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I am standing outside my bedroom, on the precipice of lost innocence.
Wide eyed, and barefoot on cold hardwood.
Someone is hammering on our front door.
My father, looking a bit annoyed, shuffles anxiously down the stairs.
Tussled hair, a bewildered vein bulging in his forehead,
wearing his old, blue plaid robe, (one with a woven rope belt),
he frowns like a lightweight boxer, ready to enter the ring.

There are two grim faced policemen waiting on the front porch.
My mother, at the top of the stairs, clutches the neck of her gown.
She looks as if she might choke herself.
Confused alarm, reflects in sleep-swollen eyes.

They ask my father,  “How well do you know those folks across the road?”
As they notice me standing on the stairs, they quickly lower their voices.
In a hushed, rather husky monotone, they whisper to my father... 
something about a boy who has taken a shotgun into the hillls...
and into the chill of the night… 
He has taken his own life…and has been identified as the boy..., 
the teenager, who lives kitty-corner across  our road.
The same kid who mowed our grass when Dad was sick for a spell last summer.
The one who bags Mom’s groceries at the local A & P.
They think I don’t hear them            ……but I do…
and I hear them ask my father, 
      would he,  please, come along to help them break the news?

My father, glazed eyes, and head low, steps away a moment, to quickly dress.
I remember hearing my mother gasp, then suck in a  sob,..
But then is right behind me, pulling me towards her…..
and I can feel her heart pounding, through flannel of my pajamas.
She is squeezing my shoulders..so hard that it hurts,.... somehow I don’t mind.
I look up seeking reassurance,.... her eyes are huge, …
                      and she knows that I have heard…. 
And we both know,...that nothing will ever be the same. 
After this day is over,  the childhood of yesterday, will wear a different face…

Father pulls a coat over his pajama tops, …he gives my mother a touch on the arm.
With a desolate look at me, he touches my head.
He steps out into the darkness of a not quite dawn.
And through the window,  I can see the line of shadows on the lawn.
Three men, like hunched over soldiers, walking slowly into the wounds of a new day.

.............................................
(Sadly,  this is based on a true story)

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