by Claire Adams
“Hey,” I say. “I think we should talk.”
“Can it wait?” he asks, holding a spoonful of cereal between his bowl and his mouth. “I really want to see how this ends.”
He takes his bite and I grab the remote, switching off the television.
“Dude!” he says. “Now I’m never going to find out if Snoopy made it home!”
“Chris, what are your plans?” I ask.
“Oh jeez,” he says. “Do we have to do this every day?”
“We’ll do it until either you move out or I get an answer I like,” I tell him.
“I’m not going to be here that long[1],” he says. “I don’t even know if that guy’s still looking for me, but I ain’t going back there until I feel safe.”
“What did you even do?” I ask. “Did you con a single mother out of groceries? Did you swipe a kid’s cellphone? What?”
“I don’t get why you always gotta make me out to be some heartless guy,” Chris says. “I’ve got feelings, too, you know.”
“I don’t know what to do here,” I tell him. “I’m just getting to where things are starting to go all right in my life, and I can’t have you coming in here and screwing it up like you always do.”
“I don’t screw things up,” he says. He cocks his head, thinks about the statement a moment and then amends it, “I don’t always screw things up.”
“Yeah, well we’re going to have to come to some kind of understanding here,” I tell him. “Otherwise, I think it’s best that you don’t come around for a while.”
“Really dude?” he asks. “I’m your brother. You’re really telling me that you want to just kick me out and cut me off? Doesn’t seem very fraternal.”
“Neither does expecting me to go out of my way to fix all of the problems you create by being a scumbag,” I tell him.
“Scumbag?” he asks. “May I remind you that when we were kids, I kept dad off your back for years.”
“You didn’t keep him off my back,” I retort, “you just pissed him off more than I did. Come on,” I tell him, “what did you do?”
“Well,” he sighs, “I fell into some old, discarded jewelry and I was just trying to sell it at a fair markup. I don’t know why the guy got so mad at me. I think he was one of those sociopath guys. He totally seemed like the type that would give a cow beef jerky.”
“So you tried to pawn some worthless crap onto someone after telling them it was pure gold and diamonds or whatever, he found out you were trying to screw him and it blew up in your face,” I say. “Is that about right?”
“That’s not the way I see it,” he says. “It does kinda sound like what that guy was saying when he was chasing me to my car, though.”
“Christ, Chris!” I exclaim. “You’ve got to stop pulling this crap! Has it ever occurred to you that one of your more jilted clients could follow you here and pull me into your mess even more than you already have?” I ask. “What’s the matter with you?”
“I’m just trying to get back on my feet[2],” Chris says. “What’s your deal?”
“My deal is that you keep doing the same things you’ve always done, and you still expect me to bail you out when it goes wrong,” I tell him. “You’re my older brother. You’re supposed to be the mature one, the one who has his life together, but you’re just a child.”
“Kids have it made,” Chris says. “Follow a few simple rules and someone will take care of everything else for you. That’s the life.”
“It’s time to grow up,” I tell him. “Can you even hear yourself?”
“You know something, bro?” he asks. “Studies show that most people who go around telling everyone else to grow up are just unhappy that they don’t have a better relationship with their inner child.”
Chris and his studies... It’s a joke, but I’m not laughing.
“I’m not going to do it anymore,” I tell him. “Find some other patsy.”
“Anyone ever tell you that you talk like a geezer?” Chris asks, but I don’t dignify the question with a response.
“So, what are you willing to do?” I ask him. “If you’re going to stay here, I’ll help you, but only if you stop all the scamming and get a real job.”
“Oh, like the ‘real job’ you’ve got?” he asks. “Just invite me to one of your fights and I’ll see if I can’t get my new career off the ground. I can’t wait to work with my little bro!” he mocks.
“If I thought for a second that you had anything like the discipline and determination to fight, I’d train you myself,” I tell him. “That’s not going to happen, though.”
“Hold on a minute,” he says. “We’re just going to gloss right over that? What you do isn’t any more legal than what I do. Where you get off acting like you’re better than—”
“The difference is that I don’t trick anyone into fighting,” I tell him. “I don’t lie or make up stories to get through the door, and if someone wants to back out, that’s on them. The money I make, I make because people bet on me. They know that I get things done. It’s not even the same thing.”
“Potato, tomato,” he says. “It doesn’t matter, only…”
Why did I have a feeling there was another shoe just waiting to drop?
“What?” I ask curtly.
“Well,” he says. “I’m sure you noticed I don’t have my car[3] with me this time.”
“Yeah,” I answer. “I assumed you’d stolen it, though, so I wasn’t expecting to see it again anyway.”
“I didn’t steal it!” he protests. “It was on loan[4].”
“Uh huh,” I yawn. “Who loaned it to you?”
“Well, it was more of an ‘I borrowed it’ thing than a formal loan,” he says.
“Okay, so you stole it then,” I state.
“No—gosh, will you listen to me?” Chris says. “I was working with this guy who works at a dealership. We were doing a new take on the Spanish Prisoner, but when I got that bag of jewelry—”
“Hold on,” I tell him, rubbing my forehead. “So you’re telling me you got this guy to let you use one of the dealership’s car’s, you and him start scamming people together, at which point, you decide to then scam your partner?” I ask.
“In the business world, they call that initiative,” Chris says.
“In the real world, they call that twenty years in a cell with a large roommate,” I respond.
“I’m just trying to get back what’s mine,” Chris says ambiguously. “I know you think you had things hard growing up, but things were worse for me.”
“They were not!” I shout. “Even if they were—which, again, they’re not—that doesn’t entitle you to just start ripping off everyone you meet.”
“Oh right,” he says. “You know you were mom’s favorite.”
“Mom’s favorite was a half-gallon bottle of cheap vodka, with a splash of Everclear in every shot,” I snap back. “What does that have to do with anything anyway?”
“I’m just saying that you and I grew up in different worlds and mine’s not easy to get out of[5], you know?” he asks.
“If you’re trying to get out, I’ll help you get out,” I tell him, “but I’m not going to let you con me into thinking you’re going to change when we both know you’ll just look for the first chance to take a shortcut.”
“Then what do you want from me?” he asks. “If wanting to get out is the only way you’ll trust me, but you wouldn’t trust me if I said I wanted to get out, where exactly does that leave me? You’re going to just throw your own brother out onto the—”
Line: crossed.
“Do you know how many times I’ve taken you in?” I ask. “I’m only twenty-one and you’ve already used up more chances than most people get in a lifetime.”
“Whatever, dude,” he says and finally stands. He walks over to me and I’m almost expecting him to throw a punch, but he just reaches out and grabs at the remote control in my hand.
“Let go,” he says.
“We’re
talking, Chris,” I tell him. “I’m not going to let you drown me out with my own television.”
“What do you expect me to say, huh?” he asks. “I wasn’t born with the gifts that you were. I’m not motivated the same way other people are,” he says. “I know that. Maybe you could even call me lazy or tell me that I just take shortcuts, but do you have any idea how much skill and planning goes into a successful job[6]? Instead of going to college, maybe you should think about interning with your big brother for a little while.”
“Three days,” I tell him. “I want some kind of substantial evidence that you’re turning things around within three days, or I want you out of my house.”
“It’s like that, huh?” he asks.
“Yeah,” I tell him. “That’s what it’s like.”
“Harsh, bro,” Chris says. “And how exactly am I supposed to give you some kind of evidence you’ll actually believe. You’ve never really given me the benefit of the doubt.”
“I did give you the benefit of the doubt,” I tell him. “I gave you the benefit of the doubt when we were both kids and you were the closest thing to a functioning parent that I had, but you lie all the time, Chris. For all I know, your entire half of this conversation has been completely made-up.”
“By the way,” he says, “that chick you’ve been seeing: what’s her story?”
“Are you serious?” I ask.
“What? She’s cute,” he says.
My fingers bend into my palms and my mouth is open, ready for whatever diatribe is about to come out, but that’s when I see the gleam in Chris’s eyes.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
“What do you mean?” he asks.
“You’re just trying to get me mad now,” I observe. “Why?”
“Oh, I didn’t mean that I was going to try to steal her out from under you,” Chris says. “I just wanted to know a little bit more about her in case things go bad with the two of you.”
“Are you threatening me?” I ask. “Do you really think that’s a smart decision?”
“Put the guns back in their holsters,” he laughs, patting one of my arms. “I just wanted to break the tension.”
“You know, I don’t think it worked,” I tell him.
“I’ll make you a deal,” he says. “Let me back toward home tonight and I’ll see how things look. If everything’s copacetic, I’ll just be gone.”
“If it’s not?” I ask.
“Well, I might need you to help me get back out of there again,” he says.
Chris never has fewer than half a dozen people on the hook at any given time. Most of them are quick, five-minutes-and-out cons, but he’s never let someone with an impressive pocketbook go so easily. The story he’s giving me, as outlandish as it is, can’t be the whole truth.
“What aren’t you telling me?” I ask him.
“Nothing, I swear!” he protests.
“Isn’t that the line you always used when mom asked you if you’d stolen any of her vodka while she was sleeping?” I ask.
“Okay,” he says, “I can see the charm everyone else knows and loves isn’t going to be enough.”
“Stop trying to con me,” I tell him. “Are you going to make a change or are you going to find somewhere else to live?”
“Mase,” he starts.
“I hate that name,” I interrupt.
“Mason, brother, whatever you want me to call you, look,” he says. “I’ve got some money[7] and collateral[8] tied up right now, and I can’t just walk away from that.”
“How much are you down?” I ask.
“It’s really not all that much,” he says. “I never like to let a client[9] hold onto too much money for too long. A lot of people don’t know how to handle large sums of money. They start to get ideas.”
“How much?” I ask.
“Does the number really matter?” he asks. “It’s not like it makes any difference.”
“Chris,” I say, looking my brother hard in the eyes, “how much?”
“I don’t have the exact figures at the moment, but if you’ll give me and my secretary until Friday—” he starts.
“You have five seconds either to tell me how much you’re down or to grab your stuff and get out of my house,” I tell him.
He sighs.
“It’s really not that big a deal,” he says. “My partner[10] doesn’t know about my other investors[11], so it’s not like I’m really down,” he says, “but I’ve got about two-fifty tied up in all of it.”
“Tell me that’s just in normal dollars and not in the hundreds of thousands,” I breathe.
“Yeah, sure, of course it is,”[12] he says.
“Where do you even get your hands on that kind of cash?” I ask. “I thought you dealt with smaller cons. Even the longer ones were only ever a couple thousand here and there. What have you gotten yourself into? Are the cops looking for you? Do they know about you?”
“No,” he says. “I’ve got a friend on the force[13] who gives me the heads-up if someone files a report. I’m not that worried about the money,[14] really, I just want what’s mine.”
“You’re not in with loan sharks or anything like that, are you?” I ask.
“Are you kidding me?” he asks. “People like that hate people like me. It never really made sense to me, though. When ya think about it, we are pretty much in the same line of work.”
“So there’s nobody that’s going to come after you if you don’t go back for that money,” I say.
Chris’s eyes go wide and he’s shaking his head as he takes a step back.
“That’s mine,[15] bro,” he says. “I love you and everything, but this place isn’t exactly worth giving up all I’ve worked so hard to achieve.”[16]
“It’s not your money,” I tell him. “You have an opportunity here. You can finally make the change we both know you need to make and I’m willing to help you every step of the way, but I need to know—and I mean absolutely know—that you’ve given up the life.”
“I don’t see why your panties are in such a bunch,” he says. “I pitch in with food. I’ve helped you with rent when I’ve stayed with you before…”
“You mean last time you were here and you gave me fifty bucks to replace the toilet seat you broke—how, I still don’t know—and with the food, I’m assuming you’re talking about that time you bought Funyuns and forgot to take them with you when you left?” I ask.
“You can paint me any way you want to, but this isn’t a one-sided deal,” he says. “I help you, too.”
“You’ve helped me before,” I tell him. “You helped a lot when I was younger and that’s probably why we haven’t had this conversation until now, but I’m sick of it, Chris! I never know when you’re going to show up, and when you do, there’s always the chance I come home to police cars and helicopters.”
“Oh, I’ve never brought the fuzz home with me,” he says, making another grab for the remote control.
“That’s just the worst case scenario,” I tell him, pulling the remote away from him. “Usually, you end up drinking all day, every day, and you never miss a chance to humiliate me. It’s really not that much better.”
“So, what?” he asks. “You want me to give up a quarter of a mil just because I like the sauce?”
“If it was actually your money, I’d tell you to spend it on rehab and some serious counseling,” I tell him. “Since it’s not, I’d say the bigger gesture would be giving it all up in favor of your new life.”
“I can’t do that,” he says. “You’re out of your mind if you think I’d do that.”
“Then I guess we both know what happens next,” I tell him. “You’ve got five seconds to grab your stuff and get out of my house.”
For a second, he just stands there, but as soon as I actually start counting, suddenly, he has a lot to say.
“Whoa, whoa, wait,” he says. “Just hold on and let’s talk about this.”
“Four…” I count.
“Wh
at are you going to do?” he asks. “You going to literally throw me out of the house?”
“Three…” I count.
“The cops?” he asks. “You’re not actually saying you’d call the cops if I don’t—”
“Two…” I count.
“Do you have any idea what we could do with that kind of money?” he asks.
“One,” I count and take a step toward him.
“All right!” he cries. “I’ll give up the money, but I’m not paying rent. You’ve kind of just poached my nest egg there.”
“That’s fine,” I tell him. “First thing I want you to do is start looking at therapists.”
“You said I didn’t have to do that if I gave up the money,” he says. “I’m giving up the money. How am I supposed to pay for a therapist?”
“I’ll take care of it,” I tell him.
I have no idea where I’m going to get the money to cover someone else’s therapy, but I’ve got a very small window here, and I’m not going to let it close without doing everything in my power to get my brother to stop swindling people.
“I’ve been to therapists before,” he says. “You know that. Why do you think this time’s going to be different?”
“I don’t,” I tell him. “I just hope that it is.”
“You really think some shrink’s going to make me not want to work?”[17] he asks. “I really don’t think it’s a psychological issue.”
“Maybe it won’t do anything,” I tell him. “Maybe it will. I don’t know. It’s one of my requirements, though. I need to know that you’re making a real and honest effort.”
“I’m not going to any Freudians,” he says. “They’re all about Oedipus complexes and penis envy. It freaks me out.”
“As long as you’re going, I don’t care whose philosophy your therapist subscribes to,” I tell him. Remembering my brother’s unique way of twisting just about everything I’ve ever said, I decide to be more specific, saying, “It has to be a real therapist, though.”
“Who’s to say who’s a real therapist and who’s not?” Chris asks.