When the Oven Gets Cold

Today is April 31. At least, that’s what it feels like down here. April 30 was yesterday but, for us, May might never come. So here we are, trapped in some purgatory where the arbitrary human meaning of time no longer exists. Time is no longer counted in minutes or hours or days but is now counted in the shuddering breaths my mother takes. It is counted in the duration the dust takes to fall from the cracks in the ceiling. It is counted in the intervals between the bombs.

It is a shame, really, that time is broken because May 6 is my birthday. Now, I might never live to be 25. I was supposed to finally feel like I was shaking off the glitter of “the early 20’s” and finding out how I fit into the world of proper adulthood. I was going to get a real job, an important job. I was to travel, leave this tiny town and visit somewhere from the postcards that hang on my wall from my grandma’s brief backpacking stint. I was going to get a dog.

I was going to. I was going to. I was going to.

I suppose it’s not important right now. It doesn’t help, right now. But still, I cannot shake the thoughts. I don’t know how to feel. I am empty. I am burning.

“Did I turn the oven off?” The world could end tomorrow and these are the only words my mother has said to me. While the other mothers have been stroking hair and singing lullabies and telling stories with funny voices, my mother has been thinking about the oven. I know she thinks I’m all grown up but I still need my mother. After all, I’m not 25 yet.

“I hardly think that matters right now,” I snap back at her. Take a deep breath. It’s not her fault. She is dealing with this as much as you are, I tell myself. No amount of time on Earth can prepare you for this. So, it is not her I am angry at. And if I poke at my emotions, if I tweeze them apart like frogs in the science labs above us, I’ll find I’m not even angry. I’m scared. But it’s much easier to brandish my anger like a sword and pretend that is why my pulse is a sharp, stabbing thing.

The walls around us shake once more. This basement was built to house the extra equipment the school above us doesn’t need. It was not built to withstand the hatred of men. These walls won’t hold. Already they howl and groan like an injuried dog kicked by its master. Is that a crack by the corner? The night is still too young. The bombs have only just begun to drop.

“I had your father’s dinner in there.” Her voice is so small and her eyes won’t settle on a single spot for longer than a second and every now and then her breathing squeaks. She reminds me of the mouse George and I once found with its tail cut off, crying as it ran in desperate circles.

“Burning it will be an improvement on your cooking, dear.” Dad winks and nudges me. He’s always one to try and lighten a heavy load, to use humour to make the damp air down here a little less suffocating. At least he still thinks I need protecting, like when I was younger and afraid there was a monster hiding in the dark corners of my closet. My mind would mould the shadows of coat hangers into twisting teeth and the light that bounced off the buttons of my raincoat were eyes that watched me no matter where I hid. He would come in with a towel wrapped around his neck like a cape and kill the beast with torchlight and whatever weapon he had found that night. No matter how many nights I asked for him, he was there. Even if he showed me that day that there was nothing to be afraid of, come night, Dad would be there, never once wearing the chore like a burden. “For you, my warrior,” he would say, “I would kill a thousand monsters on a thousand nights, because it means that you still need me.”

I know by the tension in his shoulders, in the faux wrinkles as he forces another smile, he wishes he could protect us from this too. But there are some monsters too great for flashlights and capes and fatherly love.

Across from me, an old man stifles another yawn. He’s been fighting against sleep for the better part of two hours but still he will not close his eyes. Instead, he ruffles the ears of the dog on his lap and picks up his toy for another round of fetch. His dog has been run ragged but, as though she senses her owner’s restlessness, she gets up and agrees for another round.

“What about that pea and ham soup where you used the entire bottle of lemon juice?” My parents now bicker over who is the better cook. My mother says my father never uses enough spice. My father reminds my mother of the time she set the kettle on fire while making a coffee. He gestures too widely and apologies as he knocks the person next to him.

I’m amazed how many of us we managed to cram into this old basement. But I’m even more frightened by the faces I don’t see. Where is my neighbour, Mandy, who always made an extra jar of plum jam for my dad because she knew he liked it on his scones? Where is my favourite English teacher who always gave the best book recommendations? Where is the barista from the cafe I get brunch at every Sunday? Oh god, what was her name? Samatha? Sarah? I should know that.

Walls shake and dust rains as another bomb plants itself in one of our gardens. Who’s house was that? Was it Gerald’s or Yvanna’s or Raef’s? What if that was the barista’s house and I am just one more person who never knew her name?

The school teacher raises her voice over the shuddering rafters, distracting the kids littered by her feet with stories. Her husband uses the torch next him to make shadow puppets, acting out the hero’s dramatic rescue of the princess. Together they craft a better world from make-believe. The children are enraptured, as are half the adults pretending not to be listening as intently as the children, pretending they don’t need it just as much. I find myself charmed by them as her husband makes a clumsy attempt at a dragon.

I suppose that is what my mother is doing, in her own way: making puppets from the flames in her mind. She cannot comprehend that our tired little town would huddle in on itself as men, far away, decide we are acceptable collateral in their war. None of us can.

This is not supposed to happen to us. This is supposed to only happen to the towns with names we can’t pronounce. The news should be as close as we come to this. We might shake our heads and say “what is the world coming to?” and move on with our lives. We would not really think about the kids in schools that did not have basements. We would not think about the hospitals hit and playgrounds razed. It was not ours to bother to think about. Besides, we had laundry to do and dishes to clean.

Now, here we are, still trying not to think about it. Distracting ourselves with games and stories and humour and pointless squabbles over whether or not the dinner will be burnt.

The world that awaits us tomorrow, if time allows it, will be an entirely new one. One where we can no longer pretend we are so removed from the world around us. One where our name becomes a warning to every other tiny, tired town who thought they were immune, who thought, like we did, that their privilege bought them protection. But for tonight, we’ll pretend once more. We’ll pretend everything is normal and the biggest problem we have is whether or not we turned the oven off.