Signature Odor

   “This house smells as bad as it did 20 years ago, huh?” George talks to himself while he sets down his wife’s overstuffed suitcases down on the squeaky floor of his 87 years old, family house. 

   “Um, George. Is this where we are going to spend our Christmas vacation in? Are you delusional?” Karen’s heels’ clicking is embracing the voidness of the hallways’ corners, and George remembers being beat up in every one of them. He remembers the taste of blood, the taste of tears, his mother reading, his father beating. Poetic.

   “Honey, the open house is tomorrow night. We agreed to at least make this place presentable.” George reaches for Karen to hug her, instead of returning the gesture, she says, “ugh, take a shower first. You’ve been sweating all over my suitcases.”

   “Babe, we’ll divorce him, I just need a couple more weeks. You know, till he sells the house.“ She gets off the phone, after responding to George’s many attempts to call her downstairs.

   “What the hell is this smell?” Karen’s heels are still clicking.

   “That’s what I am trying to figure out. Have you seen father by any chance? It looks like he’s not home, he said he’d be here.”

   “No, I haven’t seen your beloved father. Just call him or something.” George would never get furious with Karen, he is just grateful she agreed to be his wife. “Your mother must have pissed herself while dying in here. This living room reeks of death!” No, George hates her. 

   “Just go upstairs, I will get everything ready. Just go.” George is using a tone he had never used with Karen. George didn’t love his mother but he had principles, so, he doesn’t tolerate speaking ill of the dead.

   “Whatever.” More clicking. George wishes he had never bought those glittery, pink heels for her birthday. They were too much, however, they suit her personality well.

   “Father.”

   “Yeah.” His father, lean and tall, entering the property he reluctantly consented to sell. He rushes straight to the fire place -without even glancing at George- and he bends down to grab a razor blade that George did not notice earlier when he was cleaning.

   “What is that?” To George, it looked stained. Blood. “What the...”

   “Shut up,” his father hisses with an accent George did not recognize. Was it there when he left his parents to go to college? Yes, it was there but after all these years, nothing is familiar to him except for the sound of his screams filling this sweet home. It was never home to him. When he was 10 years old, he believed that it was a dungeon for naughty children and he happened to be placed here unfairly. He believed he had no parents and that the angels put him on earth so they can take him to heaven once they were done testing his faith. Everyone seemed to notice, except for his parents, that George was the angel.

   “Mom’s death was natural, right?” George did not really care that his mom died at all, he just wants to make sure he’s not corrupting a possible crime or suicide scene. 

   “What else would it be, idiot?” George hates this word until this very day, idiot, he can’t even pronounce it correctly without gagging, it dug out memories that were long buried in the back of his mind. 

   He notices that his father has the razor inside the pocket of his beige, worn out, slacks. Father starts ambling to the door of the basement, the forbidden territory, George thinks. 

   Once the door is open, the odor he’s been smelling all day flutters even stronger to meet George’s already-fed-up nostrils.

   “Kid, come down with me,” the father utters. 

   “Why?”

   “What is third rule of this home?” 

   “Obey, never ask, sir.” But George is pretty sure he remembers that the first rule is ‘never get near the basement’.

   “Good. Let’s.” 

   It all comes rushing back. He is 15 years old again in front of a tall figure clutching an absurdly long cane and his mother weaving or reading in the corner, unbothered.

   He doesn’t help but notice he’s now taller than his father by good 4 inches.

   He follows his father down a staircase he can’t identify. The odor keeps punching him more intensely each step.

   When he begins taking objects in, he understands that if he had ever pictured a slaughter house, this is what it would be like. He doesn’t dare say a word. Not in front of this man who liked being called father or sir.

   It has probes of every kind, some sharp, some blunt. Some rusty, some very shiny. Every one of them, however, is blood-curdling .

   “I have to place my stuff in boxes. Go find some and start stackin’,” Father said while he sat down. George can’t swallow his saliva and he is choking inaudibly.

   “What is this?” 

   “Why is it any of your business?” 

   “Where is mom?”

   “Are you gonna realize I don’t answer questions?”

   “I’m not giving you a choice.” George didn’t recognize his own voice.

   “What did you just say?”

   “You heard me.” George now has no control over the words that are hustling out of his mouth.

   Father is reaching for something long, both sharp and shiny. In the descending moonlight, George knows what it is, it is a hack saw.

   “You can’t do it.” He doesn’t believe it, he’s just testing his waters. 

   “I can.”

   “So? Kill me, I don’t care.”

   “You do. Your mother did. I’ve always thought that you two were so similar that I don’t believe you are my child.”

   “I will call the police.”

   “Do it. I’d like to see you do it.”

   “Karen!” George screamed, she’s his only hope, he knows he left his cell phone upstairs.

   “Oh, that slut? She can’t hear you.”

   “Just do it!” Now, he means it.

   Father gets closer and he swings the saw until it collapses with George’s shoulder. He shrieks in agony. 

   “You can’t be my child, your mother was a whore. She came down here thinking she can send me to prison. Look where that got her!” George is on the floor, swimming in a pool of his own blood. He starts watching clips of his sad, miserable life and he starts laughing, he must be watching a movie, he thinks.

   Another swing. One more followed with hysteric laughing. The next is deadly. No more laughing.

   Karen starts singing a tune her lover would always play to her on his guitar. One would think that a person like her could never love but she genuinely loves him.

   She is peeling an orange in the kitchen, still singing. She stops when she hears a loud thump, coming from the window that is facing her. She peeks outside, trying to bring her view into focus. She sees her husband’s father stacking bodies of children in the backyard. She freezes. Father continues stacking and he struggles to get one larger body on top of them. It is George’s, followed by his mother. Father stands there with his back to the window, he screams Wanting everyone to hear him but Karen screams louder than him. A perfect harmony.

   Just then, father turns around, catches her gaze and he starts toward the kitchen’s backdoor with a saw in his hand.

   Turns out, George was right about his home being the dungeon they punish naughty kids in.