Diorama Family

This time, they’re framed within the walls of a shoebox. Last time, an Amazon delivery box. See how normal they look: Mom, Dad, 2.5 kids—their dog is the .5. This is the twenty-seventh diorama Timmy creates, his latest dream.

Mom runs a vacuum, front and center, frozen plastic smile, perfect lipstick, and tidy apron. She is the focal point. Dad, in the armchair—cigarette in hand—stares at the television with whimsy in his eyes. Sister looks in the mirror, holds her hands near her face. Barbie-shaped fingers touch temples, pinkies askew. Brother runs his Matchbox race car across a path in the carpet, curled amusement masks his mouth. The dog hides beneath the table.

Dara, he tells himself, loves herself, the way he does. He is astonished by her growing beauty and strength under these circumstances. She is the honey of his home, his safe person. He wishes Dara could see herself like he sees her. He tacks a gum-wrapper foil to the inside of the small mirror’s frame.

Mom runs the vacuum as she often does now. She pushes it and pulls it across the floor, the whirring sound of the machine covering her crying. In the diorama, Mom’s grief is replaced by painted-on teeth. The dollhouse vacuum provides the erasure of everything but the whirring. Hear it? A humming sound, not quite soothing.

Fritz, the dachshund, has dashed below the table and will not emerge. Lately, Timmy yells at Fritz. Best keep him tucked away. In all twenty-seven dioramas, Fritz hides, sometimes below the table, sometimes underneath the chair, always behind the back of the brother’s dioramic avatar.

If you look closely into this shoebox, you’ll see a groove that is worn in the carpet where the brother repeatedly runs the Matchbox race car, maybe humming an imaginary motor sound as he repeats the run, harmonizing with the vacuum’s whirring. Timmy makes this groove with the point of a sharp knife, scratching, scratching with a satisfying scrape; imagine how long it would really take him to wear out the carpet in the living room with just his toy car. Imagine, too, how mad Dad might be at the damage.

Dad, still in his chair, the memory recreated, hole drilled in plastic fingers where the makeshift cigarette-toothpick protrudes. Timmy aims Dad’s eyes at the TV, hears the incessant cough—a harbinger of loss escaping the shoebox.

Maybe this time he should light the diorama on fire. He has plenty of pieces of dollhouse furniture and odd objects that serve as familiar things. He knows all the details, can render the tiniest specifics. But only one Dad-figure; one of each of them. Next time, he won’t let Dad smoke.

He holds the box over his head now. Then Timmy smashes the diorama, crushing and tearing it into small bits. Gasps heave as he rips and throws, kicks and stomps the pieces.

Fritz whimpers.

Shoulders collapse as the whirring of the vacuum starts up again calming his breath. He carefully picks up the dog, sister, Mom and Dad, and searches for another box.

Number twenty-eight.