Page 32 - The Houseguest

neighbors. As much as I didn’t want to be here on this earth, the thought of being found in that condition was troubling.
Another alternative was a firearm which we never owned, though I had thought about getting one after bringing Katie home and finding myself completely engulfed in protective parental instincts. But Karina insisted against it, spewing details of mishaps and mishandlings like she had been rehearsing her response assuming my inevitable request. She knew me. She knew me better than I will ever know myself. That fact always influenced the outcome of our rare disagreements. Usually conceding without much opposition, I knew, she knew, what was best in the end. That trust was real, built over years of having someone you knew had your back, always. Not wanting to dishonor her memory by disregarding her wishes even now, I abandoned the idea of shooting myself in the head. I could hear the words I’d spoken to her years before: “No guns in the house, my love, no guns. That’s a promise.” The last nocturnal hallucination was the most disturbing to me. In this one I am walking alone, as I did as a child, to the Flying Horses Carousel in Oak Bluffs. I am grown now and moving slowly with my head down, repeating to myself the chant I knew as a child...
There’s a Carousel in Oak Bluffs town, The horses don’t go up or down, The horses just go ‘round and ‘round, On the Carousel in Oak Bluffs town.
I reach the carousel and stop suddenly, stunned at what appears before me. There are only two passengers on the carousel this day and I notice
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The Houseguest by Linda Ellis www.LindaEllis.life