Zero Zero

13: tick, tick

we spent another night at frank's place; figuring out things. figuring out what we were going to do come tomorrow. 

frank slept the night through. his skin was warm and smelled so soft and like the fluffy blanket of sleep.

I couldn't.

I was too filled with nerves. I was too filled with whatever might come. 

frank helped, unconscious as he was. just by being there, he helped. 

and I liked to, like to, think that he knew. on some larger plane, that transcended the boundaries of the mind, he knew and he comforted me and my restless mind.

the following day, we woke up and plotted everything out. 

then exacted the plan.

frank's mom wasn't in on the whole thing. frank said she couldn't be, as much as he loved her. I agreed. the less she, or really anyone, knew, the better. the safer for them. the safer for us.

the three of us took a roundabout way, paid in full cash in a subtle attempt to keep them from finding us. bus, train, bus, bus.

no one seemed to be following us, which comforted me only slightly. it was only my recurring fear being laid to rest for the second, one hummingbird's heartbeat, before it would inevitably return.

before long, although that short forty minutes felt like a decade, the moment came where that fear was rendered nil. we'd arrived there, here, at my childhood home.

one-story, half brick half sun-bleached beige paint, with those windows with the strange diamond shaped metal parts. home, as it felt. 

it felt like home.

it felt so strange.

not like frank felt like home. this felt like memories. this felt like nostalgia, maybe, to some strangely fucked degree.

we walked across the silvery metallic threshold. the memories hit me like a fucking tsunami.

some good, some bad. certainly not a whole lifetime of memory. but certainly so so much more than I'd ever had since this all began. 

I almost wanted to take it back. 

I knew nothing good came without consequence, but this left me gasping for oxygen on the inside. stoic as I was on the surface. frank could read me.

he squeezed my hand, but knew there wasn't much he could do to make this better.

because most of those memories left a bitter taste in my mouth. 

still I knew, in my mind and in my gut to some degree; remembering was far better than not remembering. 

and besides, the contrast of those bad memories, from here and from The Institution only heightened the intensity of the good memories. 

but perhaps the strangest part of it all was the reaction of my parents. or, of my mother, who was the only one here at the moment. but it wasn't like frank's place, where it was clear his mother was the only one living there is you looked for the clues. here, a mix of my father's and mother's items mixed and mingled and clashed in the small one-story house.

it really did feel like home, a phantom of it, resurrected almost like frankenstein's monster, but home.

but that strangest part, my mother's strange reaction, it did feel almost deadly. she looked like she'd seen a ghost when she got a good look at frank's face for the first time. at that diner, she'd been so focused on me and on not drawing too much attention, but now.