The Iceberg Tipping

At the end of the block there’s a house that was recently painted white, a truck and a beat up car sitting in the driveway and a ‘for sale’ sign still sticking crooked in the front lawn. Day after day Rory spent time within these hollow walls, exploring an old house made new. It was obviously built in the late eighteen hundreds, there was a wrap around porch and half of the peaks had flat roofs. At one point there was a three story tower, the only attic to speak of being his room at the top. The inside was cozy, much to Rory’s surprise. It was an odd feeling to be cozy inside of a house you knew had such a horrid history.
indent The old lady who’d owned the house beforehand had gotten it from her father who’s father had won it in an cross-town auction. The story went that back in the thirties a lot of the town came down with some bad cold or gross disease and were confined to either their attic rooms or their basement rooms. It sounded stupid to Rory, but it went on to explain that the highly contagious illness had infected and killed the inhabitants to most of the houses on his side of town.
indent Thinking about it, Rory laughed before climbing the last set of spiral stairs into his room and taking in the antique feeling that his room emanated. The old radiator near the window almost bowed the light colored hardwood flooring, the dark carpet could only cover so much ground. A built in cabinet sat across the room, old paper lining its inside and smelling of mothballs and old ladies. Rory wasn’t bothered by that as much as he was bothered by the fact that someone supposedly died in the same space and that it smelt more of dust than death.
indent Rory knew what death smelt like. His father was a nurse, for one, and often came home smelling like a hospital. Secondly, and more sadly, his mother had died mere months before they’d moved into the victorian town. He’d gotten over it quickly enough, locking most of his memories in a box at the back of his mind, but in a way his bones still longed for the feeling of his mother’s embrace after a hard day. He felt girly just thinking about it.
indent Floorboards creaked on the first floor and Rory could almost hear the patent sound of his father’s shoes squeaking against the wood. It was amazing that he didn’t drive his own patients mad with the noise. “Rory! You in your room?” he yelled up the stairwell, his voice excelling past the first half of Rory’s room and straight to the second half where Rory kept most of his things. The first half was mostly unpacked boxes, their labels glaring at him in offensive, thick sharpie’d words. “Rory’s Room” they screamed, threatening to make him feel at home again.
indent He didn’t want to feel at home, though. “Yeah, I’m up here,” it wasn’t his room yet, it was still the dead family’s attic. He wandered over to the window before yelling ‘why?’ down the stairs as a second thought. Pieces of brown hair got into his way, but he didn’t care, waiting for a response from his father.
indent “How do you feel about pizza tonight?” Rory’s father hollered back up the stairs, putting a small, half-hearted grin on Rory’s face. There’s no doubt that his life would be different from now on, he knew, but he couldn’t help but feel reassured by the reminiscent feeling his father had given him.