Chapter 4

Chapter 4:
Age 8

When I was 8 years old, I heard something that should have never entered my mind, something that no normal child could endure, or maybe even understand. I was walking up the stairs one night from the basement, where the playroom and TV were. I wanted to get a cup of water, after all that fun on the Wii Fit I needed a drink. I was a few stairs away from the top and the door to the house was slightly open.

Samuel and Mary sat at the dinner table talking about various topics when Mary slowly looked down at her food. She pushed it around like a kid would when playing with food they don’t want to eat.

“Samuel,” she said slowly, hoping he didn’t hear her.

“Honey? Is there something wrong,” anyone would know from Mary’s tone that something was wrong.

“It’s nothing Samuel, nothing...” her voice trailed off even though she tried to sound upbeat.

Samuel got up out of his chair, took his plate to the sink and brought back a cup of water. He took the seat next to Mary and sat down. He looked straight at her, looked at her straight in the eyes.

“Spill it, spill it all,” he said.

“Samuel...” she was holding back tears.

“The results, they were...” she was almost sobbing now, “they came back.”

At this point, I was still clueless, I knew nothing about results, doctor appointments that meant bad news, or anything of that sort.

“What is it, Mary?”

She shook her head as if to indicate negative. Samuel’s jaw almost fell on the floor from intensity the news.

‘How? It’s impossible? No! It can’t be.’

Samuel looked at Mary for support, but she was sobbing uncontrollably. He got up instantly, put the cup in the sink and opened the partially open door.

Dad saw me sitting there on the stairs, at that point his mood fluctuated in so many different ways, I was lost.

“Chris! What are you doing here?!” He shouted

“Umm, sorry, Dad.” Chris was afraid from Samuel’s wrath.

“It’s alright, son.” His face transformed from red and angry, to one almost like a little pleading kid.

Samuel noticed Jadon sitting a few steps down from Chris. It was amazing how well those two got along, Samuel thought. They were the best friends who were siblings.

Dad picked Jadon up, even though Jadon was now almost 5 and a half, and took him into Jadon and my room. I ran into the room and me, Jadon and dad wrestled for a while. I remember the whole time dad was laughing, but tears were flowing down onto his cheeks the whole time.

“Dad, look at you cwying,” Jadon said, in his baby talk filled accent.

“Shut up, Jadon!” Said Chris.

“Chris, remember what we said about bad words?” Samuel said, wiping tears from his eyes.

“Sorry, Dad.”

I just hoped everything would be all right after that. Things that I didn’t understand didn’t bother me back then, I just left everything to my parents, who were always the heros at making life right.