The Lock
The lock is harder than I remembered. The sound is the same. The door opens without effort, the whole hallway laid out before me.
On the left, the paintings are gone. On the right, the bright living room sits bare, stripped of its small ornaments. My eye looks for the photo of me with the red telephone, forgetting it is already at my own house. The sofa has been shifted slightly, the small table pushed into a corner. It was the only way to get through with the walker. The shutter is up, the curtain open onto a pleasant, sunlit day.
The big living room television is gone, leaving a patch of different colour on the cabinet. Next to it, the kitchen. The fridge is off, the small television also gone, the table pushed into a corner. The smell of the stuffed olives she used to make for me is still there. Or perhaps it is only in my mind. Without thinking, I open the oven. Empty, as it never was. I close it again. The mantel clock has vanished, and so has the Frate Indovino calendar. The fireplace is still sealed. They said it was the regulations, but grandfather was tired of carrying the wood up. The old boiler is off, its dial worn down.
I turn back and step toward the hallway. The old pendulum clock is still there, stopped. As a child, in the old house, I used to play around it, circling it. It looked enormous to me. When they moved, grandfather cut it short at the bottom and hung it on the wall. Crooked, otherwise it would stop. I lift it off the wall, revealing the mark behind it, and set it down on the floor. I remembered it lighter. To the left, the room where I slept only once. I smile, because everything is the same. I open a drawer, empty. The family photos used to be in that drawer. I close it. On the wall, my embossed poster with a cat and a dog. Faded with the years, flattened by games and house moves. I fought to keep it from being thrown out, even in that state.
I leave the room and move on to theirs. The photos are gone, and all the furniture is polished and clean. A ray of sunlight comes through the window and falls on the chest of drawers - it's morning, the sun comes from the east. When they were here, the shutter was always half-lowered at this hour. They would get up very early and take a nap mid-morning. Then they'd raise it again, and I'd know I would find them awake. Ready to make me something good when I was hungry. Or just a comfort, when I was tired.
I turn and go into the room across the hall. I open the doors of the large wardrobe, but it is empty. My comics are gone, and so are my toys. All of their things are gone. How big that wardrobe is, and how full it used to be! There are still some things on the old red table. Thirty-five years ago, give or take, in its place there was the cardboard box. He had brought it home so we could play with it, and we had turned it into a kind of fort, with all our friends. It seemed enormous, but it was probably smaller than that table. So many memories, here. Out of habit, I look at the corners of the room. My friend had brought the fishing worms and we had forgotten to close the box. They had spread all over the room. But I got away with it, that time too.
I leave the room, on the right the brown bathroom. In good shape, but worn by time. I didn't remember that handle. Ah yes - grandfather had put it in when he was starting to have trouble moving. The shower could use some work, but it still functions. I keep walking and reach the other bathroom - my bathroom. The tub is still untouched, even after more than forty years. It can't have been used five times. The toilet still has its original seat, in perfect condition. That day, just back from school, I was peeing when she came running into the bathroom. She was crying. A boy in her class had insulted her. "Don't worry, just tell me who it is, I'll come to school and your big brother will have a word with him." She smiled and calmed down, while grandmother was telling us to wash our hands because everything was ready. The bidet is still gleaming, while the sink shows a few more signs of wear than I remembered. Maybe, in the last few years, she had taken some shortcuts to clean it more quickly. But I haven't been in here for a long time, maybe I'm not remembering well. The tiles are still spotless. Except for the one near the window, where I dropped the hammer.
I take another walk through, trying to memorise everything, one more time. The bare walls, to my eyes, are still full of life. The cabinets full of photographs. And again, I catch the smell coming from the kitchen.
I take down the pendulum clock and lift it onto my shoulder. I reach the door. I open it and step out. I turn, looking once more, for the last time, at the long, bright hallway.
I close the door, forcing the key a little, and tear the label off the doorbell.