Dad takes you to the Tree when you turn twelve years old.
“We’re leaving,” he says as he wakes you, a shadow of a man standing tall over your bed. The world is gray outside your window; the air is frigid, unpleasant. He does not speak as you untangle yourself from your blankets, eyes heavy with sleep. He does not say happy birthday.
“It’s cold,” you try. You are barefoot, dressed only in plaid pajama pants and an off-yellow shirt, but he does not let you change. He only stares—dark eyes, dark, graying hair—before he turns and walks away.
There’s nothing to do but follow.
Down the stairs, past family photos of that all-American dream. A mother with laugh lines, a father with a strong, angular face. Two little boys, glowing and laughing with youth, next to a dog with floppy ears. Turn the corner. You drift through the kitchen, past threadbare, empty sofas and a fireplace, unlit.
The front door is open when you get there, and the wind bites your skin. Dad does not shiver. He is already grabbing the keys to the truck, breezing out the door. The swing hung from the tree in your yard sways piteously back and forth. Wood creaks. Leaves ripple.
You spare a glance back at your home–dim and foreign and weary. Your teeth chatter, and there is something coiled and heavy in your gut. Something that yells at you to turn back, to run, to burrow under blankets and away from the chill. But you are twelve years old, now, you remind yourself. You’re not a little boy anymore.
Dad starts the engine; it sputters before roaring to life. You hurry toward him. The darkness prickles at the back of your neck, and the pavement digs harshly into your bare feet. You shake, as you pull on the handle and haul yourself in.
The truck’s moving before you even shut the door.
Dad does not turn on the radio. Dad does not say anything–still does not say happy birthday–as he peels out down the road. Words are stuck in your throat. The silence weighs down on your shoulders, makes you curl in on yourself, sinking into the musty leather of the seat. If you close your eyes, you can almost hear your mother’s laugh in the rattle of the exhaust system. You can almost see your younger brother’s gap-toothed grin, feel his sticky fingers on your face.
The truck jerks to a stop, and Dad grabs your arm. “Come on,” he says, and you follow.
You always follow, and so you step out, blink your eyes open, and–
There’s the Tree.
It is a goliath of wood, a monster of sickly, brittle leaves. The smell of decay is heavy in the air, and flies buzz gleefully around its trunk. One tries to get in your mouth. Gagging, you stumble back, and something squishes underfoot.
You look down. There is a heart on the ground.
There is a heart on the ground, with twine hooked in its muscle–with red staining the grass. You are frozen, wordless, and as you tear your eyes away, the Tree greets you again. Only this time, you can see the shapes hanging from its boughs, swaying gently with the wind. Dozens, hundreds of hearts.
“Family tradition,” Dad finally says. “My father took me here when I turned twelve. His father took him. On and on–all the men in our family, far back as anyone can remember.”
Your breathing is coming out too fast, too harsh. Blood is soaking into your sock.
“You’re scared,” Dad notes. “But you won’t be. You’re not a little boy anymore.”
Dad unzips his jacket, pulls the collar of his shirt down. And right over his chest, is a jagged, ugly scar–puckered and red. A missing piece, as he pulls out a piece of twine from his pocket.
He clamps a hand on your shoulder and smiles. “It’s time to become a man.”
Lynne Inouye is a young, queer fiction writer who lives in Minnesota. Her work has been previously published in Blue Marble Review and Pyre Magazine, and you can find her on Twitter @liinouye.