* * *

My left hand slid upwards, never letting go of the sturdy wooden railing. How many times had the fingers of others touched that railing? Hands of the young, the old, the clean and the dirty.

The wood had darkened over the years, much like the wood lining the tobacco kilns. The dingy green walls added to the palpable misery of the house. There was just enough light to see where many of the footsteps of the past had chosen to overlap one another. Exposed wood showed the way.

As I climbed closer to the small window, I had to avert my eyes away from the bright spring sunshine making its way inward to the all-encompassing darkness. Like always, the croaking and crackling voice in my head told me, “Look at what you refuse to clean up.” So many dead bodies. Most of them had their legs pointing upwards as they lay on their backs, their wings flattened, cracked and broken beneath them. Silly creatures. They fight their way in, then can’t find the way out. They must think that flying towards daylight is their one and only option.

“Stupid, foolish, dumb flies,” I said out loud.

I reached into the pocket of my apron, feeling for the heavy metal key—too heavy to put on a chain and wear around my neck. Grandmother always did, but then her neck was so much thicker than mine. Every time I put the key into its lock, I imagined myself as a jailer about to open a jail cell. If a shoe fits, you must wear it or suffer the consequences.

“Good morning Grandmother,” I said, pushing the door inward.

Covering the single window in the small room, a pair of moth-eaten wool fabric panels hung from a wooden broom handle. A sliver of sunshine pushed its way through the gap where the stretched-out panels didn’t quite touch each other.

As per usual, Grandmother lay on her bed. Always the same, as if her closed eyes stared at the ceiling. Nothing really remarkable to look at up there, except for the many dark and circular stains concentrated above her body. The police shows called it blood splatter. I thought of it as the results of a planned accident.

“Grandmother, you’ve lost weight,” I said, adjusting the brown flannel sheet I had spread over her. “I know you’d want me to do some dusting, but I really don’t enjoy doing it. Besides, who else is ever going to see this?” The room was dingy, but I had convinced myself that my housekeeping skills weren’t all that bad.