shuffling its legs impotently into the air. Its head was bleeding in several places, and a few large shards of glass were still lodged in its flesh. It seemed to be about halfway between piglet and hog, so I managed to cradle it in my arms and get it to the bathroom so I could clean it off. Do not discount the strength of a pig. The hydrogen peroxide clearly wasn’t fun for it, and as a result it was much less fun for me. The wings flapped upon reaction as well; I’m convinced that there’s a small feather lodged beneath my right eyeball, and I will never be able to retrieve it. Eventually, with its wounds dressed, the pig acquiesced to a makeshift bed made of my mother’s garments. For reasons I hope never to understand, my father took great joy at the sight. He gave me the tightest hug I’ve ever felt and wished me a good night. —- When I awoke the next morning, the pig was gone. It had simply vanished. There were no traces of movement, no disturbances to the doors or windows. I checked the internet. The markets were still in flux. Myriad small, dictatorial nations expressed resolve and hope in the upcoming summits. My mother never came home. I haven’t seen or heard from her in years. But the pigs never did make the news.
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May 22, 2017 07:52
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