Pandora's Aquarium: My First Bad Truth - Pandora's Aquarium

I was six years old. I know because I still owned this ugly peach make-up compartment holder that held all of my most prized hair ribbons and scrunchies; thus, it had to have been before the flood. I was putting away the container under the bathroom sink. I wasn't still supposed to be awake, but I had sneaked into the bathroom to pick out a different scrunchie for the next day.

At that point in my life, I was an utter brat about my hair. I kept my hair down slightly past my waist. I was so afraid that all of the school kids would think I wore my hair the same everyday. Therefore, I created a rule - I could not repeat the same hairstyle more than once a month. Repetition would never be mistakenly attributed to my hair. With that obsession came my obsession with hair decorations. I often sneaked into the bathroom after I was tucked into my bed; that night was no exception.

I think maybe I was in the bathroom later at night than I usually was. I didn't know how to tell time on an analog clock just yet. I heard mom and dad in the kitchen. Before this, I'd never heard them fight. Not once. It isn't like I imagined my parents were the perfect couple. I just accepted that mommy and daddy were an indivisible unit. When I was five, a lady at school asked me if I hated having to share a room with my younger sister (number 5). My response was, "No. All the boys share a room. All the girls share a room. Even mommy and daddy have to share a room." Little did I understand that my parents did not quite feel that it was a required action. I had such infallible logic - and that logic extended to the fact that parents just didn't fight. Yet, there they were in the kitchen fighting.

The odd thing is that I remember that awful peach hair compartment contraption so clearly. Other parts of this memory are a little more blurred. I remember a glass shattering. It sounded like a plate - like when I was trying to carry my plate to the sink and I had an "uh-oh" happen. But, usually when uh-ohs happen, there is only one crash. This time, there were multiple crashes and lots of loud words being yelled - loud words that I didn't understand and didn't know. I think maybe they were explicatives. I don't know. I managed to not learn my first cuss word in English. I learned it in American Sign Language, but not until I was nine. I definitely can't relay what was said in that moment.

I peeked out of the bathroom and down the long hallway. There is a bar area that is able to be seen from down the hallway - and through that is the kitchen. I could see dad pressed against mom. They were really close together...and crashes still kept happening. I can't figure it out. It doesn't quite mesh. How did the sounds keep happening if dad was so close to my mommy? My only thought is that the sounds and the visuals were separated and that my memory has squished them together. I think maybe he hit her or he choked her, but that is me filling in the blanks based on my gaping memory. I think this is correct, but I'm not sure that I'm attributing it all correctly.

I remember sneaking back into bed and closing my eyes really tight...to make it all go away. I fell asleep rather quickly. I don't suppose anything much else happened - at least not in the immediately surrounding days because I don't remember anything else.