Week 10 journal

Iceberg

Why couldn’t Steve ever do his own laundry? Beth stared at the mess of clothes on the bedroom floor. She had left them there in hopes that he would pick them up himself, but he didn’t. He never did.

Beth grabbed an empty laundry basket, and instead of picking up the mess, this time she walked to the living room, where Steve sat on the sofa watching TV, and dropped it in front of him.

“Pick it up,” she said.

“What?” He asked.

“Your clothes. Pick them up.”

“It’s your job.” He waved her away and turned back to watch his show.

“You can take responsibilities, too.”

“You’re going to tell me to take responsibilities? You can’t even do everything you’re supposed to.”

“Do you want to be a good influence on the kids?”

“I think I am a pretty good influence.”

Beth sighed. She couldn’t live like this. To her, it wasn’t about the laundry. It wasn’t about Steve being lazy. She couldn’t believe that this was all there was to life.

“Will dinner be ready soon?” Steve asked her.

“You know what?” Beth asked. “You can make dinner tonight.”

“What did I do?”

“Take responsibilities, Steve. We all have to do our part.”

“I already have responsibilities. You have different responsibilities.”

Beth grabbed the remote on the table next to Steve and shut off the TV.

“Hey,” he complained, “what was that for?”

“Just do it,” she said.

“Fine, but I’m not doing this again.” Steve slowly lifted himself from the sofa and grabbed the laundry basket that Beth had dropped in front of him.

If Beth knew that getting married and having kids would have turned her life into this, she never would have done it. Those were her biggest regrets. She didn’t care who did the laundry. The house may have only been clean because of her, but she didn’t even mind the cleaning. It was the monotonous life. What was the point of anything? When she married Steve, he had convinced her to move out to the suburbs, and this was what she was left with. She wanted to redo it. She wanted to live again, the way she had when she was a child.

Last Lap

“I knew you’d find your way here.” My dad stood at the top of the staircase.

“Dad, this is crazy.” I looked around the dark basement. It was just like the one I grew up in. It was only illuminated by one dim light bulb. The staircase was made from wood that creaked on every step. I think that was designed on purpose so my dad would catch us if we tried to sneak upstairs.

“You shouldn’t have tried to leave.”

“Are you out of your mind? It’s been two decades. I thought you were dead!”

“Well, I’m not.” A smile grew across his face. “Surprise, son!” The stairs creaked as he took one step closer to me. He looked just the same as I remembered. His hair was falling out of his head, and his clothes were tattered. I couldn’t smell it from here, but I imagined the strong scent of alcohol that radiated off of him, just as it had when I was a little kid.

“Let me out of here,” I said.

“If you try to escape again, you’ll end up like your sister. We wouldn’t want that, would we?”

I shuddered at the image of Beatrice’s body propped up in my window. My dad must have done it. I had no idea how he found my address. I hadn’t talked to him in over twenty years, so I was hoping he had died, but he hadn’t. When I saw the body, I called the police, but by the time they arrived, it was gone.

“She’s here to join us right now,” my dad continued his way down the stairs that creaked and groaned under each step. I stepped farther away from him as he passed by me, and continued off into the dark.

“Aren’t you gonna follow me?” His voice said, but I couldn’t see him.

“No thank you,” I replied.

“That’s too bad. You wouldn’t look very nice laying next to her.” He switched on another light bulb, and a bed was illuminated, with her rotting body laying on top of it.

My eyes widened. I had to get out of here. My dad was busy staring at her, so I turned towards the stairs.

“Hey!” He yelled behind me.

It was just like when I was young, trying to escape his house. If only I had remembered what the house had looked like better, I wouldn’t have ended up here. I was only ever in the basement, so I had no memory of upstairs or the outside of the house. They had gone by in a flash as I ran for my life. My mom hadn’t made it, but my sister and I had.

When we escaped to the outside world, we kept running for what felt like miles, until we finally made it to a gas station where we tried to call for help, but no one would help us. They thought we were just two crazy little kids with ratty hair and dirty clothes.

And now, my dad had led me back here. He had left notes for me wherever I went, telling me places to go. I would go out of curiosity, and each time became more curious. Why would he send me to the zoo out of all places? The notes stopped after I found my sister in the window, staring back at me with her dead eyes. Or, they stopped for a while, until I found one in my mailbox, left with coordinates. The coordinates had led me to this house. And, consequently, to the basement. That’s when I realized, each note he had left me with a place to go had been leading me closer and closer to this house. He had been trying to get me to go back on my own, but I hadn’t taken the hint.

I almost reached the top of the staircase, when something hit my head with enough force to knock me out, but I was still conscious. With fuzzy vision, I reached for the door handle.