"Atlas" by Katharina Davoudian

To save the house, we must change the Law. But the Law grips its fingers around our home, knuckles white, squeezing the walls until they crack. Up on the roof lives Atlas, holding up Father’s lien, his sweat dripping from the ceiling. We are desperate to set him free, to let him eat, to give him sleep. But we watch his bones break, his spine split, and his hands inflame with arthritis. The lien licks its lips as it fattens and fattens with interest, a ticking bomb that will one day slip from Atlas’s fingers.

“Father, can you please try to get rid of the lien?”

“I won’t do anything until your Mother and I settle.”

“Father says he’ll put your name on the house, Mother, then the Law can’t take it away if something happens to him.”

“But how can he give me half of nothing? The house is the lien now.”

I watch Mother and Father dance like electrons: their positions misplaced, but their velocity certain. They move at such speeds that the air grows hot and thick until we can’t breathe. We don’t know where they’re going.

The Law does not know or care about Mother and us. The Law only knows Father. The Law is old and frail, the past living in the crow’s feet by its eyes. The Law only has eyes for married couples. Without marriage, the house is only Father’s. Without marriage, the Law makes us guests in our own home. Without marriage, our home is here as long as Father lives.

There’s no way to get to the roof without a ladder, no secret door through the ceiling in the attic. We keep Atlas company from afar, bid him good morning and goodnight under the roof or outside by the walls. I hear him moan and shudder. I hear him curse. I hear him dream about standing tall with his shoulders back. I hear him talking to the birds.