Memories of the Past

Prologue

It all seems so hard to believe really. The day started out like any other. It was a cold

winter’s day at the beginning of January. The first day back at school after the Christmas holidays.

I was in grade twelve and I had just turned eight-teen in November. I was a year older than most

of my class mates because I had started school late.

My best friend, Danica or Danni for short, was about two years younger than me and in my

little brother’s class. Owen and Danni hated each other with a passion.

I have two older siblings as well, my sister Reggie, short for Regina, and Devin my brother.

Reggie is twelve years older than me and has two sons. Aaron age eight and Nathan age

four. Devin is about eleven years older than me and had one daughter, Coral-lee who is almost

seven months old. Reggie lives on the side of the city but Devin is sort of living half at our place

and half at his girl friend Jess’ place.

Owen and I don’t get along very well; in fact we fight all the time. If you were to take a look

at us you wouldn’t even know we were related. All of my family has brown hair with either brown of

hazel eyes. Owen on the other hand has hair so blonde its almost white and dark forest green

eyes.

Then there’s my Mom, Cheryl. She’s basically raised us alone, my father passed away three

years ago but I hadn’t seen him since I was four anyway so it didn’t bother me that much. I’m sure

that all of these years must have been hard on her. She worked really hard and we make do. She

never complains and she loves us and her grandchildren very much.

All in all although my family spends most of our spare time together, we’re not really what

you would call a tight-knit group. So when I woke up that cold Monday morning and heard no noise

upstairs it wasn’t that unusual. My Mom had already been at work for a few hours already and my

brother Owen has class first thing in the morning while I have a spare. Devin, I just assumed had

gone back to Jess’ the night before after I had gone to bed.

So I dragged myself out of bed, got dressed, and went upstairs. As soon as I came up from

the basement I noticed that it was overcast outside. I opened the door to check the mail and

noticed that besides the dreary sky it wasn’t that cold.

As I was pulling my boots on, my cat, Skitz, was snoozing on the couch. Since I still had a few

minutes before I had to leave to catch my bus, I reached out to pet her. At first she arched into my

touch, but then she opened her eyes, hissed at me, then high tailed it up the stairs. That was my

first clue that something was wrong.

Now before I go on let me tell you more about where I live. It’s in Winnipeg so the winters

are always very cold. My domestic dwelling though, it’s not exactly an apartment but not really a

house either. It’s more like sixteen houses stuck together to make one giant town house. Each

unit has either one or two bedrooms and a bathroom on the second floor. A living room and

kitchen are on the main floor. Finally the laundry room and my room are located in the basement.

We also live right across the street from a cemetery. I love it there. You can almost always

find me there late at night in the summertime. Especially it there’s a full moon.

As I was walking to the bus stop I noticed a long funeral procession across the street. I had

never seen so many people attending a funeral before ‘Whoever died must have been really

popular,’ I thought to myself and continued on my way.