34 Edgefield Road, winner of the Broadside contest, Dominican University

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Summers, our bikes leaned against the front porch; winters, our boots piled in heaps by the door. Chris and I couldn’t wait for his mom’s pancake breakfasts on Saturdays. Mrs. Riley was a round woman, freckled, cheerful. I was eleven when she died; an accident, everyone said, nothing else.

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Soon afterward, Mr. Riley moved the family away– though he refused to sell the house. None of us knew why.

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Now 34 Edgefield Road remains, sinking into the earth, dilapidated, forlorn. This morning, I watch sparrows flying in and out of its broken windows. Do they sing inside those empty rooms?