12 and a half
David Nibert

Some statistics about your average sandcastle: Snap!

1.) - Average Lifespan (from conception to death): 24 minutes

2.) - Average number of construction workers: 2.78

3.) - Average distance from shore at conception: 20 feet

4.) - Average number of cave-ins per construction: 5

5.) - Total number of sandcastles not abandoned: 0

6.) - Current number of sandcastle wrecks on beach: 6 plus me.

People engage in all sorts of fruitless and ultimately meaningless activities at Velvet Beach. The ice cream they buy has frozen and re- melted an average of 3 times per individually plastic-wrapped iced dessert treat; since shipping. Drinks purchased by your average beach-going nuclear family get warm and flat in under and hour. The sunny days they demand upon arrival inevitably fade; unfortunately before the plutocrat fathers, elitist mothers, and ignorant children can get near-fatal cases of malignant melanoma, forcing them to reconsider the hazardous lives they've led and take up charitable indoor occupations devoted to the service of the underprivileged minorities that the father used to employ for twelve hour days at wages far below subsistence levels. They consume. Click! And there in the slight dunes, like leviathans beached upon inhospitable shores, like grey hulks of once lived-in condominiums, like cracked and bleeding riverbanks, grey like overcast and chilly autumn mornings, are the tide-filled, partially-destroyed, once-loved, now abandoned fortresses of sand. And I'm with them. I'm as long-winded and empty as these beaches at night. I'm at peace, now, with the pieces of myself. It wasn't always this way, though, for a while it was worse. You see its all about averages. Statistics. Numbers and figures. Eight plus seventeen over two. Let me explain, please. Cheese!

***

Ellen is my older sister. No, she was my older sister. No she's my older burial. My younger burial is Father. I've gone and made it confusing again. Father, Ellen, and I (Reese) lived in Northbrook in a small house in a not- quite-decent neighborhood off 51st. The neighbors were varying shades of brown, for the most part. This intrigued Ellen and enraged Father. I never much noticed, keeping my eyes ever-grounded, at Father's command. The white paint on the walls appeared a pale yellow from all the incandescent lighting. There was a living room with a pink and brown couch, placed in front of a useless entertainment center. Where the TV, VCR, and other appliances should have gone, Father kept picture frames. But before we discuss our Father's hobby, the rest of the house awaits! The kitchen was a dripping sink, lawn furniture, a loaf of bread, reusable fast-food cups, a fridge stocked with beer, and a seemingly unreachable window. The window was the only other exit to the apartment and just large enough for a child to fit through. Down the only hall were three rooms: Ellen's room, a nook with several of my father's playthings, a futon, and a cinder-block shelf for her books, a crumbling bathroom, and the room that Father and I shared. The family routine was simple enough. My alarm would ring; a screeching buzzing atrocity that marred the seldom peaceful aromas of my dreams. I would wake up, put on clothes, and cross the hall to Ellen's room. It was here that I was greeted with many of the foulest, most hideous images the world can offer an eight-year-old boy. I would untie Ellen, remove her blindfolds, remove her gags, wash and tend to her cuts and cigarette burns, turn off Father's cruel devices, wipe dried tears from her eyes, wipe dried blood from her encrusted mouth, help her bathe, help her dress, make her breakfast, and then help her walk to school. Daily. And Father, now partially recovered from his drunken rage, would every morning have the audacity to wish us a "nice day at school." Smile! School would pass uneventfully. Ellen and I would walk home and play make believe until father arrived. We pretended like the whole house was going to explode unless we turned every single terrible picture around so we couldn't see it. When we had finished the game we would lounge around until the late afternoon where we would play the reverse game, turning all the pictures back to how Father arranged them. Father would come home and eat whatever He could find. After our bed time He would drown in drink until disoriented. Then He would stagger to Ellen's room. Father would bark a few jumbled commands and arrange her in whatever torturous manner He desired that evening. Occasionally Father could be heard saying something along the lines of "Ok, now hold that and look at the camera.*click* good. A few more." After the shooting was complete He would rape her. All the empty spaces in the house were devoted to Father's collection of pictures like these. He would only keep the very best and prettiest naked photographs of his daughter. Needless to say, we didn't get many visitors, until Father lost his job. Father was an artist. Ellen was the media. The visitor was the muse. "Could we have her doing W to my X while you Y her Z?" "Oh that would work wouldn't it? Want to give it a shot?" "Sure." Click!
Once my Father was fired, He began selling Ellen's body to any bidder. He would photograph the rape sequences and post them on his very own internet site. My Father used Ellen for her body, and sold her with a Three-Day Trial.

Ellen was solid. She was truly a masterpiece. She was clever, curious, caring, blessed with a youthful wisdom. She kept a secret ultra-hidden diary but would let me read parts of it. I never heard her utter a distasteful word towards Father. She had plans for the future, hopes, and dreams and ambitions, countries she wanted to visit, mountains she would climb, rivers she would cross, and oceans she would ponder the depths of. Ellen viewed the world as a series of doors left slightly ajar. All one had to do was nudge forward, and countless new opportunities waited. Freedom, cirrus clouds, wings of angels and honey. Ellen was beauty. Father was adversity. I was just scared. About two months before my ninth birthday, Ellen got sick. She stopped eating and grew pale and weak. She had a deep mucus-filled wheeze that would often result in coughing up blood.
"Ellen, do you need another tissue?"
"Nah, I doubt I'll cough anymore really. I'm feeling a lot better."
"Ellen, you can hardly stand up by yourself."
"I'd just prefer to sit, that's all."
"You haven't eaten since breakfast, Sunday." I began to tear up, fearing the unknown source of Ellen's strength. I'm not sure what I wanted to see. Did I want her to break down? Was I eager to see her crumble like a castle of sand?
"I'm just not hungry, Reese."
"Ellen," a tear dropped. "Why won't you cry?"
"What do I have to cry about?" she asked innocently. I burst into tears. Through chocking sobs of pent up rage and terror I managed to repeat desperately.
"Ellen, why won't you cry?"
"The sun will shine tomorrow, Reese." I needed something. I needed whatever realization kept her going through months of sexual abuse. I needed to know how she persevered through sickness and poverty. I needed to understand my stoic sister. I needed to understand now!
"Ellen!" I pleaded. "Why the fuck won't you just cry?"

The air shattered.

A moment passed as I furiously wiped the stinging tears from my youthful eyes. Pearls of colored radiance formed from the refraction of the light from the window. Blinding, brilliant halos of pastels coated the room like fresh paint, wiping away the blood and dirt from the house as I had wiped it off my sister. She got up and moved to the kitchen, where our lone window perched above the mildew-infested sink. I followed, keeping some distance between myself and my angelic sibling. As I began to say her name she shushed me.
"God loves you, Reese" I was dazed. I had no breath. "But what about you, Ellen?! Why won't God listen to you?!" Her brief laugh sounded like a bubbling mountain stream of milk chocolate.

"He does Reese, He does." Ellen died of a severe lung disorder the night before my ninth birthday.

***

Years past. I grew. Father drank more and spoke less. I had to take a job to support myself as father used the welfare checks primarily for his own alcoholic exploration into the realms of post-consciousness, occasionally to the point of dramatic breakdowns in the living room where He would squeal like an infant and cry, begging for a mother that He never knew and a father who tried his best to support Father's three siblings but could never seem to make ends meet. I took pride in the fact that I, starting at the age of nine, was a stronger man than my Father. My Father, a shell of a stock broker, the carved away remains of a nuclear bread- winner, a son who squandered even the poverty that was given him, a husband who was left criminally alone, a man not capable of recognizing (much less dealing with) the society that marginalized him to obsolescence. He meant well, I'm sure. Father knows best. Father knows nothing. He was a self-destructive willow, the flailing branches creaking downward and splintering, devouring the hollow, though once-sturdy, trunk and, more importantly, the delicate roots. Father destroyed his foundation. Father was all but lifeless, a self-gratifying automaton. Ellen had been his plaything: an obsession with which to captivate his life while it dripped away like skim milk through his sobbing fingertips. He wrapped himself around her torment and thrived on it like a giant though emaciated flea. And through it all, Ellen had nothing for him but kindness. I could not understand. Our lives digressed without major event until the spring before my seventeenth birthday. I had a few meaningless sexual relationships with unprepared girls. I regretted them all. I briefly experimented with several mind-altering drugs but resented the lack of self- control they afforded me. And so it was, that deeply wounded by my inability to escape my circumstances that a recently elected lieutenant-governor began a crusade to crack down on child pornography. My Father was audited by the IRS. His dirty money, only partially laundered, was easily detected and calculated. The seventy-six thousand dollars He made from selling Ellen was a giant barb in His ass, slowly shoving its way up His spineless body. He made the front page of the Northbrook Herald. The headline read, "Child Pornographer Makes Thousands" and the subtitle was "Kills Daughter." Listed in order of importance I'm sure. He began burning the evidence but it got out of hand. The sheer volume of records and photographs was enough kindling to spark a blaze through our entire house. The roof beams, held together through my own shoddy repair work, began splintering and falling. Father, desperate to hide His guilt, made sure that each photograph and incriminating document was reduced to ashes. As He tossed a final stack onto the growing inferno that had become Ellen's nook, a large roof support beam fell in the living room, both blocking and engulfing the door. His screams for help were barely audible as I arrived home from work and sprinted to the house. "Jesus Christ get me out of here! The door is jammed!" He screamed "What?!" I could barely hear Him over the popping of dried wood. "The door is JAMMED!" He repeated. It was true. The front door to my home was crushed off its hinges and jammed into the frame, not to mention completely on fire. "Father, Go to the Kitchen Window! I'll meet you there!" I couldn't tell if He heard me but it didn't matter, it was His one shot. I raced around back and propped up our trash can to look inside. I saw my Father, His clothes searing with zealous orange embers, stagger into the kitchen and climb up onto the counter. "Oh thank God, you gotta help me, boy!" begged Father. The window was a square foot, far too small for my alcohol-enlarged Father to squeeze through. "Pull me out." He commanded. We tried several different arrangements. Legs first, head first, stepping through. We both tried making the hole bigger. I got a hammer, He used kitchenware. "Pull me out!" I wanted to. I tried. I swear to God, I tried. With all of my heart I wanted to save my Father's life, to demonstrate that I was not an evil man, that I was not my father. I would save life when he ended it. I would preserve while he would destroy. I knew I was better than my Father and I could prove it. I knew I could. I pulled. I pulled harder. He started screaming in pain. I redoubled my efforts. My shoulders and back popped at the strain and my Father was no closer to escape. An awful smell that could only have been burning flesh filled my flared nostrils. His screams were piercing. "'ve gotta get me out!" He yelled while sobbing in pain over the crackling fire. I prayed to God, I prayed to my ancestors, I prayed to Jesus Christ, I prayed to everyone I could think to pray to. I begged for my Father's life. I did everything I could to save the burning man within. And as I collapsed and fell off the trash can, crushed both by my failure and the sheer emptiness of the world above the clouds, I cried. I looked up at the window, smoke pouring from it like water through a leak in a dam, and my father's hand extended outside. It clenched in agony and reached for salvation. Then, with a final nervous quiver, it settled to its final, haunting position: with index finger released to point at the one person who could have saved Him: me. As often as I'd wished for my father's death, its occurrence broke me. My father's funeral was the day before my seventeenth birthday.

***

She wasn't my bridge over troubled waters, she was my Chinook. She wasn't the light at the end of the tunnel; she was the forklift hauling my emotional baggage and I through a labyrinth of dusty catacombs. I trusted her, she loved me, I made her laugh, she made me smile. It was golden. We sang bits of songs to each other, occasionally at the same time. We agreed on politics. We liked most of the same music. I took her to museums. She took care of me. She had this aura about her, this purple and green shimmer. Shy as she was, eyes would follow her through a crowded room. She had the innate ability to find beauty in all things. She was a proton. I'd tell you her name, but I don't think I'm ready.
It hurt her that I wasn't a Christian. So I became one. I read the bible. I memorized the Lords Prayer. I can't do this. Jesus Christ my Lord and Savior. Thank you, Jesus. I love you Jesus. God is all knowing. This isn't me. God is all loving. God is all powerful. Lying makes baby Jesus cry. I'm living a lie. God gave us his only son. Jesus died for my sins. Jesus is the Messiah. I killed my father. Honor thy Father and thy Mother. Thou shant, thou shant, thou shant. Praise the Lord, to whom our Praise is due! Spears into pruning hooks. He is my Rock and my Redemption. I can't believe this. Judge not, lest ye be judged. Mathew. Mark. Luke. Puke. John. Come to me all of you who are tired. Chorazin. Bethsaida. Sodom. Pittsburgh. Gomorrah. I can't change myself. Let the dead bury their own. I wanted to change. I tried. I looked back. I am a pillar of salt.
My favorite thing in the world was her. Her favorite thing in the world was God. I could tell. She seemed absent sometimes. Her body was with me but her thoughts and mind were elsewhere, drifting in and out of lightning storms and daffodils. Her head was above the clouds. I knew that if I let go of her, she would float away. And there I'd be, like a child helpless to follow his lovely, lost, blue, brilliant balloon. I kept hoping that I could love her enough to keep her grounded. It was a tug-of- war: Me vs. God. I lost. She left me. I forgave her immediately. I've yet to forgive myself.

In ways which mere mortals like ourselves will never know, the destructive forces of the universe are kept in check. And that's what matters. If the sum total of a life is ever-so-slightly more positive than negative, then the sun will rise another day. My Father wasn't a bad man. He created two kids, and killed one. Father wasn't evil, he was neutral. I know it's simplistic, I know it seems arbitrary. But doesn't it explain a lot about God? The ultimate creative force. Whether or not you grant that He is all- knowing or all-loving or all-powerful. Who has created more? I'm sorry, God, for doubting you. I'm sorry Ellen that I couldn't have saved your life. And Father, I hope you finally find peace. It's all you ever wanted in life. Please, dad, find it in death. I love you.

***

I decided that for the sheer volume of his creation that I would re-think the events of my youth. I did. It wasn't easy. Those were tough times that I had buried beneath many years of blank existence. Occasionally it tore me up inside. I quit my job, left my apartment, and just started walking. I found some gorgeous places. Some nice bridges, a few parks. I finally stopped my trek here, at Velvet Beach. Something about the inevitability of the tides is comforting and hypnotic. In the early afternoon as I sit under the boardwalk, the light will drip down through the cracks, only interrupted by the soft tapping of pedestrians. I ease into the sand, it forms around my sun-darkened skin, and I watch the waves. They go up and down. It seems like each summer, fewer and fewer families bother coming out to Velvet Beach. The half-life of my home is around two and a half years. Yet every time a child innocently asks his dad "Can we dad? Can we make a sandcastle? Can we!?" I can't help but remember. Click.