" I wish he never pulled the trigger," she whispers, rocking a wooden chair. In her  arms is a wooden doll, and on her face is the shadow from a setting sun. Hands trembling, lips quivering with incoherent words, eyes twitching, Martha occupied the porch, silence crowning the large mansion towering above her.

She was alone with earth, mice and crickets. Grey as an owl, age became the wrinkled lines on her forehead and the saggy breasts left bare to cold and grief.

Dubem was the first to arrive. For holiday, he had chosen his grandmother's famous haunted house, hoping for a glimpse of his late father. 

Soon, The twins zoomed in, wearing a polychrome of irritation. Of all places to be during the holidays, their grandmother's was the last. Their mother soon arrived, her eyes searching for the lone dweller of her husband's homestead. 

When their eyes met, it was pity and sighs. By two generations apart, they were both mother's. The first, Martha, had buried more than she has nursed. The  second, Dubem's mother, hasn't felt the pang save when she lost her husband. Yet, there was a soft murmur of a pattern, somewhere from the shadow of their past. It was that season that spring turned into an eternal winter for Martha and her siblings.

Seven at the time, she stayed awake imagining the scene of the incident her father had narrated to her mother behind closed doors. He had shot a woman. The order was to annihilate every single one of them. He met her in black hijab, the identity tag. He had his orders and a duty to fulfill. She had an unborn child she would crawl to protect. That life slipped out of her grasp and she laid the curse. Every male of his line will die premature.

It wasn't the curse that drove the soldier out of camp, into bars with bottles of gin. It was the lives. He questioned his loyalty. If it was worth it. And when his sons left one after another, he felt that death was justified.

It should have ended with them, but the burden revved and dropped on Martha, Dubem's grandmother. The last of the offspring of the man who pulled the trigger that winter in Afghanistan.

Dissatisfied, the twins settled in. Dubem glanced their way and turned to his grandmother who had just said hello. There was something about the way she never welcomes him. As if she was fearful that he two would pass.

His mother whispered it. Dark circles ringing the worry in her eyes.

" It's alright," he beamed. " The debt has been paid in full." He told his grandmother. He wasn't sure she believed him. Not even his own mother seemed hopeful enough. The twins had their internal rivalry like scores on a blackboard to settle. And he, watched the beginning of a long holiday, determined to survive for the sake of the woman who never welcomes him home.

Years later, Dubem's grandmother said her goodbye, twinkling with a tired smiled. She never said welcome to the only male left to her line, but she did say " well done".