Video games were strange places to hide notes.
I was sorting through my old collection of PS2 games, reminiscing on the classics, when a scrappy piece of paper slipped from my copy of Kingdom Hearts. It had been neatly sandwiched behind the game itself, frozen in time, a folded crease splitting it in half, the corners chewed. Kingdom Hearts was my favorite game as a little kid. We couldn’t afford the consoles my friends were playing at school, but a PlayStation 2 was good enough for me.
I didn’t recognise the handwriting clumsily written in bright green marker, by what I guessed was a preschooler.
“Seri. Itz my tern 2 play. Giv mee the controla NOW or iym tELLING Mommy YOUR BEEING A NOODLE HEAD.
NoAH.
PS. Yoo hav 5 sexond or the bom will ECSPLOWDE!!!!
Cute.
The note felt strange in my hands. Familiar, and also not. I don’t know what it was about this piece of paper, but just holding it made me feel almost hollow, a suffocating feeling slamming into me like waves of ice water. Loneliness. Suddenly, it felt like I was alone in the world, and always had been. My bedroom was too small, closing in on me. I choked out several breaths to get a hold of myself, squeezing the paper between my fingers. Why did I feel like I knew this writing?
I didn’t just know it. It felt like a part of me had been cruelly torn away, a piece of me I didn’t know existed. And seeing these childish squiggles brought it back. Letting the note slip through my fingers, I shuffled back on my bed, my stomach twisting.
I didn’t have a sibling.
But that was definitely my name written in a stranger’s writing.
“Seri, are you ready?” Mom’s voice came from downstairs.
I had forgotten I’d gone upstairs to grab a pile of games to take to the thrift store.
Without thinking, I scooped up the rest of the pile, leaving Kingdom Hearts and the note on the floor. I dumped them in my backpack, and before I could stop myself, slipped the note in my jeans.
There was probably an explanation. Mom had friends with kids, so it was probably some random kid I’d been playing with.
Was it normal to forget or suppress them though?
I had memories of solo playing Kingdom Hearts. That thought in particular twisted my gut, and I felt nauseous all the way to the thrift store. I wasn’t surprised when Mom insisted on milkshakes at the diner.
She even got my favorite. Double fudge brownie with extra whipped cream. But I wasn’t stupid. I may have been easily blackmailed as a little kid with sweet treats. Now, however, I preferred cash.
I knew what this talk was about.
Thanksgiving dinner at Grandma’s.
Mom had been playing around the subject for a while now, casually mentioning it over dinner, or when I was half asleep, spooning cereal into my mouth before school. I wasn’t quiet about my disdain for Grandma’s house.
Located in the middle of nowhere, my grammy’s house reminded me more of Dracula’s castle. There were too many rooms to get lost in, doors that led down hallways that reminded me of The Shining, and everything was frozen in the mid 1900’s. Mom offered to renovate the house, but apparently grammy was comfortable living like she was reliving the Spanish flu. I wouldn’t have hated it so much if her house of horrors was actually interesting. But I wasn’t allowed to explore. I had to stay in the lounge and freeze to death while the adults got tipsy on cocktails, Grandma repeatedly asking me if I wanted more candy. The year before was painfully boring.
Grammy refused to turn the heating on, expecting her tiny fireplace to actually generate heat around the house. I spent the whole time that year curled up in a chair playing on my Switch, which died halfway through dinner. I brought my charger, but none of the outlets were working. Of course. Grammy didn’t have a TV, only an ancient radio that didn’t even have a touch screen. She did have an ancient games console, but there was no TV to connect it to. Thanksgiving was for family get-togethers, but in the Eaton household, it was more of an adult thing.
I had no doubt Thanksgiving 2022 was going to be just as insufferable.
I had been hoping to use the I’m almost eighteen excuse, but Mom was winning me over with surprise shakes.
The shake was as sickly as I remembered. I downed half of it, sure I was going to projectile whipping cream everywhere. The diner was our special place. Even the booth was ours. Ever since I was a kid, it was always the second booth from the door. I sat by the window, Mom opposite me. I found my gaze wandering. The seat next to Mom felt too empty. Like someone was supposed to be sitting there. There was that feeling again. Loneliness I didn’t understand. It was always just me and Mom. So, why were my eyes stinging?
“Seri.”
Mom’s voice tore me from my thoughts. I had been absently staring at the seat next to mine. I had a vague memory of being cramped up and squashed into the window. I looked up, downing the remnants of my milkshake to choke the questions slowly taking form in the back of my throat. “Yes,” I swiped cream from my lips and fixed my Mom with my best smile. “I’ll come to Grandma’s for Thanksgiving dinner.”
Mom’s expression crumpled. “How…?”
“You conveniently bought me my favorite shake the day before Thanksgiving,” I rolled my eyes when her lips broke out into a wide smile. It’s not like I had a choice. Before she could burst from excitement, though, I pulled the note from my pocket and smoothed it out in front of her. “On one condition,” I slurped up the last of my shake. Dangerous territory. I was going to barf if I kept downing the dregs of chocolate syrup sticking to the bottom of the glass. “Can you tell me who wrote this?”
I don’t think I had ever seen her go that pale before.
Mom’s expression crumpled. Her lips twitched, like she might speak, before she pulled her mouth into a wide smile.
Leaning forward, she plucked up the note like it was poisonous and stuffed it into her coat pocket. I opened my mouth to protest, but she was already speaking, at first hesitantly, like Mom was unsure of her words. “Seri,” she cleared her throat, wrapping both hands around her mocha.
“Do you remember Jane?”
I shrugged, pulling my legs to my chest. Again, my gaze was wandering, like it was searching for something–or someone. I rested my chin on my knees, trying to avoid eye contact with Mom.
“Jane from Australia?” I said. “Your Facebook friend?”
Mom straightened up. “Jane,” she said, her tone hardening, like I was supposed to remember someone who knew me as a baby. “You remember Jane! She lived down the block and made your favourite cupcakes,” her smile was too wide when she reached for my hand, entangling our fingers. “Red velvet cupcakes! Seri, you remember Jane!”
Mom’s eyes were manic, lips stretched into a grin. Like she was trying to convince not just me, but also herself. To her credit, though, there probably was a Jane. Mom had too many friends to count, so it made sense that this woman would slip through my memory.
But still. I couldn’t seem to tear my gaze from the seat next to her, my mind trying and failing to carve a figure from nothing. I blinked. There was nobody there, so why was my subconscious telling me otherwise? I hadn’t notice until that moment, but both of us were playing a game neither of us wanted to lose. I didn’t believe her, and she knew I wasn’t buying it. Mom studied me like she could see right through me. I tore my gaze from the seat next to hers.
“I don’t like red velvet,” I said, snapping out of it.
Mom cocked her head. “Since when?”
“Birth.”
She dismissed my words with an eye roll. “Anyway!” I could see the mania alive in her eyes, though, panic and paranoia tearing her apart from the inside. I should have backed off. But it was Mom’s expression that sent shivers creeping down my spine. She wanted me to believe her words, each one slipping from her lips dripping with desperation.
She didn’t just want me to believe them.
Mom wanted to believe her own BS.
“Well, Jane from down the block, Jane with the bad hair cut! You know Jane!” she bopped me on the head, still with that smile that was too wide. Mom had zero subtlety. “She had a son who was the same age as you! His name…” Mom cleared her throat, swiping at her eyes.
She made it out like she was fixing her makeup, though I could have sworn there were tears in her eyes. “His name was Noah,” Mom pulled out the note and waved it in my face, though I noticed she was gripping it a little too hard. She slapped it on the table, like she was putting the final card down, almost breathless, her smile widening.
Mom was winning the game.
I could hear her triumph in every word. “You kids used to spend all day playing video games. Noah was a… sweet child. He was always polite, and stayed for dinner when his parents were at work.” she swiped at her eyes again, her lips twitching like she was going to speak, but instead she stayed silent.
Noah.
The name felt right on my tongue, like I knew it.
Except why would I forget such a close childhood friend?
“Noah,” I said. “So, that’s who was writing me notes?”
“Mm. He was more literate than you,” she chuckled. “Only a year older, and while you were struggling to write your name, Noah could write full sentences.”
Jeez, I thought. Why didn’t she just adopt this mysterious whizz kid and replace me?
“Oh,” I said, dropping my legs. She was waiting for me to ask questions. I could sense the cogs turning on her brain. “So, did we stop talking or something?”
“Yes.” She picked up the note, smoothing it down with her nails. “I believe you just simply drifted apart.”
“That doesn’t make sense,” I found myself saying. I snatched the note off of her before she could dispose of it. “Why would he leave?”
Mom continued to sip coffee from a cup I knew was empty, her gaze never really finding mine. Instead, she was looking everywhere else but at me. Mom stared outside at the darkening sky, streaks of orange and yellow illuminating the horizon. I couldn’t help being in awe of my mother’s beauty. The kids at school were convinced she was my older sister.
I inherited her light blonde hair, though on my mother, every strand was perfectly in place, haloing her face. The late afternoon sunlight illuminated her face free of flaws. She really was beautiful.
I was like a Walmart version.
“Sorry, what was that, honey?”
Her tone was soft, almost whimsical, her eyes following fall leaves dancing across the sidewalk outside. I followed where she was really looking. Mom was watching a family of three loading groceries into their car. The parents were struggling with bags, while their kids, a boy and a girl, ran after each other, splashing through puddles.
Mom watched them, a sadness in her eyes I didn’t understand.
“Mom.” I said, with an edge to my tone.
“Hm?” she took another dainty sip of coffee that wasn’t real. I watched her drain her cup when we first sat down.
“He left,” I said, louder. I prodded the note, and that caught her attention. Mom whipped around to face me once more, her expression hardening. “This kid who was supposedly my best friend just stopped talking to me one day?”
Something in her face twisted, and I knew not to push further. She stood up and grabbed her bag, gesturing for me to follow. “Children, especially young children, will grow out of friendships,” she said coldly. “Noah grew up. You both did. It is a completely natural and normal thing to happen.”
I found myself nodding and following Mom out of the door, my chest clenching. I was paranoid, watching the note in her clenched fist. I opened my mouth to ask her for it back. That little piece of paper was my only connection to a stranger in my life that had been torn away. Once we were outside, and I was pulling my jacket around me, she was quick to rip it up, and dropped it into a murky puddle.
I felt something shatter inside of me, watching the note dissolve into nothing.
“Mom–” I jumped forward to try and retrieve it, only for her to step in front of me. She was shaking, I noticed, her hands balled into fists by her side.
“It’s late,” she said. “Let’s go home.” Mom spoke in finality, and my arms dropped to my sides. My mother had a certain commanding tone that at times felt comforting, like she was dragging me back to reality.
But in this case, Mom was plunging me deeper into oblivion.
Reality felt further and further away, despite feeling the crunch of my shoes on rough tarmac, and the ice cold wind whipping my hair back. Part of me wanted to try and rescue the note, though from my mother’s expression, hard, almost hollow, I bowed my head and followed her to the car. I felt breathless, like any counter words I could come up with would be sucked away. I saw her eerie silence as a warning for me to drop it. And I did.
I forgot about the note, spending my evening helping her make cupcakes for Grandma. I hugged her, wrapping my arms around her. It was better to admit defeat than elsk on eggshells around her– especially on a holiday. Mom was the one who was more lenient with the rules, after all. Previously, I wasn’t even allowed electronics at Grandma’s.
Grammy insisted on a traditional holiday dinner. Mom eventually let me bring my Switch on the condition that it would be turned off when we were eating. Thanksgiving arrived, and we got up early for the long car-ride to Grandma’s. I usually napped for the majority of the journey, though it was too cold, both car windows rolled down, wind slapping me in the face.
“Are we there yet?” I joked, ten minutes into our four hour journey.
We weren’t even on the highway yet.
Mom cranked the radio up, her and dad singing along to 90’s music I vaguely knew, and I leaned back and closed my eyes. Motion sickness was my worst nightmare, especially on a road trip.
I tried to read books on my phone, but my stomach really did not like that.
I gulped down some water. Then a can of soda to settle my gut. Both of them made me feel worse, and by the time we were on the highway, I was shuffling uncomfortably in my seat, well aware of my temperature slowly rising despite the ice cold wind in my face. Usually when I feel sick, I look for something to occupy my mind so I don’t bother my parents.
But my phone signal was dead, and there was only a certain amount of times I could scroll through my photos and an offline Spotify playlist before I started to go insane. My hands started wandering, first picking at the battered leather seat, and then delving in between them.
I wasn’t expecting to pinch something, what felt like a folded up piece of card.
I glanced at the front seat. Mom and Dad were reminiscing their anniversary, nodding along to a 90’s ballad. I took the opportunity to pull the card out from under my seat. It was a folded up piece of paper, stuffed into half of a birthday card. There was a message written in smudged black pen. Unlike the note I had stupidly given to Mom, which she had destroyed, this one looked recent, maybe a few years old.
“I dare you to tell Mom Leonardo D’caprisun has died. Maybe she’ll turn the car around and we won’t have to go see the wicked witch of the west :((((.
Noah.
“Seri?”
Mom’s voice was too close. I could sense her slowly turning around to check up on me. I jumped into action, stuffing the new note between my legs.
“Yeah?” Swallowing hard, I pasted a smile on my face despite sour bile slowly rising up my throat. My hands were shaking in my lap. Noah, my childhood friend, had somehow been inside our car. This time, a teenage version. I clung onto the note as if she was going to rip it away from me again.
Mom was lying to me.
Noah wasn’t a childhood friend.
So, who was he?
“Are you okay?” Mom was frowning when I lifted my head. “Sweetie, you look pale. Do you have car sickness?”
I couldn’t help it. The words were in my mouth before I could swallow them down.
I stuffed my hands down the seat once again, searching for more notes from this phantom stranger who wouldn’t leave me alone. Who was ripped from every memory. My fingers did skim across something, though it wasn’t a note.
It was a pen. The same pen used to write the message.
Which meant this wasn’t some little kid from when I was a pre-scooler. I didn’t know when the pen had been used. It could have been the day before, or two whole years prior. Dad never cleaned the car, so I was still finding McDonald’s wrappers from 2020 stuffed in the back.
“Mom. I’m an only child, right?”
Her expression didn’t waver this time.
“This again?”
“I’m just asking.”
“Of course you are, Seri.” Mom twisted around in her seat. “Is this about yesterday?” She directed the conversation to Dad. Though, I couldn’t help notice his fingers had tightened around the wheel. “Seri found a note from one of the boys she used to play with. You remember little Noah, right?”
Dad didn’t reply for a moment, his gaze on the road. Mom lightly shoved him.
“Hm?” His voice was gruff. “Oh, yeah! Noah. I remember that kid.” Dad laughed heartily. “Sweetie, do you remember playing that game with him?”
“Kingdom Hearts,” I said through a breath.
“Yeah! The Disney one. You kids were obsessed. We tried to get you to play outside, but you insisted. One summer we had to physically drag you outside!”
I wasn’t buying it. “So, me and this kid were close?”
“Yeah! But all you did was sit inside and write to yourself! You had quite the imagination! You even…” Dad drifted off when Mom nudged him again. Harder. His sharp exhale of breath told me her elbow had actually made a mark. I watched his fingers gripping at the wheel, white smudging his knuckles, the crease between his brows. “Noah. He was, uh, a really great kid.”
Mom’s smile made my stomach projectile into my throat. Her eyes were to wide, almost cartoon wide. Like she was doing her utmost to sway my thoughts, planting seeds in my mind. “See! Now, why on earth would you think you’re not an only child? It’s always been you Seri. We only wanted one child, and that was you.” I wanted to find sincerity in her eyes, but all I could see was slowly blossoming paranoia, fear twitching between her brows. Her gaze was on my clenched fingers, like she could sense the note. Eventually, she gave up. “You were our first…” Mom leaned back in her seat.
“And our last.”
I noticed her eagle eyes flash to the car mirror. “What have you got there?”
“Nothing.” I shoved the note in my pocket when she averted her gaze. Mom had eyes in the back of her head.
“I was just curious,” I said, shrinking in my seat. I was with my parents. I was safe. I should have felt safe. So, why did I feel like I was being driven into darkness? An unsettling feeling came over me, and wouldn’t leave me alone. Mom didn’t look like my mother anymore, more of a faceless shadow in the front seat.
While dad was drowned out completely.
The sun was too bright, and I had a sudden overwhelming urge to jump out of the car. When Mom chuckled and changed the subject to her and dad’s jobs, I leaned my head back, squeezing my eyes shut, allowing the jerking movement of the car to calm me down.
I had to concentrate. If I did have a sibling, why would I forget about them?
And more so, why would my parents try to hide their existence?
I didn’t mean to actually fall asleep. I dreamed of trips to the diner with three shadowy faces I couldn’t make out, and Mom. This time I was squashed against the window, though I felt comforted by the silhouette next to me. I shoved them, and they shoved me back, snatching my straw from my drink. But the figure did not have a face. Neither did the one opposite me. They existed as carvings of figures, footprints in the snow.
Mom, however, did have a face.
Her lips were moving, but her voice was drowned out. She was talking to the shadow next to me, and I could hear phantom laughter that sounded both real and not, a voice trying to force its way through the barrier in my mind.
“Hey!” my voice was real, enveloping theirs.
“Mom! Mommy, I don’t want–”
One figure lunged across the table, this time grabbing my shake and pretending to drink it. I tried to look through the shadow, but there was nothing.
Even its voice sounded wrong, like faded ocean waves. I was just staring into pooling darkness, a deep, dark cavern where something used to be. Another memory hit me. This time I was in the back of Dad’s car. The windows were dark, the moon following me through the window, bobbing through illuminated clouds. “What did I tell you?” Mom’s voice was loud. I was squashed between two figures again. Neither of them moved. “Seri, give me the pen,” Mom’s voice swam in and out of clarity.
*“Honestly, how old are you? I’m so tired of this. Give me the pen. Now.”
Already, I could sense my younger self shoving the pen down the crease in the seat. “What pen?” my voice was giggly.
“I don’t have a pen!”
Mom turned around so fast I jumped back.
For one fleeting moment, she did not have a face.
“Give me,” the shadow with the voice reached out its long, spindly arm, “The pen.”
I shook my head. “What? Noah has it!”
The car jolted, the reflection of the moon dancing across the window. I blinked rapidly. The shadow with Mom’s voice turned back around, her voice breaking around the words. “Seri, I don’t know how many times I have to tell you this, but Noah is not–”
Before I knew what was happening, I was waking up with my head against the window, an embarrassing amount of drool pooling down my chin. The door opened suddenly, and I jerked properly awake, reaching for the note stuffed in my lap. Mom’s hands were gently shaking me. “Hey, sweetie, we’re here.”
I could only respond through a grunt, jumping out of the car.
My shoes landed in ankle deep snow, and I took a moment to groggily drink in my surroundings. It was lightly snowing, flakes dancing across my eyes and clinging to the strands of my hair.
Grandma’s house towered over us, a foreboding presence to it. There were no holiday lights, or lights in general, so I had to use my phone flashlight, stumbling after my parents up the long winding concrete steps and through the gate. When we stepped through the door, I could see my breath in wisps of white. “Can we please turn on the heating?” I whispered, only for Mom and Dad to ignore me and head into the kitchen to greet Grandma, who was clanging around already making dinner.
My Grandma looked almost too good for her age. Her hair was held in a strict ponytail, and just like my mother, not a strand was out of place. I was desperate for her skin care routine, because when she saw us, her face lit up, her made-up eyes brightened. Grandma was made of sunshine, on the outside at least. She didn’t look a day over 30, free of flaws, smooth, perfect skin and silky hair that I was envious of. I couldn’t wait to grow up and be ID’d past my prime.
I stood at the door, grateful for the warm golden light filling the darkness of the house. Mom pulled out food she’d made at home, and dad made several unfunny Dad jokes, popping champagne and offering to help Granny with the food.
I waited for Grandma to suffocate me in hugs and throw sweet treats in my face.
But she just continued talking to Mom about her job.
After a while, I started to feel invisible.
“I’ve applied to Berkeley, Grammy,” I said loudly, only for her to speak right over me. Rude, but I figured she was excited to speak to my parents. Dad made drinks. Coffee for him and Mom, and a sweet tea for Grandma. I headed over to the faucet to make my own, but he shut the cupboard before I could grab a glass.
“Dad,” I said, “Can I get a drink of soda?”
He didn’t reply, laughing at the joke my Mom made about his cooking.
When I stepped in front of him and demanded a drink, his eyes didn’t find me, instead drifting past, his lips latched to his own coffee mug. I stepped back and pasted a smile on my face. Being blatantly ignored stung, but I could play the same game. “Fine,” I said, shooting Mom the stink eye. She continued downing her wine, a smile splitting her lips. “I’ll go entertain myself in the dining room.”
Usually, the rule was for me to stay out of the dining room until dinner. I waited for them to come back to life, warning me to stay out. But they kept talking, completely ignoring my announcement. So, I strode past my mother, intentionally knocking into her. She almost dropped her champagne glass, her fingers tightening around the rim. I waited for her to start yelling at me, though her eyes skimmed right past me.
“Mom.” I said through a sharp breath. I thought it was a joke at first, some stupid joke between adults. Except this joke had been going on for too long. I situated myself in front of her, waving my arms. “Mom, why are you ignoring me?”
It wasn’t just ignorance, I quickly came to realize. My family had decided to pretend I didn’t exist. I sat down with them for dinner at my usual place. I noticed there were more plates than needed at the table, including one for me. Which was ignored. There were only my parents and my Grandma, but there were eight sets of plates and silverware. A glass was set in front of me but it wasn’t filled.
When I reached to fill my own plate, since Mom had seemingly forgotten my existence, the food was swiped from the table before I could wrap my hands around the potato salad.
I tried to grab the gravy.
Same thing. Dad reached for it for his own dinner, ignoring my protests.
When my family were eating, laughing and joking around, I sat back in my chair, frustrated tears stinging my eyes. I started to notice it in slight splinters at the corner of my eye. When I was glaring at my mother eating the last of the turkey and giggling over the rim of her glass, something next to me moved.
A fork slid across the table, daintily jumping into the air, and hovering for a moment before dropping onto the floor.
Mom definitely heard the loud clang, pausing in sipping wine from her glass.
Dad stopped chewing.
Grandma stayed perfectly still. Her plate was still filled, as was her glass.
I took the opportunity to stand up, making myself known. I picked up my own glass and dropped it onto the ground. “What is going on?” I demanded over the sound of shattering on the floor. Mom flinched, and a shiver crept down my spine, phantom bugs filling my mouth. “Mom, I know you can see me!” Before I could stop myself, I strode over to her and snatched her wine, throwing it at the wall.
Mom didn’t even blink, though her gaze snapped to me for a fraction of a second, her hands trembling in mid air as if still holding her drink, before dropping into her lap. Her reaction was enough. Enough to make me feel invisible.
Like a barrier stood between us.
“Why are you doing this?” I whispered. There was that feeling again, swamping me in ice cold water. Loneliness. I thought I didn’t know or understand it, but the feeling of suffocating in my own bubble, cut off from the people around me, was familiar. I knew the feeling of being ignored, and it felt like a blunt knife being violently dragged down my spine.
I slumped back into my seat when they continued talking.
“I know you can see me!”
The lights above flickered, Mom flinching again.
“They don’t want to see us, Noodle Head.”
The voice was both familiar and not, just like the note.
Suddenly, it was as if a barrier I didn’t know existed was pierced through.
The voice slammed into me, and I lifted my head. I exhaled, and I could see my breath. The world continued around us, my parents talking and eating, while I found myself plunged into this unknown, this limbo between reality and something else entirely. The table was a lot fuller than I remembered. The chair opposite me was occupied, a boy my age hiding behind a mess of blondish brown curls.
Something acidic crept up my throat. There was something wrapped around him, frayed rope binding his arms to the chair, his body to the table. There wasn’t just rope. There were chains, rusted and falling apart, pinning him to his seat.
Glancing down, I saw shackles around his ankles, loose chain running directly under the floor. This guy looked like he had been plucked directly from the past, and yet also had the expression of a 21st century teenager. There were creases in his face that shouldn’t exist, streaks of grey in his hair. His clothes, a jacket and jeans, were hanging off of him, a skeletal figure drained of all life. He looked both seventeen and seventy, playful eyes almost mimicking those of a child.
I knew his voice, mocking his younger self.
I knew his rolled eyes, his brow raising into his hairline.
Noah.
I felt like I couldn’t breathe, the breath dragged from my lungs.
My brother.
Three Thanksgiving’s ago, I was told not to look at him. I was told to ignore him.
His ghostly voice hit me, a frightened cry. “Seri, you can see me, right?!”
Noah had slammed his hands on the table. “Please! Seri, you know I’m here!”
“Look away, Seri,” Mom had said calmly, ignoring his screams.
I did.
And I forgot my own fucking brother existed.
“It doesn’t hurt!” another voice I knew, one that squeezed my heart.
Sitting next to Noah, willowy blonde hair turned grey and lifeless, was my little sister Alex. I forgot her four Thanksgiving’s ago, forced to turn away from my wailing sister screaming to be acknowledged, while phantom rope turned to real rope, coiling around her arms and snaking across her neck.
Presently, Alex’s hand was skeletel when she lifted it to wave. I could see the ugly rinds of skin, rugged and ancient.
My sister was a year younger than me.
Twelve, when I forgot her, and presently fifteen.
Fifteen, with yellowed teeth, her eyes sunken.
I had siblings.
Kids my mind had suppressed into shadows.
“Yes it does,” Next to my father was Annalise, my older cousin, skin and bones. Her smile though, was still sweet.
I had a vague memory of my cousin following me around, begging with me to look at her. But I stared at the ground. Mom told me to look at my food instead. Annalise’s restraints were the oldest, her beautiful face haggard.
“You just don’t remember it.”
I could feel myself moving back, a cry clawing in my throat.
They were always there, shadows in the diner, and squashed next to me in the car.
How did I forget them?
“Mom.” I knew she could hear me. I jumped up, only to be dragged back into my seat, phantom tendrils snaking around the back of my neck. I could sense them entwining around me, unearthly rope pinning me to the seat, ghostly chains suffocating my screams.
I choked on a shriek when the first layer of flesh was ripped from my arm, which was violently dragged behind me. A second layer, and the pain was white hot, sending my thoughts into a whirlwind.
“Happy Thanksgiving,” Mom spoke through a strained smile and lifted her glass, when I was watching streaks of red pooling down my arm and spotting my plate. The skin on the backs of my hands was starting to fold and wrinkle.
Mom’s smile was directed at Grammy on the other side of the table. With the barrier breaking through, clarity was starting to bleed through. I didn’t remember Grammy not having eyes, her head bowed and shrouded in darkness. But I could hear her lips smacking together, like she was eating.
I caught Alex wincing, her lips forming a silent cry.
Annalise squeezed her eyes shut, and Noah tipped his head back, lips parting.
Grammy was eating them, gnawing on them like fresh meat, stripping their flesh straight from the bone, sucking the life from their faces. Annalise’s cheeks were sinking, turning gaunt.
“And,” Mom tripped over her word when I felt the skin start to peel from my face.
I could no longer feel pain, my body was numb. But it wasn’t a mercy. The more that I felt myself being stripped of my life, my mind, my thoughts started to turn to soup. I had to blink several times and remind myself of my name.
But it was getting harder to string words together in my mouth.
“Happy 250th birthday, Mother.”
The lights flickered, and Noah let out a breath.
“I’m sorry,” he said, when that phantom tumor continued eating away through me, chewing through everything I was.
“Grammy has to eat.”
I couldn’t move my arms, they were already shackled down.
My lips were numb, unresponsive.
“Wait.”
Mom’s voice was calm. She turned to my dad, “Sweetie, could you go upstairs?”
“This is new,” Alex hummed, my brother agreeing with a low murmur.
Dad’s face turned ghostly white. “But..” he laughed, though it was choked. “You said if we leave…” I had never seen my dad look so scared. Mom didn’t speak, but her expression was final. Dad’s lip curled in disgust. He started to protest, only to shut his mouth. Still though, he stood up and nodded, leaving the table.
When he shut the door, Mom turned to Grammy.
I didn’t remember her not having eyes.
She was still beautiful, youthful, and yet her eyes had been carved from her skull.
With the barrier no longer there, I could see her for who she really was.
“Can I talk to my daughter, please?” Mom asked the thing with Grammy’s face.
It nodded, and slowly raised its hands to cover its eyes.
“Seri.” Mom stood up slowly. She didn’t move towards me or even look at me. But she did speak directly to me.
“Do not look at them,” she said in a sharp breath. “Don’t touch them. Don’t speak their names, or aknowledge them.” her gaze found each seat. Alex, and then Noah, and finally Annalise.
“Run.” she said. “There is an old phone box down the road. Tell them you need help. And promise me you won’t look back.” When she lunged at me, part of me thought she was going to attack me. Except her trembling arms were going around my neck, squeezing me to her, and then grasping for my restraints.
“Promise me,” she spoke through sobs that wracked her chest.
“Don’t look at them. Don’t say their names. But when you realize what you have thrown away, you have to use it.”
Her smile was bright and beautiful despite her skin flaking away. “It runs in the family, Seri. Remember that.”
When the ground rumbled, and the thing that was my grandma lowered her hands from her eyes, my mother squeezed me tighter. I knew exactly what she meant. She didn’t want me to forget them.
Mom wanted me to save her children.
I did not cry or scream when my mother started to wither away, her skin peeling and then melting from her bones when I jumped up on unsteady feet, grasping for my sisters chains and choking out her name. I was pulling my sister from the chair, when Mom dropped onto her knees in front of grandma, and begged for forgiveness.
Alex was already pulling a shaken looking Annalise to her feet, and Grandma let out an unearthly cry.
The more of my family I was freeing, Mom was growing more haggard, her face sagging.
My hands were on Noah’s arms and pulling the ropes from his wrists, when our mother dropped to the floor, crumbling into dust. Grandma stood up, then, nothing but darkness hidden behind a pretty face. My hands were caught on Noah’s wrists, struggling through a particular knot, when Grammy, whose hair turned white, and then grey, opened her mouth, revealing razor sharp teeth. “Any day now,” Noah hissed out. He twisted around.
“I’m going as fast as I can,” I whispered.
“Seri, she’s coming!”
I almost had it, but the knot binding his wrists together was stubborn.
Grammy took a slow step, but just like Mom, she was starting to crumble.
Noah jumped up, pulling the chain from his wrist.
He was free.
And Grammy, or what was left of her, was gone.
With her, she took the suffocating darkness, and looking around at my siblings, whatever she had stripped from them, was slowly starting to creep back. Noah’s cheeks brightened. He looked his age again, the grey streaks and wrinkled skin making way for exactly what she took from him– from all of them. Granny, and my mother. I think my Grammy was a God of a different world. That’s what Alex hypothesised, anyway. She said the adults in our family held a ritual every Thanksgiving, sacrificing a child’s existence and using us to stay young.
I hugged my sister, squeezing her to my chest. Her youth came back slowly, bleeding into her facial features.
We found dad in the bathroom.
A pile of dust and a newspaper. I think he was reading it.
Did he know that freeing the other kids would mean his death? How old were my mother and father, and how long had they been using kids to sustain youth?
Noah told me there were more.
They still existed in the dining room, bound to chairs, forgotten and lost in that horrific purgatory between life and death. He said once you yourself lose your own name, as well as everyone else, you will fade into noneexistance.
This story, or experience, does not have a happy ending.
I may have freed my family from my grammy’s clutches, but somehow, they still don’t technically exist. They do to me. They always will. But when I opened the door and stepped out into the snow storm, my mother’s instructions running through my head, I could no longer see my sister. Looking next to me, my brother and cousin had faded into the snowfall too. I stepped back into the house, and there they were.
The house still holds them here.
It has shackled their souls and will not let them go. There are still kids to be freed, kids still lost, nameless and alone. Only when we find them and pull them from their chains, will I be able to take my siblings back home with me.
It’s like… a barrier.
They exist inside this house, while the real world has forgotten them.
Once either of them step over the threshold, I get scared they will fade away completely.
Still, it’s not all bad. I’m not leaving them, and I’m going to find those kids.
We’re spending Thanksgiving together this year, and we’re planning our own ritual.
Playing Kingdom Hearts all day, and binging on snacks.
Noah used to be SO smug that he could clear the island in like ten minutes. Traverse Town was his favorite level.
I’ve fully moved in, and we’re in the middle of renovating the house. I’ve managed to turn the outlets on (Grammy had them turned off) and brought my laptop, as well as a bunch of things from storage that Mom and Dad threw away.
Noah and Alex’s things were stuffed deep into our garage. We’ve been catching up on a lot. According to Annalise, our aunt had abandoned the family (and her) guilty of what she was doing. I’m currently researching the nameless God that feasts on children’s existences. Noah found old records of an adoption in 2006. Mom’s signature was on the paperwork.
We have another brother.
His name on the paperwork is Jordan, but so far “Jordan” is not working.
He’s here somewhere. I can sense him.
Until I find our lost brother, I guess I’ll stay here.
It didn’t take me long to regret being an only child, it’s like living with children. Alex wears my clothes, and Noah keeps trying to take over my research, Annalise taking the role of house Mom.
I hate that they constantly leave a mess, and blame ME for being too boring. Alex’s voice drives me crazy, and Noah definitely thinks he’s the smart sibling.
But at least I’m not lonely anymore.
I’m not going to tell them this, because they’ll freak out. But I’m pretty sure Grammy is across from me right now. She’s sitting at her place at the table.
Grammy is smiling.
Her rotton teeth are pulled into an ugly grin.
Her melted face stretched and disfigured.
Skeletal fingers tap on the table.
Waiting for me to face my cruel reality.
Mom wasn’t lying when she said I was her only child.
I found a grey streak in my hair this morning.
And part of me, the poisonous part of me, knows exactly how to get rid of it.