the family // pre-miracle
‘Twas the night.
That means dark. That means smoldering embers in the ashtray. That means alien glow of the late night news flickering off the ceiling. That means more questions than answers in a room full of empty.
And the glass coffee table stained and telling. Crumbs scattered, uncharted constellations shimmering in the low lit proclamations of the TV: another politician, another celebrity, another criminal, another fast remedy.
In the corner, the tree, no taller than the child who plucked it from the neighbor’s pile of garbage – curbside, plastic, and frozen in a diamond layer of sleet. Missing the top half. Dripping in the girl’s dark hair as the ice melted and she wound a blanket around the tripod base. That was a week ago.
Here, now, in this new night, Clementine and her baby sister sleep behind the wall with the television and the tree, only one of which draws Dad’s attention like nothing else has all day, and again like nothing will tomorrow either because tomorrow will be Sunday, and Mom is at the door letting the winter inside her because the cigarette between her lips doesn’t seem to be doing anything to calm her down.
And why should she calm down? Circumstances have conspired; stars, aligned. So, it seems more likely now than ever that the girls will be going somewhere else for a while. So, the social worker left a handwritten list of next steps, with the scrawled phone number of the city’s most affordable lawyer. So, the money in the jar labeled beach! won’t ever make it to the sand. So, Mom stands at the door.
Dad sits. Dad sits because he stands all day, and he crouches all day, and he worries all day, and that more than anything needs relief, so now he sits on the couch, elbows resting on knees, head hung forward in prayer or surrender, and what’s the difference anyway?
That’s what this all looks like when the front yard explodes.
Clementine // post-miracle
The first thing I saw, Dad later tells me, was your mom blasted off her feet and blown backwards over the couch. And I tried to catch her. And everything was like in slow motion.
Mom smiles when he tells me this, so I know I need to do some digging. He’s more or less a nice guy, but “the facts” aren’t his thing. Here are the actual order of events as reestablished by yours truly after speaking with the relevant parties (ie: Mom & Dad):
- The Ford pickup came off the highway outside and screamed across the lawn doing something like ninety miles an hour.
- Mom saw it coming straight for the house.
- Mom had the presence of mind to slam the front door before she…
- …turned and took two giant steps toward the back of the couch, at which point she tripped and landed with her knees in the upholstery and her right elbow above the bridge of Dad’s nose.
- Dad (briefly?) lost consciousness, falling backwards onto the coffee table and busting up the glass pretty good even though it didn’t shatter.
- Mom, leaning against the couch, spun around to see…
- …the Ford pickup pulverize the front door, along with most of the wall, swerving left into the kitchen as the driver finally woke up, likely due to the incredible g-force he was experiencing and / or the steering wheel careening off his forehead.
- And then I woke up, and I heard the dishes in the kitchen and the fake wooden cabinets and the countertops and the backsplash behind the sink and the faucet and the fridge and all the leftover pizza and the funny drawing I made of Dad riding my bike and the magnets holding the drawing connect with the Ford pickup off the highway that was now inside my house.
- It was loud.
- I like the motel we sleep in now.
- Mom says it’s going to be okay.
- Dad says it’ll be even better.
the official report // sans-miracle
The report reads:
Suspect apprehended after brief pursuit. Witnesses describe suspect leaving vehicle after unauthorized entry into house by means of said vehicle. Suspect covered in blood, cradling left arm. Unable or unwilling to communicate; mumbling partial words and phrases such as: “now dancer” and “ho” and, several times in rapid succession, “dash away” indicating suspect’s beleaguered yet prescient state of mind and ultimate aim: to flee the scene of the crime.
Suspect was reported to have “stumbled incoherently” for a number of twenty to thirty seconds before winking furiously at witnesses and leaping through the “gaping hole in the living room that used to be the front door.” Meanwhile, witnesses gathered to support one another. It was during this time that law enforcement was contacted.
Upon arriving at the scene approximately eleven minutes later, officers discovered the suspect attempting to either 1) hide within or 2) reenter the home via the unusually wide chimney. Initial attempts having failed, the suspect ultimately succeeded in removing all barriers to reentry (namely, the grate covering the opening to the bizarrely broad chimney) and nimbly slipping both feet over the ledge with a practiced maneuver, began an unadvised descent. This was approximately sixty seconds after the arrival of law enforcement on the scene.
Officers then moved into the house to find the suspect crawling out of the family fireplace, covered in soot, tapping the side of his nose with a finger, and (in the words of witnesses) “laughing like a maniac.” Repeated demands to “stop” yielding no desired result, law enforcement was compelled to pursue the suspect on foot as he turned and ran: first past the family still huddled on the couch, then directly into the dismantled Christmas tree (at this point wildly filling the stockings on the wall with items from his pockets, itemized later and labeled as rocks and / or coal), and finally out the back door.
The lack of regimented aerobic exercise notwithstanding, law enforcement was able to pursue and apprehend the suspect on foot after a brief chase of some seventeen minutes, at which point the suspect tripped over Christmas decorations in a neighbor’s front yard, six houses down.
Mom & Dad // mid-miracle
“That was weird.”
“Do you think the girls are going to sleep okay?”
“Sure. We’ll let ‘em sleep in…”
“…yeah…”
“Yeah.”
“At first, I was really scared – ”
“My head kind of hurts.”
“…yeah…”
“Man, that was weird.”
“It’s hard to know what to do in a situation like that.”
“When a pickup truck drives through the front of your house, you mean?”
“I think the girls will be okay.”
“You were great.”
“So were you.”
“Yeah.”
“It’s really late.”
“…”
“What do we do tomorrow?”
“…first we call that insurance guy, Nick something? Yeah, we’ll call him. Can’t believe I kept paying all these years. Might actually have been worth it.”
“Okay, and then what. What do we tell the girls? Are we moving back home?”
“Moving back…”
“I mean, not right away, but you know, what’s next? This might be our chance, Josh, to start fresh. You know. Leave the bills behind. Set right what we can with the money – ”
“Don’t know if we got that yet.”
“I know, I know, but if we do. When we do…then we start fresh. I can almost feel it. I mean, it’s a little crazy – ”
“It’s unreal – ”
“ – but it’s almost like…like…”
“A miracle.”
“Yes, Joshua, yes. It’s a Christmas miracle!”
“It was so weird.”
“Yes…yes it was.”
“Okay. Well. Tomorrow. We’ll see what’s next tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow. Okay.”
“Okay.”
“Okay, good night. Sweetheart. Good night.”
“Good night, honey.”
“Good night.”
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