Bitter Harvest
Hoarders and Intervention are two of my guiltiest pleasures. I am the reaper of human sorrow.
Jack is a hoarder who needs help that can only be gotten from the TV show Hoarders. Merida is part of the clean-up crew, and has a few hidden skeletons of her own.
…..
People always assume it's the big earthquake, that huge life-altering catastrophe that has the most influence on the current behaviour. If anyone would listen, Jack would tell them that yes, the big one sucks and is hard to cope with, but the real killer is all the little aftershocks that follow.
For the first two years after the motorway pile-up that kills his mother instantly, keeps Emma in the ER for two days until she finally gives up and breaks Jack's ribs, collarbone and his heart, he copes just fine. He sees a counsellor regularly, still goes to school, eats and showers on a regular basis and gets enough sleep.
The first aftershock is finding that his hair has turned white at the roots, and is growing in completely white. That is evidence of the crash, long after it's happened, and it's frightening. He clips off the remaining brown and saves it in an envelope, a testament to the before.
The second is when the house springs a leak right above his mother's bedroom, which has been untouched since she died. It's a minor leak and he gets a plumber out to fix it, but some of her clothes and old correspondence gets saturated and has to be thrown away. It feels like throwing away evidence that she was alive, so he resolves to keep the rest of her things safe.
He graduates from high school and doesn't go to college, because they never talked about it before his mother died and he can't bring himself to open the applications. He doesn't need to work anyway, he's been given enough to live on for the rest of his life by her insurance and her inheritance.
When he's dating Tooth, she spends a lot of time at his place, practically lives there. She's sweet and fun and beautiful but she's flighty as hell, and with her creative streak comes a lot of junk that she picks up, intending to do something with them but moving on quickly to the next infatuation. When they break up, a lot of her stuff is left in his house and he can't bring himself to part with it.
Tooth's friends are also Jack's friends, and with the break-up he sees them less and less. Not through any fault of theirs, but he doesn't go outside much anymore. North has been like a father to him but he lives on the other side of the country and barely knows how to email. Aster and Sandy were always more Tooths' friends than his to start with.
The hoarder logic makes its way in gradually. The stove is blocked off, but it doesn't matter because he's a terrible cook and anyway, he has enough money to eat out for every meal for the rest of his life if he wants.
One day he loses a brand-new pair of shoes in a pile of clothes. He could buy more, but this has happened more than once, and what's the point? It's California, it's warm enough to go barefoot. And anyway, he almost never walks outside anymore.
Once the last bed in the house is swallowed up, he makes a bed on the couch because it's more comfortable anyway. It'll save him having to wash sheets and comforters, which is handy because the washing machine is blocked off now too.
He doesn't acknowledge it as a problem until North calls by unexpectedly for a visit and he can't bear to let him in the house. North forces his way in, and the look of horror and shame on his face when he sees what Jack has been reduced to feels like losing his family all over again.
…..
The TV show is really their only option. Financially, it would use up Jack's entire stipend to get the help he needs and with no real prospects, he needs that money to survive. North says he'll take care of it, pays to put Jack up in a hotel room for a week and hugs him so tight he feels the ache in his ribs for hours after.
Aster and Sandy can't make it to help, Tooth refuses to. Jack suspects that just uttering the word hoarder put her off. She's sentimental, holds on to a lot of seemingly worthless things for the sake of 'memories'. North is more than willing to help, but he can only be there for the first day. For at least half of the clean-up, Jack will be going it alone. He's terrified.
But the initial consultation with the camera crew and then the therapist is promising. The therapist is so calm and reassuring, and doesn't react with disgust when he shows her the worst parts of the house. She prompts him to talk about his family and comforts him when he cries.
He has to make decisions on everything they throw away. The downstairs half of the house is easy, it's almost all rubbish, old unwashed clothes and old takeaway cartons that can be dumped. He rediscovers his lost new shoes after a pile is cleared, and the camera gets some footage of him putting them on. The therapist is pleased with his progress, but they haven't gone upstairs yet, to his mother and Emma's room.
…..
"We can't move it. There's no room yet."
They're in Emma's room. Jack is freaking out, for the first time since they started. The therapist is trying to talk to him, and North has stopped clearing the kitchen to sit with him and let him clutch his arm. It feels like there's no air in the room.
The problem is an antique chest of drawers, found and moved and restored in white and gold for Emma's 8th birthday. It's insanely heavy and awkwardly placed in front of her walk-in wardrobe. They were supposed to move it before the accident, and it never happened. There's a backlog of stuff behind it and in front of it that they need to sort through before they can move it properly but they can't get past it. Someone brought up the idea of taking it apart, and Jack overheard them saying this. He feels like throwing himself in front of it, to protect it.
"Is ridiculous," North grumbles. "There is gap at the top. Send someone through gap."
There is a gap, but it's pretty small. Nevertheless, the clean-up crew examine it.
"Who's the smallest person we got on the crew?" the professional organizer asks the crew manger. He thinks for a moment.
"Dunbroch. Probably. No, definitely."
"Get her up here, then."
The manager opens the window, sticks his head out and shouts down to the garden.
"Dunbroch!"
There's an answering shout from below, indecipherable.
"You're needed up here! Back bedroom on the left!"
She's there within a minute. He's seen her in passing, he thinks. Wearing the blue t-shirt and baseball cap of the clean-up crew she probably blended into the rest of the group. But the cap is gone, her hair isn't tied back and her face and shirt are covered with dust and sweat.
"What do you need?" she asks, and he hears an accent, a pleasant melodic tone.
"We need you to get back there," the manager says, pointing to the gap.
"Righto," she says gamely. There's a hair tie around her wrist and she uses it, demonstrating great compression skills by cramming every bright red curl into a single topknot.
The camera crew focuses on them trying to help her get over the chest rather than his emotional breakdown, and he's very grateful for this. They pay particular attention to when she gets stuck between the doorframe and the top of the chest, leaving her legs dangling in the air. He's pretty sure the camera is focusing on her ass at this point.
Finally, one of the crew members grabs both her ankles and just shoves her in, and she goes through to the other side with a clatter and a few muffled obscenities. And it's all so absurd Jack can't help but laugh.
…..
As the sun goes down, the crew break for dinner. North leaves to catch his plane, but he hugs Jack one last time and seems reluctant to let him go. He promises to visit more, and write more.
The therapist orders in food for herself and Jack and then steps outside to have a coffee and a smoke alone. Jack takes himself back to Emma's room for a while, because it's the quietest room in the house and he needs some alone time too.
Except he's not alone. The red-haired girl is still stumbling around behind the chest. She calls out to him as he enters the room.
"I need another bag back here! I'm almost done!" she calls.
"Um, sure," Jack says, looking around for a bag.
Her head pops up through the gap.
"Is it just you? Where's everyone gone?"
"They went for dinner," he tells her, shrugging.
"Oh, lovely. And they just left me here to carry on. Bastards."
He laughs, then stifles it.
"I'm sorry."
"It's no' your fault. Happens a lot on these jobs actually, just not usually to me. I'm bloody starving."
"I'll ask Dr Menken to order you something. Hang on, I'll find you a menu."
"No, no, don't bother with a menu. I'm not picky. I like noodles."
He calls down for the extra food to the therapist, and decides he'll sit with her for a bit. She's good company, as far as he knows, and she's a distraction from his thoughts.
"Are you doing okay back there?" he asks her.
"Yeah, it's fine. I've almost got it all cleared out. Good thing I'm not claustrophobic though, I found a wee hidey-hole back here and I had to clear that out too."
"A hidey-hole?"
"Aye. A wee crawlspace."
She disappears for a moment, then pops back up, pushing a small box towards him. It's blue, Emma's favourite colour, and covered with sparkly stickers. All the air is sucked out of the room again.
"I found a load of pictures back there, and this wee box. Figured you'd want them kept."
And with that she's gone again, rustling around in the dark behind the chest. Jack opens the box, with trembling fingers.
Emma's pictures, of herself mostly, as a princess or a warrior with a diamond sword. Pictures of deer and horses and cats. Pictures of Jack, and Mom, and all three of them. A comic book she made and bound herself with ribbon, of Jack's adventures as a Peter Pan type trickster with a talking frog.
There are other things too, like a tiny plastic unicorn, a mood ring, a piece of amethyst. Sheets of stickers and hair ties and barrettes. Mom's old eyeshadows and lipsticks and perfume atomizers.
Holding these treasures, he can't stop the tears. A regular cleaning crew might have thrown these away, or not found the crawlspace at all and missed them. These precious snippets of his sister's existence, and he has them safely in his grasp. He curls around the box and sinks to the floor, sobbing.
Merida's curly head pops up in the space again when she hears him crying, and she curses under her breath.
"Sorry! I'm sorry, didn't mean to freak you out! Hold on, I'll be right out!"
She struggles to climb over the side of the chest on her own and gets stuck again, and bangs her head on the doorframe. She uses swear words he's never heard before as she rubs her head and tries to pull herself out of the gap. As Jack calms himself, he puts down the box and comes to her aid, but pulling her out ends with him misjudging the force needed and toppling backwards, landing on his back with a face-full of her chest.
"The camera lot are going to be raging they missed this," she laughs, getting off him and readjusting herself.
"I'm pretty sure they have enough material even without this," he says, though he wishes it didn't come out sounding as beaten down as it does.
"Oh, pish," she says, waving him away. "You're not the worst we've been on. You're not even the worst this month. You're making great progress. I guarantee the crew working the other job for this episode are having a much worse time of it."
It's heartening to hear, and he knows instinctively she's not just saying it to make him feel better. This is a girl who doesn't bullshit.
…..
He doesn't see her the next day, and then the clean-up is over and the final interviews are complete. His house is clean and clear, and Emma's box is stored away safely. He got to keep the things that were precious. He has an aftercare package, he'll be working with a therapist and an organizer so he can work out his problems in a healthy way.
The program airs, and as it turns out she was right. His segment is paired with a woman in Illinois who hoards cats and has been letting them use the house as a litterbox. His segment gets very little attention online in the wave of horror and disgust for the other woman's circumstances, except to say that he seemed nice and willing to work and they wish him well in the future.
The only real attention his segment gets is the creation of the 'Hoarders Crewmember Booty Appreciation Group' that focuses on the ten seconds of footage of Dunbroch's rear end wiggling through the doorway gap.
…..
Two months go by, and he feels a growing emptiness. He can feel the need to hold on to the little things more and more, and although therapy is going well its only once a week. North has been great, but he's still on the other side of the country. Aster and Sandy have been over twice and three times respectively, but they don't seem to know how to talk to him about the hoarding. Tooths' silence has been deafening.
He needs to talk to someone. Urgently. Someone who knows.
He tracks her down through social media, at 3am. Dunbroch is an unusual name, but he finds nothing until she shows up in a picture on the profile of a friend of hers. She's hard to miss with that hair, and apparently she can't take selfies because her rictus grin next to her friend's sunny smile is pretty hilarious.
Her profile picture is a roaring bear, for some reason. Her first name is Merida.
He sends her a private message.
I need to talk to someone. Can I talk to you?
For a half hour, there's no answer.
Then….
Sure. I'm downtown. Meet me here?
Just seeing it there, blinking on the screen, is enough to allieviate the empty feeling somewhat.