The Secret Poem by A Kal

I have a secret that I must not tell. My mom has the same secret. It is our little secret that we must not tell. We must not tell. We must not tell. We…must…not…tell. We must not…I repeat over and over rocking back and forth, back and forth in front of the full length mirror that’s hiding a secret no one knows about except my mom and me, my brown, beautiful hair rocking back and forth in time with my constant rocking.

Everyone thinks that the mirror is just a mirror and nothing else, but that’s not entirely true. There’s a room behind the mirror. The room itself is not the secret that we must not tell, but what is inside the room is where we keep the secret. My mom and I installed the room when my other sister and my one and only brother and their dad were on vacation. We were supposed to go to the Cayman Islands on a Caribbean cruise for the Christmas holidays, but I was feigning a high fever that I gave me by slipping the thermometer accidentally into my hot chocolate when it was just mom and me in the room. Everyone was excited to go to those Islands except my mom and me. We had to stay so that our secret could not leak out accidentally. We must protect this secret at all costs. If we protect this secret, we protect my family. We must protect our family. The rest of the family is innocent.

I remember it as if it were yesterday even though a year has passed. Time flies when trying to keep a secret that would ruin the whole family not to mention doing time ourselves if we’re caught. If we are ever caught, that is. I remember getting that phone call from one of my so-called friends telling me that Scott—my boyfriend at the time—was cheating on me with her and was going to try to break up with me the next time he comes over right before our “big” trip. As soon as I hung up the phone, the phone rang. It was Scott wanting to know if he could come over for dinner tomorrow. I told him yes as if I hadn’t heard anything of him wanting to break up with me while wondering if he was going to do it before or after the lasagna. Tomorrow, he would be here.

Scott was and always will be my first boyfriend. Every girl in the school either had a crush or was madly in love with him, but for some reason, he picked me. I’ll never understand his reasons for it nor do I want to know them. A year passed. Our anniversary was coming up. I remember feeling distraught, having trouble seeing five feet from me until my wonderful mom comforted me. While she was comforting me, a plan began formulating in that head of mine to make him stay here—forever. Mom agreed and decided to help me with my evil plan. Together we went outside after wrapping ourselves in our normal outerwear to go pick some “berries” to go on top of some hot cocoa. We both know that those “berries” were poisonous if digested so we gathered all we could find. Next, we blended them to make them like a juice. We put them in the fridge to cool in the airtight container.

The following day the “liquid” was ready to be served as a cherry topping on his hot cocoa to warm him up before, I knew, he would abruptly leave after telling me his unfortunate news. Everything was ready. The lasagna was on the table and the table was set.

The doorbell rang its customary tune announcing my current ex-boyfriend, if everything went according to plan. He got inside and said, “Hello.” Everything was going well until he said, “I’ve got to get going. I’m sure that you’ve heard by now. I’m breaking up with you for one of your friends. Good-bye, Misery Hope Wallace. I’ll see you again someday.”

Of course, I couldn’t let him go without giving him something to drink. I suggested some hot cocoa before he left to fight off the winter chill outside. I handed him the drink and he drank it with that perfect smile on his face before he crashed to the floor with a bang that could wake up the rest of the family if they weren’t out watching a movie at the theatre. Once he was successfully not moving we dragged him to the secret room only to find out his perfect smile was still on his face. We looked one last time at his corpse then shut the door without a look back or a hint of regret.

My mom and I dragged him into the secret room a year ago when I was twelve years old. I’m supposed to be thirteen years old, but I feel so much older than my age because I killed my first boyfriend.

I was three when my mom started placing me in front of the mirror to rock back and forth with her. I started rocking back and forth with her. It was also the same night that she breathed her last breath. When she realized I was rocking back and forth in time with her without any help. I remember seeing her rock back and forth then looking at me with mild shock then having her rock back one last time before slumping right next to me. Her last breath in this life landed squarely on my face.

Some say that the last breath from a loved one transfers his or her soul into yours. While I continued, rocking back and forth my mom’s soul was fused into mine. I would sometimes walk to the mirror and rock back and forth just as my mom did while she was alive. I continued rocking back and forth the rest of the night and many more nights thereafter. A few years back, a realization dawned upon me. Rocking back and forth is the balance between life and death to those of us who were raised to rock back and forth and to those of us who believe that rocking back and forth will keep us alive if we rock forward the same amount of times as we rock backward. As for my mom, the shock of seeing me rocking back and forth on my own caused her to forget to rock forward towards life rather than to stay back towards death. I believe that is what happened to my mom when I was three years old. I also believe that I must pass this down to my three year old child because if I don’t I might die as well in the same manner as my mom. I will do one thing different though. I will not lose my concentration when I realize that my three-year-old child is rocking back and forth on his or her own—I hope.

Everyday I rock back and forth in front of the mirror holding the secret room where he is located. Everyday I repeat, “We must not tell, ” as if the secret could be held by those words alone. As I rock back and forth in front of the full-length mirror, my reflection in the mirror is slowly fading away into the mirror and somehow my reflection is distorted and faded. Behind my reflection in the mirror, I see my mom as if she were rocking back and forth right next to me. She was there along with the countless others who lost their concentration, too. The others were almost absolutely faded from color and were feeding upon the color from my mom. Soon, she will look the same as all the others.

When I have my first child and when my child is three years old, I will “accidentally” lose concentration and breathe my last breath onto my child’s face. By giving my last breathe to my child; I will join the countless throngs of faded people in the abyss of the mirror. I will then join my mom’s side and watch my child rock back and forth, as I rock back and forth with her.

They all say that my mom passed into a better place, but they are wrong. I see her rocking back and forth in the mirror. Mom and I are the one and the same. There was no mom. I have no mom except the one in the mirror

We must not tell. We must not tell about the body of my first boyfriend in the room behind the mirror. We must not tell about me seeing my own distorted reflection right next to my mom’s fading color among the abyss of the mirror and others who are void of color and are rocking back and forth in time as one single entity for all eternity. As I rock back and forth in front of the mirror, my beautiful brown hair swings back in forth-in time to my ever constant rocking. We must not tell. We must not tell. We…must…not…tell. We…must…not…

“No one will ever break up with me again. Never, ” I say while strolling down to the county store right down the street. The one person that I never wanted to see is walking right towards me. Everyone knows he’s got a very long time crush on me. As the distance closes, he smiles that crooked smile of his and says, “Hi, I’m Pete, want to have the pleasure of being my girlfriend? You won’t regret it. I promise you that.”

“Sure.” I smile wickedly waiting to tell my mom to start picking “berries” from outside. “We have secrets for a reason, ” I think to myself as I continue strolling to the county store right down the street wanting to buy some blueberries for the blueberry pie mom was going to make me for being a good girl on how well I got over my first boyfriend.
November 2009