October 1991

Its late. I am trying to fall asleep before Tim gets home. Luke is sleeping on Tim's side of the bed. I lie on my left side, facing the screen doors and look at the shadows on the wall and the curtain blowing gently. The fan is humming on the corner nightstand behind me. I don't like the feel of it on my face. I can't sleep yet. I'm not that tired.

I wonder if I am having deja vu, if maybe I've seen the curtains blow this exact way with the temperature in the room the exact same temperature as some other time before. Maybe the shadows are the same and that is why I am thinking about this night from years ago. I can't think of any reason why bits and pieces of a night years ago would be flickering through my thoughts at this particular moment.

The twins were the younger sisters of my roomate. They lived with her off and on when she was able to support them. They were 15. I was 17. It was 1991 in October.

My roomate was glad I had made friends with her younger sisters. She had confided that her Grandpa had molested her as a child. She thought he might be molesting her sisters too.She was worried about them. She wanted me to check out their living situation. She thought I would pass as one of the twins friends from school.

The door of the trailer made a flimsy sound as it shut behind me. I had on black polkadot stretchpants and a white tee shirt that showed my stomach. It was getting really cold out and I had a weathered brown leather jacket I had borrowed with me.

I didn't want to be there.

I sat on this gold and orange floral couch in the living room and dialed my boyfriends phone number. The younger of the twins warned me to be quiet and whisper because their Grandpa had gone to bed and his room was less than 10ft away.

I waited at the window in the girls bedroom looking for headlights. I contemplated whether to use the window or the front door.

I wonder, every now and then, if he's dead of alive. Maybe its not even me wondering, its probably the girl who is forever 17, waiting for the headlights.