“Feels like it’s calling to you, doesn’t it?” Mom suddenly asks. Her voice seems so loud thanks to the serenity around us. Compared to the sirens, shouts, and chaos of New York City, this place is like a whole other world.

“Whisper Woods, it’s certainly a fitting name.”

Mom throws her beer back in a single, quick gulp. I’m impressed until she slams the can against the deck and asks, “Why are you doing this?”

“Doing what?”

“You know damn well what.” Mom’s eyes are watering when her gaze meets with my cold stare. Her bottom lip trembles. “Why did you buy this place back?”

“Because you sold it.”

“How could you have expected me to keep it?”

“It was Nana and Pap’s, their home, the one they built and cared for together.”

“Where they were murdered, w—where you, my baby boy, saw them get murdered, where I could have lost you too!”

“A murder I can’t remember,” I whisper over the rim of the beercan. I chug mine quick, setting it aside while looking over the lake rather than at my clearly crying mother.

“Do you want to remember?” She hiccups. “Do you think it will help your art in some way?”

I glare at her in disgust. The tears streaming down her cheeks aren’t enough to stop me from hissing, “What the hell gives you the right to say that?”

“It’s the only answer that makes sense.”

“Bullshit! What? An artist has to be damaged to make decent art? You honestly believe I came here to remember the most traumatic time of my life so I can paint it and make a profit?”

“That’s—” Mom bites her lip when turning her head in shame. “That’s not what I meant.”

“Yes it was, you just hoped I wouldn’t catch onto it.”

“No, I...I’m just saying if your mind made you forget then it’s for a reason and a damn good one!”

I swear we have had this conversation over three hundred times in the last few months. What makes her think discussing it again, especially after I already bought the house back and moved, is beyond me.

“You can’t honestly believe it’s a bad idea for me to remember an entire three months that has been lost to me for fifteen years?” I argue.

“Yes, I can say I honestly believe it. What—” She suddenly grabs my hand. “What happened then, all we know is that they were killed and, somehow, by the grace of some God or the universe itself, you survived. Now you’re coming back? Because you hope to remember? Because it’s a house in our family? Why? I—I don’t understand, explain it so that I can understand.”

Mom is looking at me with pleading eyes that I can’t change. I wish I could but, shrugging, I answer honestly, “I can't, because no matter what I say, you won’t understand.”

That isn't what she wanted to hear; that’s obvious by the grip she has on my hand. I pull said hand away, causing her to flinch, either because she didn’t expect it or she knows what’s to come. No longer do I shy away from the truth, years of therapy helped me with that.

“My best memories are here because while you and dad fought and yelled and cheated—”

Mom flinches after each unintentional stab I send her way.

“I sat miserably in a house that was anything but a home. I hated it there. I hated when you divorced. I hated when he just left us and I hated when you got remarried. Now I understand you did what you could, but back then?” I shake my head at the memories of my so-called home. When compared to this, it wasn’t a home at all. It was hell. “The only good thing that happened was me coming here, every summer. Three months, three months I was away from all that chaos and I can honestly say my greatest memories are always with Nana and Pap rather than you or that bastard.”

Mom bows her head, even if I didn’t mean to make her do so. Seriously, I didn’t. The grudges I had in my youth are gone, especially after all our talks, years spent in therapy trying to mend what was never intentionally broken, everything she tried and succeeded in doing. My mom worked her ass off to earn me back so I really didn’t mean to snap at her, but my grandparents will always have a soft spot for obvious reasons.

Her voice is soft when she says, “I’m...I’m so sorry, Winnie, for everything. You know, I’m so, so sorry.”

“I didn’t mean to—” I pinch the bridge of my nose and sigh. Mom is sniffling, even more so when I wrap my arm around her shoulder and pull her close. She hugs me, so tight it almost hurts when I say, “I didn’t mean to get snippy. You’re here and he’s not so no apology is needed. Besides, even if you got remarried and I hated it at first, we got that shithead.”

I gesture to said shithead with my thumb, the one sleeping on the couch and still snoring obscenely loud. Mom smacks my chest with a smile.

“I wouldn’t have a little sister or a loving stepfather if you two hadn’t finally called it off so at least something good came out of your spats.”

“Yeah, if you want to think like that,” says Mom when she wipes the tears away with the back of her hand after I let her go. Once she is under control, she looks at me with reddened eyes. “Just, I lost my Mom and Dad here, and I nearly lost you too. I can’t help…” She peers about with a disgusted grimace before spitting out, “I can’t help but to fucking hate this place.”

When she puts it like that, I don’t really have a way to respond. I lost my grandparents. Mom lost her parents. It makes sense she feels uneasy, but even after what happened, even if I can’t remember, when I look out across the lake all I feel is warmth. And I hate to admit it to myself and I refuse to admit it out loud.

“Come on, let’s see if I can scrounge us up something to eat!” Mom announces, suddenly standing while holding out her hand for me to take. I smile and do just that, standing up before giving the lake one last look.

I’m not sure what I’m doing, but I know there’s something here, something I can’t explain that makes me feel at ease, no matter what anyone says. It’s as if the woods, this place is calling to me, always has been. So many times I dreamt of Whisper Woods, dreams so vivid they felt real. I had to come back, I’m not really sure why, I just feel it in my gut.

Perhaps the woods do whisper.