The Birth of Bane

by Richard Heredia

  A thoughtful silence befell us.

  My mom is the absolute coolest person ever, I was thinking when:

  “You guys need to be careful.” Her voice was soft, measured as if she were thinking about each and every word before she said them. “I cannot stop you from doing what you’re gonna do. I know. I was once your age. But, you have to be aware that with physical contact there are consequences, and these kinds of consequences can change your life – forever.”

  Myra and I exchanged a warm glance. Suddenly, we were both glad we’d decided to wait a while. It didn’t mean we were above doing other things, things that might make my mother’s hair stand on end, but for now intercourse was something we were contemplating, not practicing. Even in my wildest dreams I don’t think I would’ve considered being relieved I hadn’t had sex with the girl of my dreams.

  “Do you guys promise you’ll be smart?”

  “Yes,” I answered at once.

  Yea, my mother was bitchin’!

  “We will,” said my girlfriend on the heels of my retort.

  “Good.” My mother beckoned Myra.

  The teenage girl walked from the bed to stand before her.

  My mom grabbed her by both hands. “Take care of yourself, ok?” she said, her look suddenly pointed.

  My girlfriend nodded emphatically. “I will.”

  “You know what I’m talking about, right?”

  “Yes.”

  I had no clue what they were saying to one another, but whatever it was, it had to be a girlie-thing. It went over my head like a fart in the wind.

  My mother got up and smoothed out the sweat pants she was wearing. I hadn’t noticed she was wearing a matching set, complete with a tank-top colored the same and thin-soled Nikes. She held out a sheaf of papers to me. “Read this, while I make us all some lunch.”

  “What is it?”

  “It’s what I came up to show you before I saw… what I didn’t want to see.” She wriggled the pages at me.

  I came toward her. “Doesn’t really answer my question, does it?”

  She pretended to whack me over the head with them. “Don’t push it, young man.” She smiling broadly, her face was cheerful again. “It’s a history.”

  “Of what?” asked Myra. She loved stories, any kind. It didn’t matter if they were fictional or not, she loved them all. I guess that’s why she’s the perfect wife. She’s always willing to read what I’ve wrote, regardless if it’s droll or not.

  “Of the house, this house to be exact.”

  “Where did you find it?” My girlfriend came to stand next to me, her tiny shoulder rubbing against by bicep.

  “Not another dream,” I interjected before my mom could answer.

  “No! It wasn’t in a dream. I found it with all the property tax information Jessie left for me when we closed escrow.”

  She put the three yellowed pages into my hand.

  I stared down at them. They were typed, the ageless Remington font staring back at me from a bygone era.

  “Read it to Myra. She’ll like it.” With that she was gone.

  *****

  According to the pages I was holding, the ground floor of the house had taken two whole years to build and was finished in 1909 by Mr. Marion Gates and his colleagues. He was a bold architect and one of the first building contractors to be licensed and bonded to work in this portion of the fledgling city of Los Angeles. He had built it for his new bride, Florence Witherton-Gates and presented it to her as a wedding gift upon its’ completion, though she’d watched it being built from the moment the very first brick was laid into what would later become the basement. Apparently, she and Mr. Gates had “camped” on the site until the house was completed.

  I remember thinking two years was an awful long time to be living out of a tent. But, then Myra had said, people were different back then, and I, finding no fault in her assessment, had to agree. They were. They were hardier than we are now, could endure so much more without batting an eye. The more I thought about it, the more it reminded me of the brave men, women and children who trekked across the vast North American continent, looking for a better life than their ancestors had in Europe, one of their own making. Mr. and Mrs. Gates seemed much like them, taking chances, gambling for something more rewarding out of life.

  “It’s kinda romantic,” I said one whim.

  Myra had looked at me through glittering eyes. “Yes, it is.” She was staring now.

  I smiled, my brow fluttering in question.

  “Are you really that adorable?” she asked playfully.

  I turned smug. “But, of course!”

  She laughed and squirmed onto my lap. “No wonder I want to jump your bones.”

  We kissed for a time before I went on reading.

  Having enjoyed their rustic existence until the spring of 1909, the Gates had conceived their first child, Franklin, while still living within their spacious tent. He had been walked across the finished threshold of their new home when he was months old.

  On the winter of 1912, Elizabeth (a mentally challenged child) was born in the Master Suite. To care for her special needs, the Gates had sectioned off a portion of that chamber, creating the sunroom where Florence could sit with her new child and relax in the rays of the early morning sun.

  In the summer of 1914, Mrs. Gates planted what was to become the towering elm in what was her front yard back then.

  The following year, Jackson Michael was born. He would prove to be the last of the Gates children.

  In December 1918, three years later, Florence planted the area’s vey first magnolia tree to commemorate the end of the Great War. It was nothing short of incredible to think that all of the magnolia’s lining the various streets around Lincoln Drive had come from the tree Mrs. Gates had put in the ground all of those years prior. In this part of the neighborhood, they are virtually everywhere. Some of them are fifty to sixty feet tall!

  By then, they had outgrown the house and Mr. Gates, taking advantage of the demolition of a local country club, had used the discarded lumber to build the second story and the attic. This had taken a year to finish, circa the spring of 1920, but at least the boys no longer had to share a room and Elizabeth had more space to herself, which she guarded fiercely.

  During that time, Mr. Gates also had the root cellar installed, so the family could store its’ “underground vegetables”, which (as we assumed) also stored more illicit products as well - those of the liquid sort.

  In 1927, their daughter, Elizabeth (fifteen), accidentally set fire to the northwestern portion of the second floor and portions of the porch and living room were destroyed in addition to a sizable area of the upper floor. Mr. Gates then rebuilt the damaged portions of the house, adding a mini-master suite for the girl and the full-time nurse/nanny he had hired to make certain the accident was repeated in the future.

  By 1934, Mrs. Gates’ mother became ill and her husband had a second house added to what was already a substantial toolshed he had built to hasten the rebuilding of the family home after the fire.

  During the Second World War, Mr. Gates had a part of the front porch screened-in, so his wife could do her needle-point without pesky flies and mosquitoes bothering her while she kept a vigilant eye out for the return of her boys from overseas. Both had seen action in the European Theater. Young Jack had even survived the first push onto Normandy Beach, while Franklin scurried about the French countryside in his “death-trap” of a Bradley, one of the many tank commanders in Patton’s vaulted Third Army.

  Amazingly, both brothers, did, in fact, make it home after the Nazi’s had surrendered in those lagging months of the planet-wide conflict. All that remained was the decision to invade Japan or bomb into oblivion.

  In 1946, Jackson married and moved to Pasadena. (Franklin was a confirmed bachelor by then and hadn’t come back home other than to visit. He lived comfortably upon Mt. Washington in a decent-sized home overlooking the city).

  In 1951, Elizabeth
died of a fever. By then, her health had diminished to such a degree; her parents had been forced to place her into a long-term medical facility. Combined with her child-like mental state, the aging couple had begun to find it difficult to properly care for her.

  From 1952 to 1957, Jackson’s three other children were brought into this world one right after another, so in ’57, with his wife pregnant for the fourth time, he decided it was time to move to a larger home. A month before the baby’s birth, the moved to Altadena and has lived there ever since.

  Over the course of the ensuing years, the other sheds were added; a wading pool was constructed, and then torn out when it proved detrimental to the cesspool sewage system. The Pot Belly stove was replaced by a furnace and the whole system was upgraded and retro-fitted the same year President Kennedy was shot and killed in Texas.

  In 1967, Mr. Gates died of a cardiac arrest at one of the many construction sites he had going on about town.

  In 1972, Mrs. Gates died peacefully, in the sunroom, after having a large cup of Earl Grey, her favorite tea since childhood.

  From there the house had been sold a number of times until my parents bought it in the summer of 1986.

  It wasn’t a nefarious past like that of the wicked hotel in The Shining. There were no murders or ancient Indian burial grounds. There was no Pet Cemetery or pumpkin patch under which a vengeful demon was entombed. There was nothing of that nature involved with the long history of 1052 Lincoln Drive, nothing.

  And yet, since the death of Mrs. Gates, no subsequent owner had stayed longer than a year and a half. It was puzzling at first glance.

  But, if you lived there, in that house, after a while, it would begin to make sense.

  I was beginning to comprehend who hadn’t left…

  ~~~~~~~<<< ᴥ >>>~~~~~~~

  PART TWO

  BIRTH

  ~~~~~~~<<< ᴥ >>>~~~~~~~

  Chapter Nine: A Sure Thing

  My suspicions over who was living in our home with us seemed to become more of a reality over the course of a few weeks. It was toward the end of January and the first week February, right before my eighteenth birthday. It was morning and I was watching football in the living room, on the big TV.

  For some reason Valerie was making breakfast, which was unheard of, despite the fact she was a descent enough cook. She merely didn’t like the time it took to prepare a nice meal. I was having a hard time concentrating. It wasn’t the opening and closing of the cabinets or the odd squeak of one of the kitchen drawers being pulled along their wooden rungs. The pots and pans rattling or the running water or the sound of sizzling bacon – none of that was bothersome. Those were the typical sounds heard on any ordinary morning.

  No, it was Valerie herself. For some reason, she felt the need to walk back and forth from the kitchen to the bathroom every five or six minutes. It was as though she were deliberately trying to annoy me. She kept stepping heels first, making the entire house shudder underneath me.

  After she’d done this for the fourth time, I’d had enough. “Valerie, stop stomping around like you have clod-hoppers on your freakin’ feet!”

  There was no reply, nothing. This was unusual. My sister was always willing to step up to the combative plate when she felt pressed upon, and yet – silence.

  “Valerie, do you her me talking to you?” I got up. I’d seen the last, whisping edges of her nightgown as she made her way into the bathroom, so I made my way after her.

  The sarcastic accusation upon my lips went to ash in my mouth when I peered into the bathroom and found it empty.

  There was no one there.

  I turned around, quizzical, head dipped in the morass of sticky cobwebs that were my thoughts.

  Wait a minute. I remember the phrase skipping across my consciousness like a flattened stone over the surface of a pond. It was touching, ever so slightly, but it never penetrated deeper than the uppermost recesses of the waters of my mind.

  My eyes darted about the dining room, the living room beyond, the snarls and grunts of the football game barely registering in my ears. I focused, letting my perception expand. Aspects of my environment began to register elsewhere than just the automated portions of my brain.

  It was late morning, not early. There were clouds covering the city, making it darker than it should’ve been at ten-thirty. There was no sound of frying bacon. The light in the kitchen was off.

  Confusion set in like a fog. I could see fine, but the meaning, the ability to cognize what I was seeing was dulled, hampered, muddied.

  I shuffled toward the kitchen, long shadows following. The house had gone eerily quiet. Even the television seemed as if it had somehow found a way to walk outside, onto the deck and close the sliding glass doors behind it. The moment I cleared the dining room hutch, I peered at the stove as it came into view. It was devoid of all cookery. There were no pots or pans in evidence anywhere.

  Valerie hadn’t been making breakfast.

  Then, who…?

  No one had been making breakfast!

  It felt like I’d been struck with a pillow in the dark. In a second I was moving cautiously, careful with every step, letting the tips of my toes acclimate to everything they touched. My secondary senses were on high – hearing, smelling.

  Then, BLAMM! the realization hit me like a slap of ice-cold water in the face.

  I was the only one here!

  My mother, Valeria and Eli had gone shopping. They weren’t in the house.

  My father hadn’t come home last night. He’d called the night before saying there was some sort of emergency in Santa Barbara and his department had been called-in to remedy. I recalled, when my mom had told us, we’d all laughed out of the corners of our mouths. We knew where he was really going. We knew what he was really doing. He was going to spend the night with Roxanna, screw her until the break of dawn.

  What an idiot. You’re a glorified accountant, not a fireman or a police officer, or even a lawyer! What the hell were you thinking? Are we that stupid to you? At seventeen, almost eighteen, he was transparent to me. Yet, how could I blame him. If I’d been bitch-slapped by something I couldn’t see, I’d probably stay away as well. Maybe he was scared. Maybe the idea of sleeping at the house was too much for him right now. I was there. I had seen what had occurred. I saw the invisible fist clout my father upside the head, nearly knock him unconscious.

  Well, whatever the reason, it sure gave him one hell of an excuse to stay away.

  My mother hadn’t so much as lifted an eyebrow. She didn’t care anymore. I guess from her perspective, Roxanna was doing her a favor.

  I was able to figure that out when I got older. When you abhorred someone, it was better to let someone else sleep with them, so you wouldn’t have to. It was survival.

  My mother had been in that mode for far too long.

  All of this flashed through my mind in second. I glanced about again on the cusp of fright. I knew I should feel a tingle up my spine. My heart should thud, my breathing increase. The hot flush, followed by the frozen gooseflesh should’ve come next. My head should’ve darted back and forth, my expression grim with wary expectation. It should’ve been there, twisting my gut, a wrenching in my chest.

  I felt none of it. The very moment another notion registered, it all melted away. I was nodding now. I know who you are, I thought, comfortable, knowing it was Her and not someone other sort of presence. She I could tolerate. She had a right to be here. This place had been hers since the turn of the century.

  “Sorry, Mrs. Gates, if I disturbed your cooking,” I said to no one in particular - other than the dead, of course.

  I walked back to the couch and resumed watching football. It was the playoffs after all. Thoughts of what had happened out of mind. After all, it was only Her.

  As if to answer, I smelled fresh cooked bacon as if she were capable of preparing it from beyond the grave. Still, I could almost see it. Long, straight, uncurled strips of meat she’d cooked over a low flame. Just t
he way I liked it.

  I smiled, thinly, then gripped the pillow I’d been holding, my thoughts flittering away.

  Oh god, go! I yelled internally.

  John Elway broke free of a charging linebacker, the pocket about him collapsing. He scrambled, twisted to the side. He launched an impossible pass at the line of scrimmage. His receiver had broken free, by one foot, two feet. The ball was coming down, a beautiful arch, a perfect spiral – touchdown.

  “Yeeeaaah!” I howled.

  Off to my right, going from the kitchen to the bathroom, the footsteps sounded once again.

  *****

  I heard her crying in the sunroom. They were small, muffled whimpering’s, barely loud enough to reach the dining room. I’d come home later than usual, after spending some time at Myra’s house. It was almost 6 o’clock, the sun was fast toward the horizon. We were still on Standard Time.

  Valerie and Eli were upstairs. I could hear their footfalls above me.

  The lamp in the far corner of the living room was the only luminance in that part of the first floor. The rest of house was dimly lit, subdued.

  The only sound was the soft click of the heating system, the faint swoosh of air as the furnace system engaged and pushed air through the walls.

  And, her near-silent sobs.

  I strode briskly toward the sound. I knew it was my mother. I had heard her weep so much over the years. I knew every nuance of the act. This fact alone was a physical testament to all the unnecessary bullshit she had to endure when I was a child. It made my teeth grind together. I was seething. What now? What have you done to my mother? My thoughts were narrow, aimed, straight for the very middle of my father. Why couldn’t he just fuck Roxanna and be done with it? Why all the torment and torture? Why was he so fucking sadistic?

  I came around the fireplace and peered through the twin, wood-framed, glass doors with their gossamer curtains and saw her. She was sitting a rocking chair, one I had never seen before. She was staring out at the darkening day, over the deck and rest of the side yard, her eyes locked on the distant tree-line. She wore simple grey sweats, top and bottom. I couldn’t see her feet, because she had her favorite white and red-colored afghan over the lower regions of her body.