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Scream
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The Old Woman Will Remain

Kyle Hemmings

    As a kid, I loved exploring the abandoned house near a burnt-out factory. It stood near center in a barren field that stretched for generations. The stairs would creak and the empty rooms would whisper. I’d hear a woman’s voice from the top floor. Slowly, I crept stair by stair, listening to my own chest wheeze. In an attic room, I found her smiling in her rocking chair. Her hair covered with cobwebs, bees buzzed around her ears.
    “I’ve been waiting to see you, “ she said, staring past me.
    Then she mumbled that I was her lost son.
    And though I was illegitimate and had cause her so much trouble, she said in a dry voice that she did her best to hide me. For years we lived on scraps. How cold these rooms were, only you and I for warmth. Remember, she said? Are you still starving?
    She asked what had taken me so long to return.
    I ran.
    Out of curiosity, I returned days later. But there was nothing in the room but her voice.
    I carried her voice inside my head for years. That voice kept me from walking blindly into certain fires, drew me into others. I judged people by their ability to like me and how light they were on their feet. Sometimes their fingertips burned me.
    And as I matured, if that is the right word,, the women around me, old girlfriends and what have you—disappeared. Many never said good-bye or that they would miss me. Some insinuated that I had hurt them deeply by never listening, by having only a superficial roving eye. They never delved further into details.
    My current wife, No. 3, the most forgetful of my soul mates, keeps burning the stew while she’s off on errands



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