hometown

you haven't come back home for a long time. not since your father disappeared. 

but your mother is gone now too, and as poor of a parenting she had provided you must have had just enough good in you to fulfill your filial duties, so you return for the weekend. just long enough to attend the funeral. not a day more than that, you promise yourself. not a moment longer than necessary. you had left and you left for a reason. 

your brother is waiting for you at the train station. at some point in the past years he's gained a few inches of height on you, which irks you as an older sister. he has a new piercing; a silver hoop gleaming on his earlobe. you know he sees you by the way his mouth flattens, like the expression has been ironed out. he doesn't offer to help you with your suitcase. to be fair, you won't have accepted. 

"so, this is what it takes?" he asks. his eyes are different, sharper, more bitter, and you falter for a moment, uneasy in the unfamiliarity of it, but gain your footing just as quickly. you're not letting him get the best of you--and that, at least, is familiar. 

"let's just get this over with," you sigh. his head jerks in agreement. 

he leads you to the car in the parking lot, where you drop your suitcase in the backseat and climb into the passenger side. in the driver's seat, he turns on the ignition, and for a while the drive is silent, and you take the time to look around. the town is just as you remember it. that had been one of the reasons you'd left it. you imagine a different girl coming back here, a hundred years later, to a place still clinging onto whatever existence it could scrape out of its people, and these roads would be exactly the same, cracked black asphalt and overgrown curbs. 

"mom was sure you'd come back," he says suddenly. you turn to him. his eyes are fixed on the road. "to the end. on the hospital bed, tubes sticking out of her like a goddamn horror movie and only me there to hold her hand and lie to her and she was saying, 'your sister's coming back. anytime now. maybe she's outside the door.'" his knuckles are white around the steering wheel and the words would cut more if it weren't softened by the wetness in his voice. "all about you like always but you couldn't even fucking come back to say good-bye." 

you look down at your hands, absently picking at my cuticles. there's smudges of purple where the concealer's been rubbing off. 

"i said my good-byes," you tell him, "a long time ago. i don't owe anything to her." 

his teeth flash. "that's rich." 

the two of you say nothing else for the rest of the drive. 
 -|-|-
there's not much of netty to remember. nothing good, anyway. her hair smelled like strawberries, or maybe raspberries. she had a mole on her left wrist. she cut herself on a broken plate once, and there's a stitch on her ankle from that. her favorite color was . . . orange. probably. could've been purple or green. 

mostly, you remember the fights between her and dad. mom tried to get her to stop, but netty never listened. not even to you. not even when she went into the woods against all of your pleas. 
 -|-|-
your mother's funeral is as memorable as her--that is to say, not at all. 

you stare at the photograph set above her coffin. they chose something from college, before the grey hairs and the eyebags, and she's still smiling. you think you can see your brother in her, maybe the jawline, or the hair. you don't see anything of you. she always said you were the spitting image of your father. 

next to the photo, there's a handful of violets wrapped in silver foil. you guess that's from your brother. you didn't bring anything, so you take out your hairpin, tucking the curl behind your ear, and place it between the flowers. maybe she'll use it in the afterlife, heaven or hell or wherever she's going. you don't care to dwell. your father was the pastor, the rest of the family just the permanent congregation he found his duty to educate. the church closed after his case was finally declared cold. good riddance to that. 

your brother frowns at the pin. you cross your arms, daring him to say anything. 

(he's not the kid you remember leaving behind. he's not the gap-toothed boy who hid behind your legs when your father's friends came over, not the child you taught to memorize bible verses because he couldn't read them, not the shadow under your bed where you'd whisper stories to try to cover up the sound of screaming in the kitchen. he's outgrown you now. you can't help but grieve that.) 

he doesn't try to start a fight. instead, he says, "you're really going tomorrow?" 

he sounds confused. you think about what he must have become, taking care of a mother who withered away with no husband, with no big sisters left to pick up the slack. he must have waited for you. he was hopeful like that. 

but it's been five years and you're sick of explaining yourself so you look him in the eye and nod. 

he doesn't wilt. you think he will, but his shoulders straighten and his chin raises. "fine," he says, flat as a dead heartbeat. "sure. that's fine." 
 -|-|-
you and netty used to sneak into the woods, get away from home. this was before you had to stay behind for your new baby brother, but you remember the paths your feet have memorized, where to duck and step lightly. 

nobody else besides you and netty have ever gone in this deep. 

until dad followed her. 
 -|-|-
you stop at the playground. there's yellow warning tape around it now at least, which you feel is long overdue. you broke your arm here when you were six because the swing's chain snapped at the peak. 

your brother watches you as you trail a hand over the neon stripes. you know he's waiting for you to cross it. you've hopped your fair share of barbed fences and taught him how to as well, and maybe he expects you to be that same sister who ran away without a second look back, the sister who used to protect him when things got worse. 

but he's not the same brother, and you're not that sister, and you're sick of being the brave one. you used up all your bravery five years ago. 

instead, you're looking at the woods. not even the bravest real estate developer wants to tackle that. only children ever wandered into it, and not all of them came out. you don't think you did either. not really. you think you left a part of yourself behind when you followed your father into the twisting trees. 

you check your watch. two hours until your train. 

"why don't you come with me?" you ask your brother. he blinks, surprised, and you are too, for saying that out loud. 

you don't get why he stays behind. this town is a black hole, destroying anything and everything that it can take, and look at you, back here, even after you swore to yourself you never would. for a brief moment you hate your mother for bringing you back. for keeping your brother here. 

he shrugs, smiles. a crack over a porcelain face. "someone has to take care of the graves," he reminds you. 

you don't get the devotion he has for the dead. two of those tombs don't even have bodies. 

"i," you begin. you lick your lips, then, impulsively, fish out a sharpie from your pocket. you grab his hand and scrawl your phone number over his palm. "if you ever want to leave," you tell him, "call me, okay?" 

he looks at the number, flexing his fingers, then looks at you. the flat line of his mouth softens just a bit. he looks, suddenly, more like your mother. your mother before your father. "okay." 

you smile at him, softer than you thought you could. 

you hope he gets out of here. 

you hope he learns to leave you behind. 

you hope he'll never find out the truth. 
 -|-|-
it was the silence that made you do it. 

you sat there and listened as netty screamed at dad, asking why he was here, why the fuck was he such a creep he'd stalk his own daughter, and he was trying to say he was just worried but she wouldn't listen and you wanted to beg her to listen, beg her to stop being so angry, dad wouldn't keep taking this he'd do something so much worse-- 

and then: silence. 

so you burst out and you saw dad bent over a mass on the ground, hands wrapped around a shovel--why did he have a shovel?--and when he shifted to look at you, the moonlight gleamed red on the blade. 

"wait," he said. "wait--" 
 -|-|-
you go alone to the train station. the wheels of your suitcase rattle over the sidewalk, bumping and skidding. you keep a tight hold on the handle when you pass a bulletin board and two faded MISSING posters pinned up on the wood. you tear them both down. that story's outdated. 
 -|-|-
when you come back into the house, your brother and mom are asleep. you're glad, as you wash your hands in the bathroom sink and watch the water turn pink down the drain. you don't want questions. 

you pick out the dirt from under your nails. 

you hope they won't be found. 
 -|-|-
you did what you had to do, for yourself, then and now. you aren't your brother. the bones in the woods have nothing to do with you. 
 -|-|-
they have everything to do with you. 
 -|-|-
the train leaves the station. 

you hope you will never have to come back.