The Locked Attic

Some family secrets aren't just hidden, they're forbidden.

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When Mark entered the colonial three-storey he'd inherited from his grandmother on December 7th, the air carried the rustic scent of things not meant to be shared. Etched on the wooden hatch leading up to the attic was a hasty scrawl borne of fury -- "Do not open."

His curiosity knocked out his sense of caution. He lifted the hatch and stepped onto the ladder. The hatch groaned awake, a mouth dropping open, waiting to speak.

Words he wasn't quite ready for.

It held what every attic did - dust motes dancing over albums and letters left unopened for years. Mark thumbed a diary open. His grandmother's impatient cursive gave his eyes a sharp poke - a feeling that he'd never known.

The yellowed pages detailed decades of tension between his grandmother and mother - arguments over her "poor" choices, her parental role, and the crossing of social boundaries that made her who she was.

And something else. A letter addressed to his mother. Helen Song.

Its yellowed edge crooking its little finger.

And Mark succumbed.

"Helen -

"I want you to know," it began, assuring yet breathless, "that I meant the best for you. Never to harm you."

Mark's eyes widened. Decades of resentment, intergenerational conflict, and tension made the hairs on his arm bristle - and he was too young to have been part of them. He had unlatched the trap door, expecting dust, mites - perhaps furniture too worn for the ultra-modern living room.

But he found a new road to walk.

At the bottom of a pile of diaries was a photo of his grandmother in the hospital ward where he was born, carrying him over a crib.

On its rails was a placeholder and a card - "Mark Lee."

Lee was the surname of the Song family's chauffeur.

He found a photo of his mother laughing with a young man, dressed in nothing but khakis and a singlet.

Mark's eye fell on his Rolex, its dials suddenly spinning backwards.

The diary in Mark Song's hand dropped to the floor.

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