Mark walked into the house and went into the kitchen expecting to see Terri but was disappointed when she wasn’t there. He walked into the dining room and looked out into the backyard. There she was kneeling in the garden apparently adding or subtracting from it. He knocked on the window and she turned to look at him. She had her straw hat on, and she waved. He waved back at her and watched as she returned her attention to her garden. He went upstairs to his office and sat down at his chair. He placed his hands behind his head and looked at the circle window. It looked like an ordinary window and he wondered why it is really an extraordinary window. He shook his head as he recalled his daughter’s story. What if he performed a test on himself and see what would happen if he changed the event. But which event?
He leaned forward, opened his laptop and the screensaver of his grandkids appeared. He moved his mouse and the password bar appeared and he typed it. His word document appeared of the story he was writing about himself. He reread his account of his birth and smiled. What was the first event he can recall? His mind went back to the time they moved from Columbia to St. Louis. They were going to live in a new subdivision being built in North St. Louis County and they went to visit the construction site. He had an accident falling into the basement foundation and broke his arm. He decided that was the event he was going to test. He began to type and add the details of the event.
There were dirt piles behind the concrete foundation and me and my brother took turns rolling down them. We would get up and run back to the top of the mound and do it again. We were laughing with each tumble when our Mom yelled at us to stop and join her. She and Dad were talking to a man about the house and they were standing beside the foundation of our soon-to-be home We were covered in dirt and she was aggravated as she brushed the dirt from our clothes.
I stepped back and tripped over a piece of rebar lying near the hole and I fell into it.
The last line he typed was “I broke my left arm and my parents had to find a local hospital to take me there.”
Mark rose from the desk and walked to the circle window. He looked to it and saw the rooftops and trees below his house. He closed his eyes, thought of the memory, and reopened them. The window shimmered. He reached out and touched the glass. He was immediately riding in a car, standing in the front seat, between his parents. In his mother’s lap, his little brother Bill, was sitting. He looked out the windshield to see them driving down a road heading up to a railroad crossing. There were no cars in front of them but ahead of them, train signals were flashing bright red light and he heard the warning bells ringing loud and clear. They slowed and waited as the train whizzed by. It was a long train and he watched the colors of the cars melt together. He began to listen to his parents as they talked over him.
“I think this is exciting, honey. Our own home. I am so happy,” his Mother was saying.
“Well, we needed a bigger place,” his Dad said to her. “Our family is growing, you know.”
“I know. I sure hope it is a girl this time.”
“Actually,” Dad told her. “Me, too. And the house should be done before then.”
“I wonder how far they are right now?” she asked him.
“Not much farther. I think they told me they were only through with the foundation.”
“What was the name of our street again?,” she asked him.
“Congress, honey, Congress,” Dad said as he waved to the guy in the caboose. The man waved back.
“Why did you do that, Dad?”
“Do what, son?”
“Wave to that man,” Mark asked his father.
“Oh, I don’t know,” he said as he slowly moved the car over the train tracks.
Just to be nice, I guess.”
A small farm was just past the track on the left and a small vegetable stand stood nearby. A woman was driving a small tractor pulling a cart full of boxes. She wore a straw hat and waved to them. Mark waved back.
“We will have to stop on our way back to see what they have,” Mom said.
They drove a little bit further and passed a road that had a gas station with a green dinosaur sign out front. A few cars were there as Mark looked at it as they passed it. A small square building stood beside it. It had a red and white lamp hanging near the front door.
“Oh, loo, honey,” Mom exclaimed. “A barbershop! You could take the boys there.”
“Maybe,” Dad said as Mark noticed street signs appearing on the left side of the car but there weren’t any houses. “Here is our neighborhood.”
They passed a few of the signs when his Mother called out, “Congress!”
Dad turned the car left on to the street. On both sides of the street, houses were in various states of construction but none of them were in a state where one could say it was a house. They continued to drive and as the road started to curve to the left, he slowed the car until he stopped in front of a small sign with the numbers 140.
“140,” Mom said. “That is our new address, 140 Congress Avenue. Mark, you are going to have to learn that when we really move here so you will never get lost.”
“Do you know what 160 means, Mark? Of course you don’t. It means our house in part of tract 1 and it is the 40th house being built,” his Dad added. Mark just smiled.
They all emptied from the car, the four of them stood looking at a hole in the ground. A car pulled behind them and a man in a blue suit emerged from it.
“Hello Morrisons! What do you think of your new home. Are you ready to move in?” he said as he approached them.
“Sure,” Mom said back to him. “I am ready to move!”
“Me,” Dad said. “I’d like to see more of a house first.”
The three of them laughed and Mark decided to take a walk around the hole. Andy followed him close behind.
“Be careful, Mark!” Mom called out. “And watch your brother.”
Mark responded by stopping and waiting until his brother was next to him. He looked into the hole which was four sides of cement walls with pieces of lumber wedged from the concrete floor to each wall. One piece of lumber was wide enough and reached to the top of the end wall. that he thought he could walk down to the floor and he headed for it.
“Mark!” Andy called out just then and he turned toward him. “Look at all the mountains!”
There, behind the hole in the ground, several piles of dark brown dirt emerged from their backyard. Mark smiled and went to join his brother. He was stopped in his tracks by a searing pain in his head. He closed his eyes and slowly opened them. The landscape seemed brighter to him. It was the same. Dirt piles, his brother running toward them and he was following him. He stopped again as the image change and he could see a tree growing in the corner of the lot that was surrounded by a chain link fence. He turned slowly around and where the hole in the ground was now his home. It was rectangular in shape and the backdoor had a metal awning above it beneath three steps of concrete. His Mom was sitting there, watching him, and smoking a cigarette. He closed his eyes and opened them. The hole in the ground was there again. He shook his head,
“Mark!” Andy yelled at him. “Let’s go up again.”
He looked down at himself. He was covered in dirt. His blue jeans were muddier at the knees because he went up the hills on his hands and knees.
“Boys!” his Mo yelled. “Come here now!”
Andy rolled down the hill he was on top of, laughing all the way down. Mark waited for him and they walked to their Mom. She scolded them as she swatted at the dirt on their clothes. After she had finished, Mark barely heard her tell them to stay close. He looked down the hole and wondered what it would be like to be on the floor. He started to walk around the pit toward the board he remembered reached the floor. He stood at its top and he heard a voice. He looked behind him but saw nothing. He returned to stare at the board that led down to the basement floor. He heard the voice again, much clearer now, and he knew it was inside him. It simply said. “Remember the test.’
To be continued…
My First Stories 