Not Even Wrong #7: Family Lore

A powerful story by Jackson Arn:

When Harold Haber was released from prison, he found out why nobody had visited him in two years. His brother, sister, mother, father, grandmother, uncle, and cousins had died. He and his grandfather were the last two Habers left in the country, maybe the world. His grandfather was 89 years old and slept all day. The house was cracked paint, emptied windows, dust, and gashes in walls. In Harold’s head, a sense of duty thickened. The family had to be rebuilt. The family name had to be spoken everywhere. He married Sarah and had five children. One survived long enough to have his own. As Harold choked he thought, I did my part.

*

Two of David Haber’s children outlived their childhoods. David Haber did not outlive his twenties. As he found his way home on a Tuesday night, belly sloshing, something tore in him. We found him the next morning with a mark, maroon and claw-shaped, on his abdomen’s right.

*

Esther had her first child at fifteen, but he could not be acknowledged. Two years later, as her husband raised her dress for the first time, she thought of her grandmother and resolved to name her next child Sarah. Her husband, taken aback by her silence in the crucial second, decided not to trust her and named the child after his grandmother, who’d died defending our glorious land. Esther secretly thought of their child as Sarah until she gave birth to her third, who she named Harold.

*

Harry Haber felt the full weight of his name twice in his life, the first time aged seven. His father was instructing him with a belt. Between the strokes he heard a hiss: “If your grandfather were alive to see you …” Then there was a pause and then a sniff. He did not dare turn to look. After a few minutes he realized his father had left the room, leaving him bent over, half-naked. The second time, Harry was dying in his trench. He thought of his three children and his father and his father’s father. Time oozed like a wound. He thought of the glory he and the rest of us had fought for, and the second glory to which his name belonged. He resolved, delirious, to pass on the name to his next child, and then he died.

Read entire story:  3 Quarks Daily

Jackson Arn is a writer living in Brooklyn. Read more of his work here.