Mary Huxley Tapes – LOG 0001
Date:  1988-03-03
Location: Huxley Residence, Basement
Subject: Mary Huxley

[Tape begins. A low hum from a furnace—steady in the background. The sound of a chair scraping softly on concrete. Mary exhales before speaking.]

Mary Huxley:

Basement this time. It’s quieter down here. Cooler, too. Feels… separate from the rest of the house. I needed that tonight. I’m just sitting on the floor, back against the shelves. Not doing much of anything. Just… being still. That’s rare lately. I haven’t seen my brother in a couple of months now. Which isn’t unusual, I guess. He’s always somewhere else. Somewhere burning. Somewhere falling apart that needs him more than we do.

[Small Pause]

Mom’s been worse. I go see her as often as I can. She tries to hide it, but I can tell. The way she holds her side, the way she gets tired halfway through a sentence. The doctor keeps using words like tests and monitoring. No one wants to say the other word.

Cancer.

I’m saying it here because someone has to. I’m scared it’s that.

Dad hasn’t called. Hasn’t written. Four years now. Not even a postcard. It’s strange how someone can be alive, breathing, walking around—probably making speeches somewhere—and still be completely absent. I don’t know which hurts more: the distance, or the fact that I don’t think he misses us at all.

[Chair creaks as she shifts.]

(A muffled voice from upstairs.)

Husband (off-mic):

Mary? You coming up?

Mary Huxley:

Yeah. Yeah, I’m coming.

[Back to the tape, softer.]

That’s my cue, I guess.

[Click. Tape ends.]