Opening the Red Door…

My hand shaking uncontrollably, I finally managed to put the key in the lock of the red door. As I turned it I started to panic and felt like vomiting.
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Ever since my Mom died when I was 10, I always slipped up to the attic when I felt lonely and lost. It became my haven. I asked Dad if I could have one of the three rooms up there for myself. Dad looked at me with those sad, blank eyes and said, “sure.” I could have asked him to take a rocket to the moon and he would have given me the same answer.

Dad didn’t do well with Mom’s death. People grieve and then they grow, but Dad never got over his grief. I lost both my parents. Dad’s depression cost him his job and we had to rent out the rest of the house and live in the attic.

The attic was grand, with three large bedrooms, and in the open area we ate our microwaved take out food in the dark little kitchenette. We took the big, overstuffed couch up with us and my brother and I snuggled there to watch TV. I loved to browse the old bookcases that were filled with all of Mom and Dad’s favorite books and all our childhood memorabilia. I imagined their laughter and the warmth of their hugs.

My little brother Timmy, who was eight, got the middle room. Perfect for a little boy – bright blue with white woodwork, his race car curtains and matching bedspread from downstairs. The special toy chest that Dad lovingly made him last Christmas was at the foot of his bed.

My room was the girly room. It faced the front of the house and had a large double window. When the sun shone in on the beautiful Victorian furniture, I remembered my mother smiling and saying how this room would be her special place.

Dad stayed behind the locked red door. We weren’t allowed to go in there. He kept it locked and carried the key with him at all times. Dad had never been a secretive person so it made me all the more curious to get in there and take a look, but I was too scared.

By the time I was 16, I was raising my brother and running the household. Dad didn’t come out of his room anymore. Timmy had become a handful and was always in trouble at school. I was quite the forger – signing my father’s name over and over again.

“You better get your head straight,” I screamed as I arched my neck back to look up at Tim.

“What are you going to do? Tell Dad on me?” he sneered. I realized it was hopeless.

One day, there was a loud knocking on the door and the police said Tim had been arrested for shoplifting. This was the last straw. I couldn’t handle this alone. I was so furious with Dad for shutting us out.

Once before I had made a copy of the key to Dad’s room but was too scared to use it. Now I didn’t care anymore. I held back the urge to vomit as I started turning the key. I was terrified.

Dad was asleep on his rumpled bed, or was he passed out in a drunken stupor? I shook him but he didn’t wake up. There was drug paraphernalia on his night table, like the kind I’d seen in the movies for people injecting heroin. Great, not only was he an alcoholic but he was a drug addict.

The room was a pig sty with everything strewn about. As I started picking up some of his clothes, I noticed his journal on the floor. The writing was illegible so I went back to the beginning.

He started journaling the day Mom died. My heart stopped as I read:

May 5 – I’m so sorry Mary. Please forgive me. When you told me you wanted to leave me, something in me just exploded. You turned your back on me when I wanted to talk to you. I went crazy. I didn’t mean to push you so hard. As you went flying down the stairs, I tried to catch you but I missed. You had that strange look on your face as you lay there at the bottom of the stairs with your neck broken. Everyone thought you slipped down the stairs by accident. How could I tell the truth? The kids would be destroyed.

May 12 – I died with you that day Mary. I’ll do everything I can to take care of the kids.

May 19 – I want to die Mary. Guilt and sadness are eating me alive. The pain never stops. I’m living in hell. The kids need me but I have nothing to give them. I’ll keep trying.

On and on for years the same comments over and over again. On one hand I wanted to get vengeance for the way my mother died. My father’s one act of violence struck down a whole family. On the other hand, a broken man lay in that bed who would never recover from a terrible accident. I didn’t believe it was intentional.

I bailed Timmy out of jail and told him to pack his bags. I called my mother’s sister who lived two states away and asked if we could come and live with her. Thankfully, she said yes.

I burned the journal, it was nobody’s business. Dad was so stoned, he didn’t even notice we were leaving. I would never tell Timmy or anyone else the truth. It wouldn’t help anyone. Although I didn’t blame Dad for the accident, I did blame him for ruing our lives.

“Goodbye Dad, you’re on your own.”

As we drove away, I wished I had had the courage to open the red door sooner.