and vandalism. Even those images--as unsettling as they were, with the house in disrepair, overgrown with so much vegetation it looked like a lost ancient civilization--didn’t trigger any memories or emotions. Perhaps it just didn’t look like the house I recall from my childhood, with well-kempt gardens against a backdrop of sunny afternoons. This house was dreary and worn, weighed down by the burden of neglect.
From what I was able to Google, I found that the neighbors petitioned to have the house torn down, believing it to be haunted and cursed, an eyesore to the community, but the request never went through. I’ve no idea who owns it now, if it might be part of an unknown inheritance my father might’ve left behind for me, or if it’s become property of the state. Either way, I doubt anyone will be troubled, if I camp there for a few nights.
According to a legal site I researched, most trusts are forfeited, if a reasonable attempt is made to contact the beneficiary to no avail. Unfortunately, my father had no records, or evidence, aside from some grainy shots caught on security camera, of having had a child, for reasons I’m hoping to understand better on this little excursion. Therefore, since nobody knew I even existed, I’m guessing I fit the forfeiture criteria. Which means, if it had been left to me in a will, and I actually wanted the house, I likely no longer have any claim to it, not without some kind of legal representation. And I surely can’t afford that.
This trip could be a complete waste of time, but it’s not as if I have anything better to do, and who knows, maybe returning will be cathartic. Maybe the reign of nightmares and sleepwalking, and daytime hallucinations of things I know aren’t real, will come to an end.
The goals are simple: To figure out who my mother was, what happened to her, what the hell this key belongs to, why my father kept me a secret, and get on with my life.
Okay, so maybe not quite so simple.
An overcast afternoon sky greets me as I enter Terrebonne parish, parish being what they basically call counties back in Michigan. Objects sit off the side of the road, and as I drive up on them, I notice three crosses of varying sizes.
A few miles down the road is a propped sign that reads Prepare to meet thy God, and I smirk, shaking my head. There was no religion growing up with Russ. The only significant thing about Sundays was football, and the only prayers that took place were the ones he quietly muttered to himself when his team happened to be winning. I don’t recall my real father ever taking me to church in the before life, either.
Or maybe he did, and I just don’t remember it.
Another sign greets me a few miles down from the first. All sinners beware.
Even if I was born in this place, and lived here a good chunk of my life, I already feel like a foreigner. An outcast.
It’s weird being a drifter, where everywhere and nowhere is home. For a short time, I might’ve felt a small sense of belonging in that cramped cabin in the woods, but I’ve found over the years that home is a fleeting thing. As temporary as the people who come and go in our lives.
Sprawled beside me on the truck’s bench is a map of Louisiana that I bought at the welcome center, where the clerk made a point to inform me he hadn’t sold one in almost a decade. Unfortunately, I had to let my phone lapse after Russ passed, otherwise I’d be like every other human being who doesn’t bother with paper maps anymore. Russ never used a cellphone, always said they were nothing but a means for the government to spy, so it was from him that I learned how to read a physical map.
A light on my dashboard flickers, indicating I have about five more miles before the truck is out of gas, and thankfully, the next sign I pass marks an exit with a gas station two miles off the highway.
Jesus. I’ll only just make it.
Warm humid air breezes through the open window of the truck, the damp heat of early summer settling over my skin in a sheen of sweat. A far cry from the cooler temperatures I grew accustomed to for this time of year while living in the north. Damn the broken air