Answer 1:

Your mother was right. I get pissed off upset too easily, and I can’t be trusted with money. I can make a lot of excuses but the clearest answer is she’s always been right about our fights everything. She thinks your best chances are by her raising you with her folks. The mines aren’t coming back. This town has no future, and she’ll get you out of here. No matter how angry you may feel at your mom and her family, you know they’re all smart people.

Except for your grandma. She is a fucking ordeal has had a complicated life.

Unless you grew up to be like your grandma. In which case I am sorry.

The truth is: I’m sorry either way. I’m sorry I wasn’t good enough to be there for you. You deserved me to be better than I am. You at least deserve some answers to the questions you’re going to grow up asking. Unless I can

 

Answer 2:

No matter what anyone says, it’s real. You’ve always felt it and your feelings are right. You really can manipulate stone with your moods. The grime gathers under your fingernails because it worships you. You can feel where every mine tunnel is underfoot without ever having gone down there. When your heart aches after a long day and dust keeps blowing up into everyone’s eyes?

You are really doing this. You are one of us.

That’s how you found this note. That’s how I got it inside that geode, and how I snuck it inside the sheetrock on your wall. Your room is going to be small, with little standing area, which means if you have a temper like mine, I’m sure you’ll put a hole in this spot one way or another.

Some day, when you put a hole in this wall, you’ll need to hear all this from me. I’ve been this way since I was a kid, just like you’ll grow up experiencing. Check out the basement for proof. You’ll find I messed up the foundations down there getting it on spending time with your mom.

You are one of us. You might be the last of us.

 

Answer 3:

It never helps being told to control your feelings. Your mom is going to do her best to raise you to have a grip on them. Even then, every kid hears that too much. You’ve heard it ten times as much, especially from your grandma.

I bet you handle your emotions better than anybody gives you credit for. Nobody knows how hard it is.

But I do.

I am proud of you. We never met and I am so proud of you the ground caves in whenever I think about your tiny face. I should be there with you.

 

Answer 4:

There isn’t anyone on my family’s side to meet. Most sunk into the earth when the rage caught up with them. My father Your grandpa was the only one I knew who was left, and he died before I ever got to meet him.

Some people were too afraid of us. Blamed us for earthquakes and cave-ins. I’ve never caused anything like that and I’m sick of their shit I have problems with my temper. I don’t believe we can do stuff as big as causing an earthquake. But your grandma some people in town believed that. The suits that owned the mines always tried to pit us against each other.

Your grandpa didn’t hurt anyone. Everybody said he could have gotten out of the mine safely. But he moved the earth to go deeper, to try to rescue the people trapped down there. A couple people came up after that. But not him.

Whenever you’re lonely and wish he was with you, remember that deep inside you, you have that kind of power. The power to go through a lot of shit to help others.

I’m not scratching that out. It’s what I believe. It’s what I tell myself when I wish I met your grandpa. It’s what’s going to bring me back to you.

 

Answer 5:

I wanted more than anything to meet your grandpa, and that’s why I can’t guarantee I’m still out there. Our plans are a joke fate plays on us. That’s something your mother said, except she said it better.

Keep listening to your mom. Study books and math and all the stuff that will get you out of this town. Wherever you go, I’ll find you. I’ll come to you. Go do better things than she or I ever did. However you turn out, you’re going to be great.

If you want to yell at me? Shake me? I’m going to do everything to give you that chance. I’m going to get my head on straight. I keep telling myself You’re not going to find this note. We’re going to pull it out of your wall together, and we’re going to laugh at it until we get the hiccups. I’m going through everything now so that I can hear you laugh. You’re going to have the best laugh in the world because it’s going to be yours.

Maybe something happened and I’m taking too long. Somehow you found this note before I got myself together. You deserved answers, so here the note is.

But I don’t believe that you’re reading this without me. I came back for you. I swear: if I’m alive I’m coming back to you.

© 2024 John Wiswell