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Neighbors<br />
by Regina Argenzio<br />
Nicole Healy<br />
Jake and Jack. Jake and Jack with the house that scares little children when they have to fetch the ball from the other<br />
side of the fence. Jake and Jack with hearts bigger than their garden, from which they so generously offer us their fruits and<br />
vegetables. Two brothers in their 50’s who never married and who never found the glory in fatherhood. Rather, they live with<br />
their mother and father and are constantly v<strong>is</strong>ited by their s<strong>is</strong>ter and nephew. Th<strong>is</strong> <strong>is</strong> quite enough for them. It’s everything<br />
they’ve ever had, all they’ve ever known<br />
Jake and Jack do yard work for our 87-year-old neighbor for free.<br />
But slowly, we see Jack d<strong>is</strong>integrating, as if someone flipped over an hourglass and labeled it with h<strong>is</strong> life. Paralleling h<strong>is</strong><br />
downhill descent are Jake’s worsening drinking problems. Soon we learn that these are the results of their mother’s newly diagnosed<br />
cancer, and that it <strong>is</strong> she who has been given the hourglass.<br />
We know the time <strong>is</strong> coming. Slowly, suffering, ailing, she passes. Now it’s just Jake, Jack, and their father. Six months<br />
later, a car accident, and now it’s just Jake and Jack.<br />
Still they don’t forget to leave a Chr<strong>is</strong>tmas gift in the mailbox for me that year.<br />
Every day they pass my house, lugging hedges, pushing a wheelbarrow. Last winter they decided to shovel our driveway<br />
in an angry blizzard.<br />
Always I look at them and wonder…<br />
I see Jake at the store and say hello. I go out of my way as he wasn’t really anywhere near me. <strong>The</strong> next week I find him<br />
on my street and I stop to talk to him. He says, “You know, you can really make someone’s day just by saying hello to them.<br />
Thank you.” He thanks me for saying hello to him. Thanks me for saying hello.<br />
A day comes when all hope has van<strong>is</strong>hed. Even my subconscious being that usually tells me to “push on” doesn’t ex<strong>is</strong>t.<br />
A day when I w<strong>is</strong>h that it was my hourglass that was about to run out of grainy little specks. A day when there <strong>is</strong> no possible<br />
way to change my train of thought; th<strong>is</strong> <strong>is</strong> it, th<strong>is</strong> <strong>is</strong> the way it’s going to be. Th<strong>is</strong> <strong>is</strong> hell. Time for me to lie down, admit defeat,<br />
and stop believing.<br />
And then I see Jake and Jack pass right in front of my window. Jake and Jack with hearts bigger than their garden, even<br />
though everything they have ever known has van<strong>is</strong>hed.<br />
When Jake and Jack pass by my house, I decide to stand up again.<br />
Th<strong>is</strong> <strong>is</strong> not to say dark days won’t ever come around again, but when they do, I just look out my window and see Jake and<br />
Jack.<br />
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