I was in my grandmother’s attic. A small dusty box filled with old letters and poems sat open next to me, and I shuffled through the box gently. I had been going through my grandmother’s things for a few hours before getting to this particular box.
The promise of a cool 50 bucks and pizza for dinner had me spending a slow summer day reorganizing the chaos that was up here. My grandmother loved writing and there were hundreds of boxes up here filled with poems and stories that she had written over the years.
This particular box was different though. It had been wrapped with a rosary and the outside of it was covered in scripture. My Grandmother was admittedly, a very spiritual woman, and there were several boxes that were filled with old bibles and notebooks full of scripture, but this box was different. It felt different, and when I got to the folded up parchment closed with a wax seal bearing a cross, I simply couldn’t help myself, I read it.
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Another soul at the edge of life, gripping tightly to the knife, There is no ripping, there is no tearing, The blade is sharp and my patience wearing. Not across the street, but down the road, the end of which will lighten your load.
I hear the sound of someone weeping, I whisper how I’m only sleeping. I’m slipping down to Death’s sweet keeping. The fear comes fast and has me fleeing, from this darkness that I’m seeing, I’m reaching out, I might be dreaming, Is that sound my Mother screaming?
I’m waking now from some place foul, from burning depths and endless bowels. There is no begging, there is no pleading. My Mother sits, contract reading. It wasn’t my life that I took, upon her face a haunted look.
She signs the page in ink that’s red, A bargain struck, the Demon said. I’ve raised your daughter from the dead.
-Mary Anne. 1985
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I stared at the name at the bottom of the poem. Mary Anne was my mother’s name. I shivered, I could feel the cogs in my brain beginning to spin. I knew something terrible had happened to my mother when she was young, and I had vivid memories of waking up as a child to the sound of her screaming. She took heavy tranquilizers before bed to keep her from having nightmares but they didn’t always work.
My mother had been institutionalized when I was eight and I wasn’t allowed to have any contact with her. I hadn’t seen or heard from her in over fifteen years. Something about the poem was nagging me, there was something familiar about it that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. I looked down at my arm, rubbing the long burn scar that went from my wrist all the way up to my elbow.
“She didn’t know baby, grandma didn’t know you would be born, she didn’t know when she signed sweetie”
I frowned at the ghost of my mother’s voice, I couldn’t remember what she had been referring to. I leaned back and closed my eyes, focusing, trying to get the memory to surface.
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It was the middle of the night, Mom and I were in the kitchen, as we often were when I woke up to her screaming. “Warm milk and some cookies will make us all feel a little better.” It was what she always said during our little night time meetings.
I remember she always asked me about my dreams, she seemed to enjoy hearing them, and paid absolute attention when I would describe them to her. I had, however, been having a recurring dream, I remember that, I also remember I hadn’t told her about it.
I watched as she put the kettle on the stove, coffee was what had soothed her soul and I remember the constant smell of it. “Did you dream?” She always asked it with a smile, but it was the kind of smile someone has when they ask you something and they don’t want you to know how important the answer really is.
I hesitated. I didn’t want to tell her about my dream, because Mr. Sam had told me not to. Mr. Sam had started showing up a few months before, he was my special dream friend and I knew mom wouldn’t like it if she found out about him. I looked down, rubbing the long red birthmark that ran from my wrist all the way up to my elbow.
“No mama, I didn’t dream.” I knew as soon as the words were out of my mouth that she wouldn’t believe me. I watched as she turned away from the stove to stare at me. I had never seen that look on my mothers face before and it scared me.
“Tell me about the dream, Right. Now.” I had never once in my life heard my momma yell, or see her get mad, or hear her say anything mean to anyone, so I knew right away that this was serious and I had better tell her the truth.
So I did. I told her about Mr. Sam, my special dream friend, and she asked me some very pointed questions like, “What does Mr. Sam look like? Is Mr. Sam his whole name? Does Mr. Sam tell you to do anything? How often do you see Mr. Sam?” I’ll never forget watching the light slowly die from my mother’s eyes as I answered her questions.
I told her that Mr. Sam is a big black goat, with long twisty horns. I told her that Mr. Sam’s name was Samael, but he said i could call him Mr. Sam if I wanted since that was easier. I told her Mr. Sam doesn’t really tell me to do things, that he just comes into my dreams and plays with me, and sometimes he says stuff I didn’t really understand like “You are past the age of innocence and soon I will come for you.”
I explained that Mr. Sam had told me that my birth mark was a beacon and he would be able to find me anywhere in the whole wide world, that it connected us and we would always be best friends, which honestly I had been really happy about because Mr. Sam was a talking goat and I thought it was really cool to have a talking goat as a best friend.
I jumped, looking up as the kettle began screaming, and I saw my mother’s face. I had never seen anyone with eyes like that, they were flat and dead. I froze in my seat, something terrible was going to happen. I just knew it was, it was like the whole house was alive and watching.
I watched as my Mother reached slowly over and turned off the stove, her eyes never left me. I watched as she grabbed the kettle, lifting it woodenly, she shuffled towards me and I remember getting scared because she moved like a zombie from one of my books.
“She didn’t know baby, grandma didn’t know you would be born, she didn’t know when she signed sweetie” Momma’s voice was sad as she reached down and took my small hand in hers turning it over.
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I shook the memory away before it could go any further, I sat staring down at that horrible poem and I wept.