It’s only after you’ve stepped outside your comfort zone that you begin to change, grow, and transform.
The house on the corner of Eighth Street and Camp hasn’t always been painted black. Through the years, it goes through multiple paint jobs as new tenants move in and try to bring it to life. The amount of people that rotate through the property with their different ideals on exterior design is absurd. In the span of a month, about five families give the house a try, painting it flaming crimsons, alluring emeralds, and vibrant yellows before moving out. The layers from so many color changes leave the house peeling away years and years of paint, the overpainting making the pigment fade to gray before finally turning black. The house on the corner is a perfectly good house, it comes already furnished with coordinating decor and furniture that matches well with the seemingly permanent black paint on its exterior. It has four bedrooms, three and a half baths, a living room, an entertainment room, an industrial kitchen, and an enclosed wraparound porch. The backyard is a decent size with enough foliage to keep a family’s privacy. However, it isn’t until the year 1993 that the community in the Garden District realized that something isn’t quite right. It isn’t until one of their own tries to spruce up the house, as they move in and make it a real home, that they all realize the house on the corner of Eighth Street and Camp is black for a reason.
The Rogers family, a lively bunch, move into the house on a gloomy April day in 1993 from the other side of the parish. They jive to the beat, tapping their feet to the zydeco playing from a boombox they bring with them. The clouds crawl in front of the sun casting the entire Garden District in gray shadows while the breeze turns cooler in the absence of the light. The family seems to relish in the familiar scent of the burnt honeysuckle of their parish that mixes in with the old paint peelings as they walk in and out of the front gate, carrying their aging suitcases. One by one they go, the amount of boxes lining the insides of the moving trucks dwindling as the sun treks across the sky before settling beneath the horizon. By the time the moon peeks through the clouds, shining its cool tones of light on the district, the Rogers are completely moved into the house on the corner of Eighth Street and Camp.
At the top of the next morning, when the sun is just beginning its ascent into the heavens, the members of the Rogers family begin their task of painting their new home indigo with an off-white trim. The entire family works together, their energy seems to bring life to the community much like the sun during that new day. They sing along to the tunes that play on their boombox. They dance as the zydeco seamlessly blends with the bounce music their city is famous for. They have a blast, having fun with each other as they paint their house. They hope to make the new color scheme stick, hoping to keep their mark on the house, their new home. The Rogers are so sure that they will be the ones to finally bring this property to heel, to make the house bend to their will. The family continues painting with such a liveliness, it makes their neighbors want to join in on the fun, the dancing, the camaraderie. The rest of the community merely smiles and continues with their own chores, tasks, and jobs. It isn’t that they don’t want to join in, something prevents them from doing so. Many members of the community have the intention of helping out, only to realize they have something else they need to do once they approach the curb in front of the house on the corner of Eighth Street and Camp.
It isn’t until a month later that the Rogers family begin to exhibit the effects of living in their new home. Steve, once infamous in the community for being Bucky’s sugar daddy, works as the founder of his art gallery while Bucky is a math teacher at the local high school. Both of them share the responsibilities of providing for their family and caring for their children. They are the first to feel the affects. Their work ethic wanes as does their energy, it’s evident on their faces. Their skin sags and their eyes grow dull and lifeless, but that’s normal for hardworking people. It isn’t until their children feel the affects that their neighbors realize something is truly amiss.
The entire family seems to be in some sort of slump, their sagging skin and their lifelessly dull eyes give way to sloth-like behavior. Their posture goes from confident and upright to slouched and tired. Everyday, the Rogers family leaves their home to attend school and to work, trying to earn money to take care of each other and their home. It doesn’t seem to matter what any of them do, the house seems to take in all of their efforts and not give them anything in return. Where they should be able to feel their energy restoring after relaxing in their home, the opposite is happening. The house is draining them of everything that makes the Rogers family who they are. It’s as if every time they use anything in their already furnished home, it’s taking something from them. Sucking the life out of them from merely grazing their hands on the walls as they go from room to room.
After two months of living in that house the Rogers family pack up their belongings, putting them in the U-Hauls as black paint peeks through the layers of indigo and off-white. The community then realize the pattern between previous tenants and their old friends. Each person that moves in comes out different, as if they become listless beings without souls, members of the living dead. Horrified by such an epiphany, the Garden District declares the house unfit for any future tenants. There will no longer be anyone to try their hand at bringing that house to life, no one to try and leave their mark or make it a real home. The house on the corner of Eighth Street and Camp hasn’t always been painted black, but now it always will be.
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