The House

If walls could talk, they would whisper with the force of a thousand dreams. They say a house with good bones can weather any storm. But what if a home is built with the bones of grief? What do the walls say then?

Poppy pulled her knees up into her chest as she sank into the couch and watched the man in the driveway appear to search for something. He shoved a hand into each pocket, individually. Each time digging deeper, as if the missing emblem might be just below the seam. Finally he withdrew his palms, empty, and walked back towards the edge of the path. He kicked at the stones as he went. At the end of the driveway he looked up and scanned the house, one hand now at his brow as if shielding it from the sun that had already dipped below the horizon. Poppy just sat, motionless. She heard the walls begin to breath and closed her eyes, letting the weight of the room sink into her skin. The man called her name a couple of times, questioningly. But she could barely hear it over the hum. It didn’t matter anymore anyway. The shadows began to drip down the corners in the living room walls and when Poppy opened her eyes again the man had left.

“Who needs him” she said into the darkness. He was not the first to walk into this house, all green and alive with the promise of love. Not the first to leave either. The house always broke them. They’d try to convince her to come away too, to trade a broken past for a new, shiny future. But she knew her place. She’d made her bed, so to speak.

It wouldn't be long before the crickets began singing and she hadn’t eaten since mid-morning. Reluctantly, Poppy pulled her small frame out from her nest of threadbare cushions and made her way to the kitchen. She ignored the stains on the countertops and the gritty feel of dust and dirt beneath her bare feet. She knew the house no longer cared, so why should she.

Three things remained in the ice box. A carton of milk and two potatoes. The milk was sour; this was evident the minute she popped open the top. The potatoes were not yet green though and keeping them chilled had prevented the eyes from sprouting. At least her vegetables weren’t watching her. She began to peel the brown, papery skins.

She placed the translucent white cubes into a skillet of salted water and watched them turn, bobbing and rolling over as the surface began to froth. She lit a candle on the sideboard and listened to it whistle as the house heaved.

Watching her colorless vegetables simmer, Poppy tried to recall a time when things still had hues. A time when life still tasted like something. Then she remembered that there were onions in the cellar and she pondered venturing into the crawl space to retrieve one. The potatoes would be better with onions. But that would require a conversation with the house. A request and possibly a compromise. She felt the air get cooler at the mere thought of this. How tired she was, how weary of having conversations with no one.

But still, the potatoes would be better.

She pulled the skillet off the tiny iron stove and drained the water. She gently scooped the cooked tubers into a cracked earthenware bowl and placed a lid over the steaming heap to keep them warm. All the while the walls watched.

There was no point in lighting more candles, they would be blown out the minute she left the room. So, Poppy took the single flame from the kitchen and began padding softly down the hall, towards the cellar.

The house had been built over thirty years before, in a time of death and hope, during a war that had continued behind closed doors long after it had ended overseas. It had two bedrooms, a small kitchen, and a living room that also functioned as a dining space. It had been born of hand hewn lumber from the Oregon coast that creaked even before it was old enough to speak. It was built for dreams. But soldiers bring battlefields home with them. Blood soaks into wood and keeps its stories there.

Afterwards, Poppy had placed brightly colored rugs in each room to hide the scratch marks. She had decorated the chipped walls with framed paintings she collected at flea markets and back alley bodegas. Still, the house remembered everything. Each picture was hung with an optimism that shattered along with the glass as one by one, they fell to the floor.

Now the walls were bare, the rooms mostly empty. It wasn’t worth the fight.

As she neared the back of the house Poppy began to shiver. She should have thrown a blanket over her shoulders. She was familiar with the shudder that came from asking for more than she was allowed. The icy response to her own audacity to exist within these walls. She winced and considered returning to the front and retrieving the patchwork quilt from the sofa. But she didn’t want this to take any longer than necessary, and she’d already made her intentions known. Better to just get things over with.

At the cellar door she paused. The candle sputtered, but did not go out. Poppy looked up and held her breath. The walls sighed.

“Please?” she whispered at the ceiling. “It’s just an onion. I promise not to cry when I cut it.”

She waited a moment and then added, almost inaudibly, “I promise”.

Nothing.

She took this as acquiescence and reached for the knob. Wind blew back against the door as she pushed into it. This did not surprise her. She cleaved a shoulder into the space between door and frame. And as she gave her weight to the wood, she began to whisper again, gently, as though speaking to a small child.

“Here we go” she cooed. “It’s okay. It’s just me and it’s just onions.”

The house screamed. The air rattled. Poppy continued to murmur and then to softly sing.“Onions and potatoes, that’s all. Just onions and potatoes. No crying this time. No one is sad. It’s just onions and potatoes. Remember, if Poppy doesn’t eat, she cannot stay. And if Poppy leaves….” She didn’t have to finish, the wind grew still. The door opened.

But halfway down the steps the candle went out. Now she was in a quandary. She was so close. Could she find the box of onions in the dark? If the door closed behind her, the cellar might just keep her. And if she returned to the kitchen for matches, she might not be permitted reentry a second time. Maybe the potatoes would be fine, enough by themselves. Maybe she didn’t even need the onions. Maybe she didn’t need any of this. Maybe she could walk back up those steps, out that front door and never look back. Maybe.

But not today.

Poppy climbed back towards the hallway, empty handed.

“Fuck you” she said finally, into the thinning air.

Then the tears came, as if given permission. They were hot as they fell, dropping onto the faded rug as she made her way back to the kitchen and the bowl of potatoes getting cold now on the countertop.

She ate them in the dark, defiant, each one stabbed with spite and sorrow, as though she could convince them to be more than potatoes. The walls expanded and contracted in silence.

Outside the night swallowed the last remanence of the day. The stars peeked out from the veil of shadows and the moon sparkled in a cloudless sky; all the while invisible to Poppy, sitting and eating onionless potatoes within the hollows of the house.