Near Comfort

Prolouge.




I don’t really remember much about that house. I would often have dreams about it;
usually the same dream.

In my dream I’d see a small white house in the distance, trees behind it, and a large
flowery field in front. I’d be dancing in the field. I’d spin and spin and spin until I’d fall
into a patch of white flowers. Sometimes a woman would be there with me, holding
my hands laughing with me as we twirled and sang, “Ring around the rosy, a pocket
full of poesy…”


I’d be wearing a yellow sundress, yellow ribbon in my hair, and I’d be bare foot.
The woman that I was dancing with was my mother who was thirty years old at the time.
I remember her long beautiful auburn hair blowing in the wind as we danced and her
warm laughter gave me goose bumps; even in my dreams.


I don’t remember my father.


One of the only things that I do remember about that house was that I loved it; mostly
the fields that seemed to go on for miles. My mother would tell me as we’d lay in the
field, “You know, when I was your age I’d spend most of my days here in the field,” The
house was her parent’s house before it was ours. I guess that would make them my
grandparents, but I’ve never met them as far as I can remember. “My mother would hold
my hands and we’d spin around and around as we sang.” That’s when she taught me the
song, “Ring Around the Rosy”.

I was only five years old when I had to leave the house.



The only other memory I have of that house was the night that it burned down. I don’t
remember how it had burnt down, but it did. My mother died in that fire, along with the
memories of her childhood. I remember that she had saved me and had gotten trapped in
the house trying to get out. The roof had collapsed on her and I don’t even think I had
understood what had exactly happened at my young age. I just remember staring at the
flames as they ate away at the small house. In my dreams I’d be dancing in the field as
the house burnt down singing, “Ring around the rosy, a pocket full of poesy…”



It feels more like a nightmare than a dream; I do not sleep well those nights.



I live in the city now in a huge brick building at the age of ten. There is lots of other
children my age that lives there as well. They call it an adoption center. Sometimes I go
outside and dance in the small patch of green grass outside near the building, but it isn’t
the same and I know that I will never live near the comfort of that small white house ever
again.