There is a house in the countryside where the sun never shines. Winds blow fiercely apon it, and rain beats down on its tattered roof without mercy. Some describe it as haunted. Others say that it is a cursed place and that no one could possibly live there. Yet someone did.
It was a shack that sagged like a loose tooth. The white paint was chipped and peeling. The grass lay uncut and empty bottles of ale littered the front yard. Yes, people lived there. A family, in fact. My family.
I remember all too well the night our family was torn apart. My parents' marrige had been on the rocks for as long as I could remember. We were a poor family, and my father wasted all of the little money that we did have on drinking. The day that our money ran out my mother confronted him. She was usually very gentle, but she hated alchohol of any kind. She told him that she would leave unless he stopped drinking and got a job. He was angry at her for telling him so many times and he was drunk. My father just glared at her with a look of hate that I know so well. She had almost reached the door when he got up and stopped her.
"Just where do you think your going?" he said in a mocking voice so different from his usual drunken snarl.
"I'm leaving."
"Are you now?" he asked, snatching a knife from the counter. "I don't think so..."
"Please... no!"
He seemed changed... almost demonic as he snarled, "You've pushed me too far, woman. You don't understand. But you will. Oh yes, you will."
She tried to back away, but he was too fast. He slit my mother's throat before she could get out the door.
She uttered five words, the last things that she would ever say and the words that I will remember for the rest of my life.
"Autumn... help August... and Ar... thur."
She sank to the ground dead.
I'll never forget that night... ever.
The next day, I buried my mother in the back yard. My father didn't even seem to care that she was dead. Did he care about anyone? Anything? August had left in the night, leaving only a note saying that she was leaving. She thought that she would be happier that way.
Over the last six years, I've searched many times for August. Yet somehow, I always come home. Maybe it's to see my brother Arthur. Maybe it's to visit my mother's grave. Perhaps it is the secret that I alone bear. I know the reason for all the misfortune that happened here. What is it?
It is because this is the house where happiness does not exist... the house where the sun never shines.
(Is this decent, at least?)