Family

Chapter 22

One Year Ago

I did get up off the basement floor, eventually. I went upstairs and showered, a long one that lasted over an hour. I scrubbed myself clean of the accumulation of waste and stink that I had gathered in the time I’d spent in the box. After that, I sat down in the tub and let the hot water run over me, let it tap at my skin, on my head, felt the warmth as it washed over me.

I took deep breaths in through my nose and out through my mouth; I read that helped purge strong emotion. The smell of the chlorine in the tap water was faint, but I welcomed it. The aroma of the box lingered, even after the repeated scrubbings, and all I wanted was for it to go away.

I ate after that, sitting at the table in the kitchen alone, the quiet almost overwhelming. I kept the lights off. The only source of illumination was the sun slipping through the cracks from behind the blockaded windows. I ate the turkey sandwich I made for myself one slow bite at a time, tasting the bread, the mayo and the meat, and trying to keep myself from wolfing it down after going without food for almost a day. The dull colors of the walls of the house weren’t visible in the dark, but the lack of light was oddly soothing.

Once I had eaten, I found myself in mother’s bathroom, staring at the checkered tiles – one little black one every four white ones, in square patterns. The room was small, closet-sized, with an old countertop, and porcelain toilet. There was only one shower in the house, and it was in the bathroom Mother referred to as mine. She did everything else in her own bathroom, though, and there was long, brown hair gathered around the white baseboards in knots, as though it had fallen and somehow gathered itself together and tied itself up.

I took the heavy cleaners from the kitchen and scrubbed the sink, the toilet, the vanity and the floors. The sharp smell of the chemicals was heavy in my nose, and I felt lightheaded. The toilet had a permanent ring on the inside of it where the water line rested, and no matter how hard I scrubbed, I could never seem to get that faded yellowish ring off. Today I tried harder than most.

I took a brush out next, a small one for scrubbing floors, and I started rubbing at the tile. It should have been easy, should have been simple. I scrubbed as I thought about what I’d done, what I’d said, what she’d said back. I took another breath, heavy, in through the nose, out through the mouth, and kept scrubbing.

I thought about the box, all the times I’d been locked in it, and I rubbed at the tile. There was a dark spot on the floor between the wall and the toilet. I wrestled myself in the gap between them, almost wedging myself in, and started to scrub, going so far as to clean the corrosion and lime off the valves that shut off water to the toilet. I focused again on the spot on the floor, which was under where the plunger rested. I scrubbed harder, seeing the ring fade slightly with the effort.

I pushed harder, the last little bit of it resisting, standing out from the white tile. I heard something crack, and felt a sharp sting, pulling my hand back as though I’d touched a lit eye on the stove. I looked at my palm and watched a trickle of blood run down it. My hand; the recurve handle of the scrubbing brush had broken off, and the plastic edge that remained was sharp enough that it had stabbed me when it broke.

I hurried my hand under the sink and turned on the water. I watched the clear liquid turn red as it ran over my wound and down into the white porcelain basin, rinsing the blood down the drain. I watched it swirl, catching the light, and after a few minutes I pulled my cold hand out. The blood had started to clot, and I put a bandage over it, taking care to treat it gingerly, taping it carefully to my skin. Once I was done, I held it up in the mirror in front of me.

I saw my face for the first time since I’d gotten out of the box that morning. Dark circles rested under my eyes, and they were swollen and puffy. My hair was frizzed, because I’d not bothered to straighten it with the flatiron after getting out of the shower. I usually did, because Mother got upset when I let myself slip in hygiene; it wasn’t disciplined to let oneself go, she’d say.

I heard movement out in the living room, the familiar beep of the alarm system turning off, and I jerked in automatic motion. I hurried to pick up the bucket and cleaning supplies, throwing the broken scrub brush into the garbage can and jamming my hands back into the gloves I’d taken off to clean; breaking a major rule, even for ease of cleaning, was a big no-no. I took a quick look, inspecting my handiwork, and realized I had been cleaning for three hours.

I came down the hall to find Mother standing in the dining room, looking at several envelopes in her hands. She was frowning at them, concentrating, and one after another she threw them in the trash can. I brushed past her without saying anything, and stowed the cleaning supplies back under the sink. She tossed another envelope into the garbage and I started past her again when she spoke. “We’re going to do martial arts practice in five minutes.” She let a postcard drop into the garbage and raised her head to look at me. “Did you hear me?” I nodded, and she shook her head as I headed toward my room to change into workout clothes.

The workout was long and focused on katas. I did the same one, over and over, working on my breathing as she watched me, calling out criticism where she felt it was warranted. I executed every move as crisply as I could; blows strong enough to hurt and kill were the standard. Weak hits, anything that looked pretty but lacked force, were called out, and my punishment was to do push-ups. I stared at the blue mats as my arms pumped up and down and my breath cycled in through the nose, out through the mouth. I let out a last breath as I finished my ten push-up punishment, and snapped back to my feet. Laggardly behavior carried its own sort of punishment – more push-ups.

“All right,” Mother said, her arms folded, her navy nylon gym pants clashing against her white t-shirt. Her complexion was darker than mine, partly due to her exposure to the sun and partly due to genetics. “I can see we’ve got some work to do on strength training, but we’ll save that for another time.” Her eyes narrowed as she surveyed me. I stood at a ready position, my hands in front of me and my body stiff at attention. “We need to work on precision; you’re getting sloppy.”

My eyes followed her as she started to move, but I felt a burning inside. Deep breath in through nose, out through the mouth. She walked to the wall and pulled a katana from the pegs and tossed it to me. I reached out and caught it, whipping it around in a wide arc and then returning to a ready position again. I avoided cringing on the upswing; the hilt was mashing against my bandage, and I felt the wetness of blood as my cut tore open under my gloves.

“You’ll do your entire form with the sword,” she said, arms folded again now, taking one small step at a time, as though she were about to circle me. “Crisp, perfect, and with every attack I had better see the appropriate amount of force.” She waved a hand in the air. “This is an exercise in control. It’s not a butcher’s knife, and it needs to be guided properly.”

I nodded and began my kata. Each move, I tried to focus, tried to keep my eyes on the place where my sword was going. I tuned out the pain, the dull, stabbing feeling that came as I wrapped my hand tight around the hilt. Mother didn’t help; she was hovering, following me around. Three times I turned to deliver my next attack and was forced to deviate as she placed herself in my path.

“Testing your control,” she said, stepping out of the way each time – after I had altered my kata to avoid her. Each move caused me pain, as I held the sword in the hand that wore the bandage. I felt blood dripping down my wrist and into my sleeve. Mother had little tolerance for anything but perfection, and admitting that I had hurt myself might reveal that I had been cleaning with my gloves off – which meant the box, again. I was holding my breath now, as much as possible, trying to bottle up the pain. Beads of sweat rolled down my face in a trickle, and I swore they might have been blood as well, as though the pain were everywhere and the blood was too.

I came to a finish and I heard slow clapping start behind me. I turned my head, still frozen in my last move, sword extended, one of my legs far in front of the other. The clapping was maddeningly slow, like a mocking laugh. She put her hands together over and over, letting seconds hang in the air between each clap.

I felt my face redden, as though the blood that wasn’t running down my arm was rushing to it, felt the heat in the room turned up to twelve. My breathing exercise wasn’t working to purge the emotion anymore; the feeling was too strong. I held myself in place, but I felt my hand shake with the sword in it. I knew my face was betraying me, but I couldn’t hold back the tide of emotions. I let my feet drift back to a closed stance, shoulder-distance apart, and I brought the sword up.

My mother raised an eyebrow, a subtle motion, but she stopped clapping, and she fixated on my sword. “What are you planning to do with that? You know what it means if you point it. It’s not a butcher’s knife, but still you wave it around like—”

I flung the sword, felt the hilt release from my hand with one last sharp stab to my palm, and I heard it hit the wall with a clatter and bounce off as I ran at her. My fists were balled up, my rage coming from deep within, somewhere that a million breaths out through the mouth could never expel. I hissed as I came at her, dropping into a low stance as I readied my first attack. I was not thinking, I had no plan, no intention but to hurt her, to hit her and drive the arrogance out of her, to make her feel the same pain she kept pushing on me. I watched her register surprise just before I landed my first blow, and I knew it would be sweet.

It lost its sweetness as she sidestepped out of the path of my strike, moving so quickly I didn’t even see her do it. She landed a punch to my jaw that caused my head to snap back, and I saw a flash of blackness before I came back to myself. My legs felt like rubber bands that I was trying to stand on, unable to support my weight. She hit me again, this time in the belly, in the solar plexus, and I lost all the wind out of my lungs, expelled in one loud noise – through the mouth. I cradled my stomach as I hit the mat without concern for the cushion I was landing on.

I stared up at the ceiling, still holding my midsection, trying to regain my breath but failing, wheezing. I knew cerebrally that I wasn’t dying of asphyxiation, but it felt like I was, like I couldn’t get enough air to my brain or my body, that I was going to die gasping right there on the mat.

Mother stood above me, arms crossed, calm and collected, unmoving. “You’ve got spirit,” she said, looking at the black gloves she wore, the same kind she always forced me to wear, “but spirit won’t get you anything save for a nasty death.” She squatted next to me, and I felt her glove on my arm. “Discipline. Control.” I looked into her eyes as she stripped my glove off, baring my bandaged palm. “Obedience.” She shifted position and gripped me under the armpits, lifting me up. I saw the box in the corner, she faced me toward it, its wide maw open as if ready to swallow me up, and I tensed in her arms.

She gripped my wrists, lifted my hands above my head and I felt the pain begin to subside, deep breaths flooding into my lungs. It still hurt, I still had trouble breathing, but it got better. “Breathe,” she said, as I stared at the box, taking deep breaths, all through my mouth, every one of them. “Get your breathing under control. You don’t want to hyperventilate.”

Her grip on my wrists faded and my legs took up their own weight again. I stared into the box, into the shadows and darkness inside, and realized I couldn’t see the back of it, not even with the lights on. It waited for me, a silent mouth ready to devour me whole. I turned my head, slow, fearful. Mother was still standing directly behind me, close enough that I could smell her sour breath, like rancid milk.

“Spirit won’t get you anything but killed,” she said to me again, and her face was blank, an empty reservoir of no emotion. “You use your strength by putting your emotions on a leash.” She looked down, then back up at me again, and I could have sworn she shifted her feet, as though from nervousness. “You will obey. You will listen. There are rules for a reason.”

“I just…” I choked out. “I just…I needed to…I felt…”

“I don’t care,” she said with a slight shake of her head, and by the total neutrality of her voice I could tell she meant it. “Feelings are irrelevant. Feelings won’t change anything; action will.” She took a step back from me, and turned toward the stairs. “Follow the rules, not your feelings.” She cast a look back as she reached the bottom of the stairs. “Your feelings will lead you to make stupid decisions – like they just did. Listen. To me, to the rules. Ignore your instincts; they’ll get you killed.” She cocked her head at me. “Like they almost just did.”

I watched her head bob back, as though she were looking down her nose at me, surveying me coldly, and then she disappeared up the stairs, head first, then torso, until her feet receded from view and I was left by myself in the basement.