My First Memory

Eyes open from sleep, my five-year-old sister on the other end. Only a shadow lights her face, while the rest is covered with midnight black. It's so thick, it smothers.
Very seriously she whispers, "Wake up, Becca."
She leads me, as my three-year-old mind walks down the dark hallway, dodging shadows of ghost and ghoul. She holds me by my hand, looking behind every few steps to be sure her baby sister is still in tact. Sometimes I see her face, other times the darkness hides it as we pass by open windows and hallway spaces.

We are at my mother's doorway.

Beyond the scene of her in the shadow-lit dark, in tears and nightgown, curled up, tasting fear, I see three men on our first-floor sidewalk, saying nothing. Their actions took over instead. Two begin to beat and kick and spit on the man below them.
"Go get me a glass of water, Jessica," she calls out.
Scuttling away quickly, my sister goes. Almost immediately one of the bad men shuffle to our window. He looks us up and down, then spits on our lawn. Only the glass separates us.
Mother motions to close the curtains and calmly mutters,
"Sleep here, girls.
Go to sleep.
Now."

Fighting sleep, my sister and I look each other dead in the eyes.
"Go to bed, Becca," she whispers, reassuring herself.

Exhaustedly turning over, I catch a glimpse of my mother still cautiously peering through the window. Too tired to learn more, I drifted, happily, into new worlds, not knowing my mind had secretly catalogued a piece of the deterioration of our youth.