desk and out of his path. The wooden sword instead carved a deep scratch into Jonathan’s writing desk, and my anger continued to soar. Beside the desk was Peter’s library, row after row of books sewn into a bookshelf; I made them rain down on Tucker like a hailstorm, and I assure you that as a lawyer, Peter’s books were anything but small.
In all my years I’ve never heard a child scream that loud.
When Tucker crumbled into his mother’s arms in a flurry of tears, she warned him about going into the study when he had been told not to. She assumed that he had been swinging his sword and knocked the books down on himself. As always, she sent him to his room, where he ripped his own books to shreds and tossed the paper , in piles, all across his room. No real lesson was learned.
I felt good, however. I felt vindicated. I knew these monsters didn’t respect me, and so I didn’t respect them. I didn’t feel bad when Denise went to shred more of my wallpaper and the door slammed behind her, startling her so badly that she ran back to her room in tears. I felt no remorse when Trenton threw a baseball through one of my windows, and I brought the window frame crashing down into the sill mere inches from his face as he came closer to inspect. And I felt pure joy when Trenton dared walk back into my study with his wooden sword, eyeing Jonathan’s lamp, and a single book on the bookshelf wiggled menacingly, as if to say ‘don’t you dare.’
He fled so fast he didn’t even close the door behind him.
Soon the children were telling Peter and Alison that I was haunted, but of course, as parents, they thought their children were just overreacting. By then I had come to hate them all—children and parents alike—and I knew that the only way to evict them as a whole would be to scare off Peter and Alison.
I toyed with Alison by opening random doors while the kids were at school, even if those doors were locked. I disconnected her phone calls; I unplugged her vacuum and iron in the middle of using them; and when she stepped away, I even raised the temperature on the stove until the food she was cooking was burnt and ruined. This left her frustrated but not scared. She thought she was going insane, but didn’t question the house. She questioned only herself.
Peter, of course, was much easier to break. I unplugged his alarm clock and frequently made him late for work. I stopped running the refrigerator so the lunch he took to work would be spoiled. I even shuffled up his important work documents, and often threw them in the trash on mornings before meetings with important clients.
Soon, the family was livid… but not with me. With each other. Their snappiness toward one another left the children bitter and angry, with no one to take out their aggressions on but each other. They fought loudly, and often. Rather than scratch and dent my walls they were now filling them with the sounds of yelling and crying, of hurtful things said in anger, and I’d had enough of it.
One night Peter was awakened by the wind. The window was open, and he hadn’t remembered opening it, because he hadn’t. I had. And as he approached the window, asking himself this very question—hadn’t he closed it before bed?—I saw the resentment in his eyes.
“I wish I’d never bought this piece of shit house,” he mumbled, as he rested his hands on the windowsill.
And without second thought, I brought the window down on all ten fingers so hard the neighbors said they could hear his scream from five blocks away.
When the moving trucks came the next day, Peter watched with a scowl (and two bandaged hands) as the team of movers hauled away his furniture and law books. His entire horrible family was gone by noon. And although the For Sale sign was once again planted in the drive, my heart was lightened to witness their departure.
I had done that, had succeeded in forcing them out of me. If only Gloria Everton had been able to do the same with
In all my years I’ve never heard a child scream that loud.
When Tucker crumbled into his mother’s arms in a flurry of tears, she warned him about going into the study when he had been told not to. She assumed that he had been swinging his sword and knocked the books down on himself. As always, she sent him to his room, where he ripped his own books to shreds and tossed the paper , in piles, all across his room. No real lesson was learned.
I felt good, however. I felt vindicated. I knew these monsters didn’t respect me, and so I didn’t respect them. I didn’t feel bad when Denise went to shred more of my wallpaper and the door slammed behind her, startling her so badly that she ran back to her room in tears. I felt no remorse when Trenton threw a baseball through one of my windows, and I brought the window frame crashing down into the sill mere inches from his face as he came closer to inspect. And I felt pure joy when Trenton dared walk back into my study with his wooden sword, eyeing Jonathan’s lamp, and a single book on the bookshelf wiggled menacingly, as if to say ‘don’t you dare.’
He fled so fast he didn’t even close the door behind him.
Soon the children were telling Peter and Alison that I was haunted, but of course, as parents, they thought their children were just overreacting. By then I had come to hate them all—children and parents alike—and I knew that the only way to evict them as a whole would be to scare off Peter and Alison.
I toyed with Alison by opening random doors while the kids were at school, even if those doors were locked. I disconnected her phone calls; I unplugged her vacuum and iron in the middle of using them; and when she stepped away, I even raised the temperature on the stove until the food she was cooking was burnt and ruined. This left her frustrated but not scared. She thought she was going insane, but didn’t question the house. She questioned only herself.
Peter, of course, was much easier to break. I unplugged his alarm clock and frequently made him late for work. I stopped running the refrigerator so the lunch he took to work would be spoiled. I even shuffled up his important work documents, and often threw them in the trash on mornings before meetings with important clients.
Soon, the family was livid… but not with me. With each other. Their snappiness toward one another left the children bitter and angry, with no one to take out their aggressions on but each other. They fought loudly, and often. Rather than scratch and dent my walls they were now filling them with the sounds of yelling and crying, of hurtful things said in anger, and I’d had enough of it.
One night Peter was awakened by the wind. The window was open, and he hadn’t remembered opening it, because he hadn’t. I had. And as he approached the window, asking himself this very question—hadn’t he closed it before bed?—I saw the resentment in his eyes.
“I wish I’d never bought this piece of shit house,” he mumbled, as he rested his hands on the windowsill.
And without second thought, I brought the window down on all ten fingers so hard the neighbors said they could hear his scream from five blocks away.
When the moving trucks came the next day, Peter watched with a scowl (and two bandaged hands) as the team of movers hauled away his furniture and law books. His entire horrible family was gone by noon. And although the For Sale sign was once again planted in the drive, my heart was lightened to witness their departure.
I had done that, had succeeded in forcing them out of me. If only Gloria Everton had been able to do the same with
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