“Winner and still champion!” we heard Coyle yell.
“Shit,” Fergus said.
“That sums it up,” I said.
I was bleeding in about six places.
Fergus and I crested to see Coyle in some dusty flats. He jogged to the edge of the dropoff like he’d jump out but stopped at the last moment, skidding. A puff of white dust drifted out over the dark water.
“No way!” he said, laughing.
Fergus ran up ahead of me and peered over the edge. He made as if he’d push Coyle. The two wrestled around, getting close, then backed off.
“Bonus prize for whoever wants to jump,” Coyle said.
He reached into his pocket and took out a beer can that he’d brought with him. He hurled the can far out over the quarry. The can arched up high and far, glinting in the light, then fell and kept falling. Far below it made a small white splash in the dark water. A delayed plunking sound rose up. Ripples spread out slowly, the can bobbing in the water.
“Go fetch,” Coyle said.
Jimmy and the others down below waited, but none of us jumped. And as I stood there, I realized that Coyle wasn’t going to do it. Something had changed in him, and in all of us, really. We’d lived through the hard years, but they were now permanently and irretrievably behind us. The scars were fading and in time would be almost invisible, and all the weapons we’d used to survive in our house would become our most useful tools. Competition would turn into ambition, stubbornness into resilience. Ten years later Coyle would be in finance. Fergus would be a computer programmer. Maddy would be a teacher. We were trained to be warriors, to be explorers, to throw ourselves into arduous and extreme tasks, but the world was not designed for poet warriors. It was a place for ordinary people, and in a few years my siblings would enter normal jobs and normal lives, with just the memory of our excessive childhood inside us, fading bit by bit. It was an affirmation of my father’s methods, but it was also a disappointment. I was accustomed to us being Brennans. We were supposed to be different.
The four of us eased from the edge of the cliff and started back into the pines, taking the path. I could imagine the others down below, waiting for one of us to jump, and then seeing the four of us walking back together, shoulder to shoulder. It would be a relief and a letdown. They knew it was stupid to jump from up there, but they expected stupid things from us.
I stopped to look up the slope. I had always wanted to beat Coyle in something, and I could feel that desire still lingering inside me. Walking past, Coyle saw what I was thinking and nudged me forward.
“Come on, Willie,” he said.
“Don’t touch me,” I said.
Fergus looked back.
“Never changes,” he said.
“Don’t fight,” Maddy said.
“We’re not fighting,” Coyle said. “We’re communicating.”
Coyle held his hands up to show it was a joke, then motioned for me to follow as the three of them, Coyle, Fergus, and Maddy, went on down the dirt path. I started after them but stopped after a moment. The familiar, ever-present wheels of competition were turning inside me. I wanted to win. I had always wanted to win. And as they went on down I turned and started back up the slope. Coyle realized what I was doing and called my name and then came after me but I was already over the lip of the ridge and crossing the flats. I was too far ahead for him to stop me. I arrived at the rocky edge of the quarry, sprinting, and it was that great moment in adolescence where you throw off what you think you ought to be and start imposing your true personality on the world, a moment of grace and strength and beauty and danger. I was leaping out as high and as far as I could. I was more than a hundred feet over the water, hovering, and then I began to fall, quickly, straight down, turning in air, head thrown back, arms spread wide. I do not remember shouting or making any noise. The entire descent was silent, solemn, and a part of me was outside of everything, watching it. It was finally happening—a tiny white figure plummeting among the enormous gray rock into the dark, still water.
Acknowledgments
This book, like all my books, was not written in isolation. I sent it out to friends and family who let me know what worked and what didn’t. That advice was particularly useful on this project which was so close to me personally. I’d like to thank John Zomchick and Michael Knight, who were early readers and encouraged me when I wasn’t sure I’d finish. I’d like to thank Terry Shaw who gave me a critical piece of advice at a crucial juncture. And Susan Falls who gave a close, perceptive read. And Tom Garrigus who helped me with ideas for essential pieces in the back end of the book. And Theresa Profant who lived through many versions of the book and was, as always, a force of optimism and strength. I’d like to thank David McCormick, my agent, and Deb Garrison, my editor, for taking on the book and persevering through the long, long editing process. And lastly, I’d like to thank my family, Mike, Ian, Erin, Mom, and Dad, for putting up with my intrusions and public scribbling.
A NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Shannon Burke is the author of the novels Safelight, Into the Savage Country, and Black Flies, a New York Times Notable Book. He has also worked on several film projects, including Syriana, and is the cocreator of the Netflix show Outer Banks. He lives in Knoxville, Tennessee.
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The Brother Years Page 23