"She's having one of her spells." Pain shadowed his face as he shifted his weight from one leg to the other, still blocking the doorway.

It was Mom he was protecting. The "spells" started after my brother died, fifteen years ago. Our family secret. As if grief was something to be ashamed of. He stepped forward, forcing me to step back.

"Okay. I guess we'll spend the night in the van." I wasn't serious, of course. But venting some of my anger made me feel a little better.

He actually nodded, his gaze not quite vacant-I gauged it as a two-thirds-of-the-six-pack-consumed stage. His own nightly trip into oblivion.

Then he got this wistful smile that made me remember swinging off a rope into a pond, his strong arms stretched open to catch me. A younger me, trusting him, making the leap.

"Does he have your eyes? Those green Costello eyes? You get that gypsy blood from your mom's side of the family, that's why you couldn't stay put here."

Memories unearthed themselves like zombies clawing their way out of a freshly dug grave. I held on to the door, the wood gouging my palm, and fought to bury them once more. I couldn't "stay put" in Scotia because I'd been LifeFlighted out ten years ago, half-past dead. Me and David-although he hadn't been born yet. That had been another rainy night.

"Try your gram. Edna said something to her about your coming back." I noted that he didn't say "coming home."

With that, he turned and climbed back up the steps, turning the light off when he reached the top, leaving me standing just outside the threshold, in the dark.

A familiar dread and uncertainty roiled over me, making me feel off balance, unable to remember the life I'd built for myself as an adult, feeling dwarfed, diminished. Meaningless. Nothing.

I was definitely back home.

Copyright 2011 by Erin Brockovich.

end.