Finally I remember where I put It! My HEART............

My sister had me by my shirt and she was moving as fast as she could with me in tow.  Up the stairs we went at 815 Balboa.  Around the corner and turned right into the Linen Closet.  She rushes to close the door behind us, pushes me in front and takes my shoulders and keeps on pushing to the back of the closet.  Looking straight ahead there were three bins that had holes drilled in the doors. The doors pulled down to open them and it was where we kept blankets, towels and sheets.  We get all the way to the back of this very long and narrow closet,  she stepped in front of me and pulled the lowest of the three cupboards down.  She pushes me to go faster. At that moment you here the knocking around of a person on the staircase we had just come up, then you could barely hear the noise of what I guess was going to erupt. 



I am in the cupboard now, the blankets were pushed aside from our last visit.  In climbs my sister and as she is turning around she begins to close us in.  I asked what was going on. She held her finger to her lips and said "SsHHH."  She always spit when she did this to me.  Apparently I had a problem with whispering and while we were in this little tiny hiding spot I cannot tell you how many times the SSHHH happened.  As we sat I noticed we were getting to big to be in there together.  It was much more crowded than it used to be and as usual it got stuffy very fast.  She would have to open the cupboard door regularly to allow the air to flow in side of the cupboard we were hiding in. I used to put my mouth up to the holes and try to get more air through those, it never worked very well.  I was always so impressed about how she knew just how long we could sit there before she had to open the door for more air allowing us to not suffocate.



By this time our wonderful parents had made it to the top of the stairs and the screaming and yelling were deafening.  Now they were looking for us to hit.  You could here my father banging my mother all around in the hall way. You could hear the screaming voice of my mother just about now, they were directly outside the linen closet.  This was always when my sister would hold her finger to her lips and stare, almost glare through the holes in the cupboard door.  She was looking to see if anyone was coming into the linen closet to find us.  She held the cupboard door and as we began to suck up all the oxygen and it became wet in there from our breath, she would just wait, not opening it for any circulation.



The fight would begin to get worse and worse but they were making their way to the master bedroom down the hall.  You could hear and almost feel as my mother was being thrown against the walls of the hall.  Then slam went the door of the master bedroom at the end of the hall.  Just then my sister would open the cupboard door for only a moment and then shut it quickly.  I was always so amazed that we did not suffocate, I thought to myself she really knows what she is doing.  From then on out on every other time she would make us stay in there for so long that I would fall asleep finally.



On this particular day before I fell asleep and after enough time had passed for her safety check. She had to sure that they were both in the bedroom and not pretending to be in there, while actually hunting the house for us to beat.   After she was sure that they did not have their ears up to doors in the house looking for our hiding places she would carefully and quite silently climb out and turn the soy lent green free standing hamper around so that it would be facing the door that lead out to the closet completely.  She would pile up the dirty clothes up on the hamper, push it as far back as he could, climb around it and back into the cupboard with me.  Then instead of fulling closing the door, she would pull the lid of the hamper as close as she could and let the cupboard door fall on it. Then take the blankets we were sitting on and fill it in a little higher. This way you really couldn't tell anyone was back there and we could finally breath easier.  Right before she was going to chance it and turn the hamper so that it would work for us, I said this to her.  "You are so smart and you always know how long we have to breath before we die.  I have to give you something because I don't need it in this place or here at all and you will know what to do with it, take better care of it and I don't want it.  I have to give you my heart, I can't have it here and I know you will keep it safe for me."



I don't remember what she said to me, but, she took it, just like a big sister would do for her little sister that is seven years younger.  A few years ago I remembered what I had done with my heart. I had been trying to remember for years what I had done with it.  I thought I had put it in a box and buried it under a tree.  I had a friend at the time and I shared this story of my missing heart.  I had told him that I had put my heart someplace I just couldn't remember where I put it and it was bugging me because I thought I should finally find it after all these years. I told him that I had put it down as a kid because I did not need it anymore along with my soul. We spent a lot of time searching everywhere. We went to old haunts, looked under trees I recognized and each time I would look at him and say, "No, this isn't where I left it, I know I left it in the safest place ever."  Then out of the blue one day I remembered, the linen closet, the drilled holes of the hamper door and my sister.  I called her right then and said. "You have my heart.!"  Silence filled the air and then, "I never thought that you would remember that you had done that to me.  Yes I have your heart."  I asked, "Is it still in good condition."  She answered "Yes."  She asked if I wanted it back now, I told her no she could use it better than I, plus you have had for so many years wouldn't it be like ripping out of you?  She replied, "Yes."  I said  "Keep it, you have taken care of it since I was small."  I asked her how old I was when this originally happened.  She told me I was three.  She thanked me for letting her keep it.  I told her that it was cool, I was just so bugged that I could not remember where I put it. I told her that I thought I had buried it in a box under a tree, but now I think that might have been my soul. She did this low half hearted chortle as if she did not mean it but it seemed appropriate for what I had said.  That was that, I told her I had to go.  It may have been the last time I spoke to her, I don't know.  I am just happy I found my heart again, it is safely tucked away with the most brilliant person in the world.  She kept us breathing while our parents fought and we did not get beaten or die of suffocation.  Smarter than I because the time the bag went over my head I ended up on the outside of myself staring at the scene of the crime.  There I was, still on the basement floor with a black bag over my head. I wasn't breathing.  I remember it like yesterday.