9. Nicole

Beth places a cardboard box labeled Memories on the living room floor beside me. I'm surrounded by my parents' belongings—boxes and totes strewn around, stacked three or four high. Mom kept them all these years, so they must have meant something. The ceiling creaks. Michael's up in the attic, carrying everything to the pull-down ladder that feeds into the hallway. He hands them to Beth, and she brings them to the living room. It's an assembly line of sorts, Beth's idea, thanks to working in a factory her entire adulthood. If I had two working arms, I'd be of more use, but instead I've been tasked with sorting everything into piles—garbage, donate, sell, and keep. I'm pretty sure my cast is more of a nuisance than it is helpful as I don't feel any pain in my arm. It's just my ribs and face that throb, but that wouldn't stop me from carrying boxes if I could. I'm used to feeling uncomfortable, so it doesn't faze me.

I open the Memories box and cough on a cloud of dust that swirls in the air. That's how memories are—dormant dust waiting to be stirred up. Inside are dozens of VHS tapes neatly stacked on their ends. Each one labeled with dates and short descriptions, like Michael's 16th birthday, Christmas 1999, and Kids playing outside Summer of 1990. The handwriting is neat and precise, just the way it is on our envelopes. My mother clearly cherished the memories on these tapes. I flip one over in my hand, running my fingers along the hard plastic edge. These little black rectangles hold worlds I once lived in. I so badly wish I could jump inside one of them and take up residence, return to a time when I was whole.

I read through the labels, trying to conjure the memories on my own. Some are long gone. Some are crystal clear. But most are fuzzy, like when you wake up from a dream and can remember only fragments of it. I want to remember more. My eyes flick to the television in the corner of the room, where a dual VHS/DVD player sits on the shelf beneath it. A tingle runs through my hands, spreading to the tips of my fingers.

"Hurry up, Michael," Beth yells from the hallway. "You're taking forever."

"You're not the one up in this nasty attic, Beth. There's barely a floor up here, mostly ceiling beams to navigate." His voice carries through the house.

"How many more boxes?" she calls out.

Michael doesn't respond right away. But I hear his footsteps shuffle along the ceiling.

"How many?" Beth asks again. The ladder creaks, and I know she's scrambling up to see for herself. She's always been impatient.

"Here," he roars. "There's one more tote and a Christmas tree with outdoor decorations."

The ladder creaks again and a moment later Beth plops a box labeled Dad on the floor. She lets out a huff while her eyes scan over the living room. It's an overwhelming sight, to say the least.

"What's all that?" Beth asks, gesturing to the tapes.

Right now, she looks so much like Mom. I'm taken back to when I was young, peering up at our mother, thinking she had the answers to all the questions in the world. We all look at our parents that way, until we don't. My dad could do no wrong, and then he ran out on us. I never thought he'd be the type to do that. I avert my eyes, staring back at the boxes in front of me before any tears escape.

"Home video tapes," I say.

Beth kneels and flips through a few, sliding them in and out of their flimsy cardboard sleeves. The inner reels rattle within the cassettes. She runs a finger along a tape labeled Summer '99. Beth would have been sixteen, I fifteen, and Michael thirteen. I don't remember much about that summer, but I do know that everything changed after it, only I don't know why.

"Seems so long ago," Beth says, staring at the tape.

"Yeah, a lifetime."

Heavy boots clomp down the hallway, and Michael emerges, carrying a tote. The old pair of Red Wing lace-up work boots he's wearing belong to Dad. I haven't seen them in years. They immediately conjure up a memory from my childhood: Dad coming home from work after a long day at the factory, plopping down in his recliner, feet kicked up. Beth and I would race to unlace his boots and remove them. Whoever was the fastest was declared the winner. She won most of the time. Dad always made chores and small tasks into games. I think he was trying to teach us that no matter how bad life was, it could still be fun. Maybe that was why he left us. He couldn't find the fun anymore.

"Was that fast enough for you, Queen Beth?" Michael asks in a teasing voice, as he walks into the room. He sets a bin labeled Journals on the floor and dusts off his hands.

Beth repeats his taunt right back to him, in a mocking voice. Michael cracks a smile and takes a few steps toward us. "Whatcha got there?"

She holds up the three tapes she plucked from the box. "Our home VHS tapes. Let's watch one. You pick, Michael. Summer '99, Nicole's birth, or Easter '96?"

"I'm vetoing my birth. I don't feel like watching the biggest regret of my life," I say with a laugh.

Beth chuckles and places that tape back in the box. "Okay, Michael. Summer '99 or Easter '96?"

He rubs his brow and bends over, opening up another box. "Let's just keep working."

"Oh, come on." I throw my nonbroken arm up in the air. "Just one tape."

Michael pulls children's clothes from a box and tosses them into a black garbage bag. "I really don't want to," he says.

"Why?" I ask.

He lets out a huff, directing his attention to me. "Digging up the past is depressing."

"We're not digging it up. We're revisiting it." I jump to my feet and swipe the Summer '99 tape from Beth.

"Fine. Just one. We've got a lot more work to do," Michael says, picking up the TV remote.

I smile at him and carefully slide the tape from the box.

My hand shakes, the tape hovering right in front of the VCR. Maybe Michael's right, it's depressing to revisit the past and won't do any of us any good. It can't change anything. Or maybe it's just what we need. A new perspective. Closure, as they say, to a life we'll never live again. I push the tape into the VCR. It clicks, disappears inside, and then makes a humming sound while it settles into place. The TV screen flicks from black to static. And then it's 1999 and fifteen-year-old me is onscreen.