Inside my neighborhood, an otherwise mundane miscellany of elderly couples, mini-mansions, and SUVS, stood abreast two decrepit homes. The subdivision, a result of the 70s suburban sprawl, had since suffered a paucity of re-development. Homes still contained gas ovens and electric stoves- postcards from a forgotten era’s abandoned technology. However, the two homes in question were long past the communal stage of decay. These houses had garnered a cult of devotion composed of neighborhood kids desperate for excitement. Over the years, these children had crafted a nefarious tale drawing upon urban legend, overheard parental gossip, and fragmented happenings to explain the origin of the two homes. From what I have compiled, the events surrounding the two abandoned houses are something more appropriate belonging within the pages of a Stephen King novel than a middle class neighborhood.
The snippets I uncovered amount to not much more than macabre vignettes: an ominous kitchen fire with unknown origin, a decaying dead body found inside an empty bedroom, mysterious packages delivered in the dead of night, and obnoxious 80s style CCTV cameras encircling the houses with an unknown voyeur. Erin, my best friend and co-conspirator, lived directly behind the leftmost of the two homes. Due mainly to convenience, we fixated our interests upon this red-bricked colonial styled skeleton. We observed the comings and goings of the home- the mysterious bi-weekly pool boy, the ominous flickering of timed lights, and the aforementioned sinister packages. During the height of the sticky summer, overheated and overcome with hubris, we hatched a plot to infiltrate the house. Deciding that breaking and entering would be a bit too presumptuous, we planned to simply spend a night in the backyard. Late on one particularly humid July night, we snuck through a hole in Erin’s fence, climbing silently onto the vacant trampoline.
We laid on the itchy nylon as the moon bathed us in silver. Hours passed in silence, it was as if we had somehow transcended time and had become eternal. I turned over, hoping to find solace in another, but Erin had already fallen asleep. I was utterly alone, captured within a terrible eternity. I stared at the sky, the few stars able to shine through the smog seemed to do so in solidarity- imploring me to stay awake in vigil with them. Early in the morning, long before sunrise, I felt compelled to leave- staying to watch the stars fade would be somehow adulterous. I climbed through the hole in the fence, glancing briefly back at Erin fast asleep on the trampoline.
As I walked home, I returned my gaze longingly at the sky- hoping to again be comforted by the stars. Instead, electric orange streetlights gazed back apathetically- mocking my desperation. Standing in the entry of my driveway I saw the decrepit home for the first time as it truly was. The house was no mystery, the tall tales I so ardently believed rang hollow. I seemed to have left some unrecoverable piece of myself on the sun bleached trampoline. Something had changed within me, I ran back to the trampoline, hoping to rejoin Erin before it was too late. The magic that had been so abundant seemed to dissipate.
This moment was the first time I consciously understood growing up as something tantamount to the shedding of baby teeth. A large part of maturing is losing pieces of ourselves within the walls and closets of our childhood homes. I seem to have run through childhood as if it were a race I could win. In this moment, I seemed to understand that I had won an irreversibly dismal pyrrhic victory. Retrospectively, I can see that growing up is not as grim as I believed it to be. Maturing seems to be bittersweet. Becoming an adult is a trade-off; we gain as much as we lose- simultaneously becoming as complete as we are fractured.
