I Remember...

Oct 2-19

I remember the smell of the stinky bugs that infested the house, and sleeping in the bed with them.
I remember waking up in the middle of the night starving because she hadn't fed us for a day or two, and sneaking into the kitchen as quietly as I could to steal bread because it was the only thing I could find that I could eat, and getting caught anyways.
I remember the cat of nine tails she used on us whenever she felt like it. We called her Granny, but she was no relation to us. She was a friend of my mothers who babysat us whenever mom was on a bender and needed a place to ditch us for a few days or a week.
I remember the layout of the house. I still know exactly where the front door lead to the living room and the kitchen and the back door and the bedrooms and the entrance to the basement.
I remember a little boy and girl hiding behind the couch playing makeout games; I often wonder what happened to them and where they ended up, if they were better or worse off than I was, and I remember the basement, where HE lived. Where things happened even worse than the cat of nine tails.  Things I mostly don't remember or that I won't retell of here. Things a child should never experience.

Today as I was cooking some toast to go with my supper, I opened the loaf of bread and caught a whiff that sent me straight back to that kitchen in the middle of the night.
It's strange the things that you remember, when tragedies and trauma blocks out the important details, and leaves you with bad smells, and house floor plans.