Mother

Let me take you back to a fateful Saturday in the summer of 1988. My day begins as I violently hit the floor, immediately followed by my bedside lamp. Jolted awake by a terrible nightmare, I must have grabbed for it when I sensed myself falling. As I regain my bearings, the last fragments of that night fade away. The lamp is smashed into a thousand pieces; shards of glass litter the floor. Mother will be mad, but there’s nothing I can do about it now.

I get up and check myself for cuts. Nothing major. I’m fine. Daylights seeps through the curtains, there’s no point in going back to sleep. The clock says 8:30, it’s time for breakfast. I make my way downstairs, mother is standing in the living room, as if waiting for something. She’s visibly upset. Mother asks if I’m alright, I don’t think she notices my cuts. She’s always been distant, barely looking at me, yet somehow protective.

Not unlike my father, who’s at work. He’s always at work. Back then I used to think that was because of me. In hindsight, it might have been because of mother, or maybe all of us together. They had my sisters five years after they had me, guess they weren’t expecting twins. It’s not that my father didn’t care, he cared a lot. He always wanted us to be able to stand on our own, he even got me a credit card somehow. It’s just that maybe an entire family was too much for him, so he drowned himself in work instead.

Mother goes on another one of her laments about how she misses my father. She does this often, but much more so recently. Her complaints are interrupted by the phone. It’s him, again. We used to talk on the phone regularly, more than we talked in person actually. He’s concerned too, something about his grandfather; he wants me to have his diary. I’ve learned not to question my father, so I go to get the diary from the basement.

Downstairs, I find a baseball bat hidden away behind some old coats, still in its packaging. Maybe a future gift? I might as well take it now, it’s not like my parents will care too much. The diary itself is filled with riddles. I can’t make heads nor tails of it. I give it to my sister Minnie, she’s always been smarter than me.

I need some fresh air. As I leave, I take my new gift with me. It’s the cheap kind, made of plastic, but I don’t mind. I love baseball, if only my father would play with me. I head for my neighbor Pippi, maybe she’ll play with me. Apparently she was named after some Swedish girl. We used to live remotely, so it’s a bit of a walk. I don’t mind though, the weather’s nice and it gives me a chance to clear my head.

I stumble across a man sitting on the river bank. His hair is long and unkempt, clothes covered in patches and dirt. It’s one of these hippies my parents warned me about, but he doesn’t seem like much of a threat. He hasn’t noticed me yet.

I don’t think I’m a bad person, but to this day, I don’t know what came over me. I sneak closer, careful not to be heard. I’ll never forget the sound his skull made when the bat connected. Like throwing a ball against a wall, but also the sound of breaking bones. He falls immediately, blood starts pouring out of his skull. He isn’t moving, in fact I’m certain he’ll never move again. It’s strange, it’s just a lump of meat now. The rest of its body still looks human, but the head has no discernible shape, it’s just a bloody lump. I don’t know how I feel about what I just did, it sort of just happened. I know I should be shocked, appalled, disgusted. Instead, I feel nothing inside. It’s like I’m watching a movie, I have no particular opinion, just curiosity. The realization scares me. It’s time to get out of here.

As I approach Pippi’s house, I see her mother crying in the front. Pippi hasn’t been seen today and no one knows why she left. Another worried mother. I promise I’ll go look for her daughter.

I know exactly where she is. Pippi and me like to hang out at the local graveyard. It’s overgrown with plenty of places to hide, if she wants to get away from something, that’s where she’ll be. It doesn’t take long to find her. I hear her faint screams coming from one of the crypts. She’s not alone, there’s three men with her. Back then, I was too young to understand what they did to her, but even then I realized it must have been horrible.

I’ve done it already, there’s no reason I can’t do it again. Just like the hippy, they didn’t notice my approach from behind. The first one goes down quickly, the other two turn towards me. They’re slow, confused and their movements are imprecise. I don’t know what drug they’re on, but it clearly works in my favor. I break number two’s arm and charge for the last. It takes some wrangling, but I come out on top. One more to go. Number two managed to get a hold of a knife with his good arm, we circle, but in the end my bat has more range.

This time I don’t get the opportunity to reflect. Pippi is crying, she thanks me for rescuing her from the “zombies”. Clearly, she doesn’t know what had happened to her either. Maybe that’s for the best. It’s getting late; the sun is setting. I really should get her back to her mother, yet, I don’t. After what happened, I don’t feel like going home, but I also don’t want to be alone. Pippi is the only person in the world I can talk to right now, even if she won’t understand. We head for the local hotel and I book a room. I don’t know why they would give a teenager a room, but I guess the 80ies were a different time.

And that’s how that day ended. Anyways, if you haven played Mother (aka. Earthbound Beginnings), you really should, it’s a blast!