6. HOME IS WHERE THE MOTHER IS
HOME IS WHERE THE MOTHER IS
The house is far away enough from the nearest city that it feels like no one else on earth could possibly reach it.
The house looks like any other quaint adobe.
A doppelg?nger of sorts. Isela added a white picket fence to outline her ever-growing herb garden.
She hung chile ristras on either side of the blood red door.
This is where Olivia grows up. A momentary second womb.
Her family moved in when she was four. She’s six now and she likes to be alone.
Well, she’s used to being alone during the mornings.
She sings to herself and erupts with noises that make her laugh.
Pops. Clicks. Gurgles. On Wednesdays, she screams until all the grackles and crows surge out of the surrounding trees. Wednesday is her longest day alone.
According to Olivia, the soul of the house sleeps in the white shed out back.
The soul glistens along the thin lines of sparkling spider webbing intertwined with years of insect carcasses and dust. The soul of the house remains appeased as long as the plants around her are alive and well.
Olivia obliges and sings to the greenery in the mornings.
She watches drunk bumblebees fall asleep inside rose of Sharon petals as the sun hits the highest point in the sky.
She sniffs the flowers and tells them they are glamorous and beautiful.
She licks petals and pokes at their centers, hoping one of the flowers will suck her inside and tuck her away forever.
The kidney of the house is the kitchen. Olivia was born with one kidney and she’s not exactly sure what it’s supposed to do, but she was always told she could survive on the one.
Kidney and kitchen sound close enough. In the kitchen, Isela left fideo in a container, along with sliced limes.
An empty bowl and spoon are left on the table along with juice boxes, chips, a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and a water bottle.
Olivia understands microwave mechanics and she knows how to wash her own dishes.
The fridge is sparse, but on special days, Olivia makes concoctions of different juices.
Apple juice, pineapple juice from the can, and orange juice.
It tastes too tart to tell any flavor apart, but Olivia insists it’s her scientific experiment and a treat for her sole kidney.
A step stool leans against the kitchen sink, ready for her to use.
Two of the upper cabinets are guarded with signs Isela drew indicating “do not open.” Duct tape from underneath the cabinet runs right up to the middle of the cabinet doors to keep them nice and shut.
Olivia turns the TV on and searches for telenovelas.
She leaves them on in the background for ambience.
Some of the Spanish words stick, others don’t.
One of Olivia’s tasks during the week is to dust the ceramic chicken figurines on the shelves in the living room.
She drags the step stool from the kitchen into the living room and gently swipes the chickens with a microfiber cloth.
The silkie chicken is named Leonora because it sounds fancy and Leonora shimmers under the sunlight’s glow.
The speckled Sussex hen is named Roberta the Second, as the namesake before her broke in a “spectral” accident.
Isela blamed a poltergeist. In reality, it was her temper; enraged from a conversation on the phone, Isela threw Roberta the First against the wall and then pulverized her with a hammer in a frenzy.
The Polish chicken is named Magdalena. Magda for short.
Mags on days when the chicken’s eyes looked deeper than they were supposed to.
Mags knew all of your secrets, Olivia just wasn’t sure how to prove it.
The Jersey Giant is named Chupacabra. This particular chicken was definitely a troublemaker.
Again, Olivia couldn’t prove it, she just knew.
The chicken shelf was the heart of the house.
According to a Mexican medical drama called Glowing Hearts: Medical Drama Mexico (Corazónes Brillantes: Drama Médico Mexico), where the male lead (TML) has the power to see glowing hearts in the chests of unknowing strangers, the heart has four chambers.
In the show, the glowing hearts only beamed inside people who were in love.
In one episode, TML has a dream where he walks through four doors, the chambers of his own heart, and finds that each room is empty.
Olivia likened the chicken shelf to these chambers.
Olivia’s room was an ear canal. A pleasant cavern with a winding path which she often imagined leading her further and deeper into the earth. She saw a diagram in the doctor’s office and loved the spiraling cochlea. It enchanted her, that such a darling shape existed inside of her head.
Her mom and dad’s room was off limits. Isela locked it shut every morning.
When she felt brave, Olivia peeked through the bottom crack of the door.
Lights flickered and shadows moved across the room.
On those brave days, she stuck her fingers under the door hoping for something to grab them from the other side, but nothing ever did.
Olivia feels overwhelming admiration and affection for the big oak trees that surround the house like old guardians.
In the evenings, Olivia sits under them with soft foamed headphones and listens to cassettes of songs she’s recorded off the radio.
She dances around. She screams. She sings.
She throws her arms up. She tries to shake out the nerves that feel permanent in her belly and she moves her hips around, mimicking scantily clad bombshells in music videos.
She loves singing her own lyrics. She’s written songs about birds, bears, leaves, clouds, what she thinks love is.
She watches fireflies and dragonflies who leave behind neon strings of light as they fly.
The colors stick around for a few seconds and then they disappear.
If the landline inside ever goes off, Olivia sprints to ensure she answers. Her dad calls during his lunch break. Her mom doesn’t call and if she does, Olivia braces herself.
My little olive, I had a dream that I was murdered in the house. Hacked bloody at the face and the belly. I was a splat! Will you make sure there’s no one hiding in the closets? Make sure for me or I won’t be able to sleep tonight.
Or My little olive, I had a dream that you ran away in bare feet and never came back. I couldn’t find you, no matter how hard I looked. Where did you go?
Or What would you do if I died tomorrow? Would you be happy? Is that what you want? Tell me the truth, little olive. Do you want me dead?
Olivia hung up those phone calls with a gentle click and held her breath until she saw spots. The spores of her imagination floated around her until she calmed herself and carried on with her day as if nothing strange was said.