Our House Changes

Our house is alive. We were raised on that. All the generations upon generations of Nicasia's learn this. We learn it when we are born and don't stop learning it until we remember.

Our house has rooms that change. We don't know how or why, but they change. Our house has seven stories, twelve main bedrooms, five bathrooms, three kitchens, two sitting-rooms, and a bathhouse. Those are the rooms that do not change. But those are just twenty-one rooms. Our house has about one hundred. But they change, so the contents of those one hundred are never the same. There are play-rooms full of toys, huge, expansive libraries chock-full with every book you've ever heard of, but mostly ones that you've never seen. There are fort rooms and baking rooms and grilling rooms and pools. There are beauty rooms and sad room and storage rooms and rooms that we still aren't really sure what they're used for.

Grandpa Decius tells us that the rooms are the house's but the house is ours. He says that the rooms come and go as we need them. If we do not need a library, the house will not give us a library. If we do not have a need for a pool, it will not give us one. He says that's the beauty of our house. It is ours.

This makes it a little hard to keep track of who needs what, though. We have a lot of people in our family. There's me and my little brother Lucius and Mom and Dad and my older sister Novia and my baby sister Cerinthia. Then there's Grandma Oppia and Grampie Lars. Then Auntie Aemilia and Uncle Paulus and my cousins, Milonia and Aulus. They're twins and they are always together. Then there's Auntie Lucia and Uncle Manius and their little baby Kaeso. And then, of course, Grandpa Decius. Granny Liburnia used to live with us, but she went away a while back. I don't know where she went, and Dad won't tell me anything else than she just went away.

We have a big family. But I'm okay with it because it means I always have people to play with. Even the grownups play with me. The one who plays with me the most though is Grandpa Decius. He's always around and he's always ready to play. I like to play dolls because I have a dollhouse that looks exactly like our house. It even has little dolls of all my family, too. The rooms change in my dollhouse too.

It was a gift from Granny Liburnia when I was just a little baby. I don't remember a whole lot about her except for her smile and her laugh. Maybe that's enough though.

We live on an island. It's very far away, though I don't know what it's very far away from. I've never left. The grownups are the only ones who've ever left. They go away for a while, and then they come back with more family! The last time that happened was three years ago when I was five. My Auntie Lucia left for a while. I don't know where she went or how she got there, but one day she was just gone. She was gone for a long time. When she came back, though, she had my Uncle Manius with her. And I'm glad she went if it meant she could bring him here. I love Uncle Manius.

I've heard the adults whispering about Novia. She's turning eighteen soon, they said. It's time for her to go out into the world, they said. I don't want her to leave me. She's so good at braiding hair and all her pictures that she paints are so pretty. She painted the roof in my room to look like the sky, with clouds and the sun and everything. I don't want her to leave me.

But maybe it won't be that bad. Maybe she'll bring back another new friend, like Uncle Manius. That would be nice, I think.

Our house is always sunny. There are windows everywhere, and it doesn't really snow here. Or rain all that often, though it does sometimes. I've never seen snow before. I only know about it because of the books in the libraries. I like the days with the libraries best. It's always warm and comfortable in thee, and I like reading all the books about the fancy places and the people in the funny clothes and the snow and the animals. We have animals here, like fish and some deer in the woods behind the house and lots of birds. But I don't want to see those things. I want to see the whales and the dolphins and the tigers and the monkeys. I want to see all of those things.

Today is a library day. I haven't left this chair all day except for food breaks and to use the bathroom. I never want to leave.

--

Today Mom and Dad had a fight with Novia. She said some words that I'd never heard before. Angry words. Sad words.

She is upset about something and I wonder what it is. I don't think she wants to talk right now, though. I knocked on her door and heard crying. She told me to go away and I told her that I loved her. She didn't say it back. She always says it back.

I asked Mom why they were yelling while she made me eggs and toast in Second Kitchen. She said that it was adult stuff. They always say it's adult stuff. I think that maybe that's just something that adults say when it's too complicated and they think you won't understand cause you're too young. I told her that and she looked at me and smiled. She said that she loved me and I said it back. You always have to say it back.

I played with Milonia and Aulus in the pool for a while. They said that they had wanted a pool day and that the house had listened. I've decided that I love the house.

Tonight before I went to bed, I said I love you to my whole family and kissed them on the cheek as they sat in Sitting-room one and told them all good-night. They all said it back. Novia is still in her room. I hope she isn't crying anymore. It makes me sad when she cries.

Tonight, before I went to sleep, I whispered goodnight and I love you to the house. I didn't hear it say anything back but I hope that it knows anyways.

---

This morning, Novia didn't even come out for breakfast. We always eat breakfast together in Second Kitchen. I'm really worried. What if she doesn't want to be part of our family anymore? What if she leaves us and never comes back, like Granny Liburnia?

I decided I was going to sit outside her door and wait for her to get out and go to the bathroom, and then I would make her tell me why she was crying and why all the adults have been whispering about her and what's making her so angry because I love her, that's why. Because I love her and I don't want her to be sad anymore.

She opened the door really quickly. I didn't even have to wait that long. She just did it. I let her do her business and then I grabbed her arm and dragged her into my room. Her room smelled like tears and tears are sad things. I brought her into my room and wrestled her into one of my bean-bag chairs and pinned her down until she laughed.

And then I said I love you again so that she had to answer me, and she said it back. Because you have to say it back. She was laughing now, so I felt happy and she was smiling so I was smiling. I refused to get off of her, but I sat on her lap like I used to do when I was very small and very light. I'm not so small anymore, but she didn't seem to mind.

I turned around and I asked her why she was crying and why she was sad. She started crying again, and so I used my shirt sleeve to wipe the tears off of her cheeks and then I grabbed her face in my hands, so she looked at me straight in my eyeballs.

No more being sad, I said. And then she smiled at me. She said I love you and I said it back. Why are you so sad? I asked her in my library voice because this was no time for outside porch voices.

She looked at me and her eyes looked sad so I shook her. No more being sad.

She told me that I couldn't say anything to Mom and Dad, because I was too little to know this sort of stuff. And maybe that was true but I still wanted to know because if I knew why she was sad, maybe I could help her. So I said I would tell nothing to no one and then I sat on her lap while she told me things.

She told me that there always has to be a Nicasia in this house. Always, always, to the end of forever. She said that when the adults leave, they leave to go find a boyfriend. So that there can be lots of little babies and lots of little cousins to live in the house and be with the family. That made me happy, to know that there would be more babies and more uncles and aunties. But I still didn't know why she was so sad. I saw no sad in little babies.

She asked me if Mom had talked to me yet about how babies are made. She did when I was seven. She said it was important for me to know. It's yucky though. I told her that and she laughed and it was a happy laugh, not a sad laugh, so I smiled.

She started crying again, though and I was confused. I thought it was a happy laugh.

Why are you sad? I asked her. I felt sad now too because she was hurting and I loved her.

She looked at me and she told me, through her tears, that she didn't want a boyfriend. She wanted a girlfriend.

I laughed a little and she looked at me weird. Is that why you're crying? That's a dumb reason to be sad. If you want a pretty girlfriend instead of a pretty boyfriend, then just get that instead when you leave! Why are you still sad? I said that to her.

She looked at me sadly and told me that a girlfriend and a girlfriend can't make a baby. And only a baby that is part of our family can live in our house. Our beautiful house.

Oh. That made sense. I didn't think about that part of it.

She stayed with me for a little bit, but there wasn't anything else to say. She couldn't have a girlfriend and she didn't want a boyfriend. That was all.

That night when I was saying goodnight to the house, I asked for it to make a way for Novia to be happy again. I hope it heard me.

----

Novia was at breakfast this morning. She still looked a little bit sad but maybe this was a sign that she was feeling a little bit better. She still didn't talk to Mom or Dad. I think she was angry with them. I don't know why. It's not like they had anything to do with how people can go about making babies.

Today was a beach day. There were stairs outside that weren't there before, leading straight down to the sandy beach. I played in the waves. No one else was in the mood for games. Everyone is sad today. Everyone but me.

I got tired of playing in the sand eventually and walked back up to my room. Grandpa Decius was busy and so were my cousins with their reading class, so I was left to play dollhouse by myself.

When I opened my dollhouse there was something really weird. All of the dolls of my family were gathered at one end of the house, behind what should have been Grandpa Decius' room. I have never been allowed to go in there before, but now everyone was there. Everyone but me and the twins. The twins were in their own rooms, doing their lessons. I was curious about Grandpa's room, yes. But what was even weirder was Novia's room. It was glowing in my dollhouse with a bright yellow-gold light. I didn't know what it was and there was no one near there but me.

All my tinglies told me it was a bad idea. That no matter what, I shouldn't go investigate. But I've always ignored them anyway, so there's really no point.

I opened my door slowly and peeked down the hall, towards Novia's room. The door was open, just a little, and a burst of light was pouring through. It was pretty. Where was it coming from?

I tiptoed down the hall to her room and rested my hand on her door. The doorknob was buzzing with energy and it felt like a fly buzzing around my head, just touching it.

I pulled the door open and stepped in. After a moment of the glowing brightness, I had to close my eyes against it or risk blindness. I felt around me slowly and then I felt a cool rock wall. All of Novia's walls were wood.

I opened my eyes to find myself in a place I'd never seen before, a tunnel. A secret tunnel.

In that place, I had two options. I knew that if I wanted to, I could go back right now, back to the safety and comfort of our beautiful house and my beautiful family and the changing rooms. Or, I could press on and risk the possibility of being lost in this secret place.

Something was telling me that going forward was an answer. But to what question?

In the end, it didn't matter. I followed the tunnel forward.

My feet touched on a soft, sandy beach after a few steps. And then noises crashed into my ears.

Laughter. Kids and adults. A bird I'd never heard before. A sharp noise that I could only describe as honking. Some form of music I'd never heard before, in a language I didn't know.

And a sense that I now had a job to do. And when that job was done, my house and my family were waiting. Eventually, the house would call me back.

My family was wrong. We do not own the house.

The house owns us.