It's All Relative

by J. M. Snyder

  “Who’s talking about your ass?” Ray asks as he stumbles into the kitchen, still half-asleep.

  I look up at my brother, dressed in a t-shirt and boxers so thin, they’re almost obscene. Neeshi and Caitlin exchange a glance, then cover their mouths with their hands and giggle like schoolgirls, but I’m not sure if the laughter is directed at me or Ray. Either way he doesn’t seem to care—he opens the refrigerator, bends over to lean inside, his shorts threatening to split across his scrawny ass. In the fridge, he yawns with a leonine roar that sets the girls off again. If I were closer, I’d slap his butt, hard enough to make him jump, and then I’d be in on the laughs, too. I even push my chair back, I could stretch behind Dan and still get in a good smack, but before I can reach out Ray stands, milk carton in one hand. When he sees me I play it off, stretching my arm around my lover’s shoulders and smiling at the distrust on my brother’s face. “What?” I want to know.

  He looks from me to my sister, then back at me again, but I think it’s the smirk on Dan’s face that makes him uneasy. “Who’s talking about your ass?” he asks. As we laugh, he glares at me like I’m the one who started it. Actually, I think, as long as they aren’t laughing at me anymore…Ray opens the carton and frowns in at the milk. “You know,” he starts, but that’s as far as he gets because he can’t think of anything witty or quick to say, and that makes us laugh harder. “You guys suck.”

  Actually, I know how he feels, but I’m glad they’ve moved away from teasing me and are onto him now. In a rare burst of sympathy, I tell my brother, “You know we’re just playing around. If we didn’t like you, we wouldn’t bust on you so bad.”

  “Yeah we would,” Caitlin says.

  Ray glares at me as if that’s my fault, too. “What?” I ask, standing. “I didn’t say it. How much milk is left?”

  “You didn’t have to say it,” Ray mutters, and before I can say anything else, he tips his head back and guzzles down what’s left in the carton.

  Milk courses down the corners of his mouth like cum, trickles down his chin, down his throat. He’s watching me stare at him, and I swear the corners of his lips are pulled into a faint smile, he’s enjoying this. “There better be another carton in there,” I tell him, pissed. “Hell, Ray, I was being nice.”

  “All gone,” he says, wiping his arm across his mouth. He is grinning, the fucker.

  A dozen scenes flit through my mind, me pinning him to the fridge, cramming that damn carton down his throat…my hands curl into fists just picturing the pain I could cause him. “That was damn rude,” I growl.

  With a shrug, my brother crumples the carton up in his hands, splattering milk on his shirt, his legs, the floor. I jump back to keep from getting sprayed. “Ray! You fucking slob!” I punch him in the shoulder, hard. When he tries to hit back, I pull a Caitlin and pop him again. “Clean this shit up.”

  “Shut up,” he mutters, but he knows I’m right—if one of our aunts comes in here, or our mom? And finds the floor sticky in front of the fridge, they’ll look for someone to blame, and there are enough witnesses here that no matter what excuse Ray tries to come up with, it won’t work. Hell, Caitlin’s likely to send Trevor running to tattle just to be mean. Grabbing a hand towel from the counter, Ray snaps it in my direction. “Leave me alone.”

  “You drank all the milk,” I point out. I cross my arms defiantly in front of my chest and look down at him as he wipes at the floor in quick, ineffectual strokes. From this position I can see the beginnings of a bald spot on the top of his head—I wonder if he knows about that? Receding in the front, falling out in the back…if that happens to me, I’m shaving my head, even though Dan likes my hair. He loves to tug at my bangs during sex, loves to brush the blonde strands from my face and tuck them behind my ear. He might not go for the Telly Savales look, though if I start balding like Ray…“I should make you walk your lazy ass over to Grosso’s,” I grumble. “Drink all the goddamned milk.”

  “It’s just up the street,” Ray huffs. “You want milk that bad, go get it yourself.”

  “Good idea.” Turning to my sister, I tell her, “Take note of that, Caitlin. Ray had a good idea. We need to mark the calendar or something.”

  A damp towel flicks my pants leg and I kick my brother in the hip. “You leaving?” Dan asks. When I nod, he starts to rise, shoveling food from his plate into his mouth as fast as he can. “You want me to come?”

  That would be nice, the two of us alone for a few minutes, but he’s eating and I don’t want to rush him. “I’ll just be a few minutes,” I tell him, and my kiss eases him back into the chair.

  Chapter 29: Grosso’s Market

  Grosso’s used to be a five minute bike ride from Aunt Evie’s, in the summer when time stretched out across the day like a cat sleeping in the sun, and the distance was nothing to a little boy anxious for Gobstoppers and frozen Cokes. But the middle of October in western Pennsylvania is nothing like August—a slight wind blows through me and sends dried leaves scuttling over my shoes, skittering across the street with a sound that reminds me of caught crabs scurrying over the deck of a ship to get away. It’s a cold sound, empty and alone. Around me the houses are silent, the trees foreboding guardians that watch me pass, and there are just enough clouds in the sky to suck any warmth out of the morning sunlight. It looks like rain, actually, the clouds low and bruised, threatening that sort of drizzle which seeps through the skin into your bones.

  A good day for a funeral, actually—too bad we have to wait for Sylvia to show up. Or did she come in last night? I feel out of the loop now, I don’t even know if she’s here. Serves you right, a voice in my head whispers, playing the bitch last night. You’re lucky your boy even slept in the same room with you, after the snit you threw.

  Yeah, well, that’s over with, isn’t it? Dan and I are cool again, right? He even asked if I wanted him to come to Grosso’s, there’s nothing wrong between us. I won’t let there be. Because if there is, then who’s to say that I’m happier with him? Who’s to say that I was a fool for turning Stephen away?

  I can’t think like that. I love Dan, I do, I know I do. What I feel for him is worlds stronger than whatever friendship tied me to Stephen. I won’t doubt our relationship, I won’t doubt myself, I can’t. I could spend my whole life regretting the choice, if I’m not careful.

  So I lose myself in the walk. I let the brisk air hollow out my mind and blow through me as if I’m nothing more than a bent reed. I focus on the trees, the pavement, the clouds. I’ve never seen Sugar Creek draped in autumn hues before, the leaves falling like tears from bare branches, stark and naked against the sky. Summer is a bustle of activity—kids everywhere, flowers in bloom, the woods full with foliage. Winter is silent, enshrouded in snow, the town itself barren as everyone huddles inside to stay warm. But this, now? There’s an almost uneasy sense of anticipation that surrounds me, a not quite pleasant feeling of baited breath. I feel caught, hung in suspended animation, waiting for a punch line that I’m not sure I’ll like when it finally comes. I won’t return here again, not after the funeral tomorrow, I know it. And what saddens me isn’t so much the fact that I’m not coming back but that this will be my final memory of this place. The Sugar Creek of my youth is gone, much the same way that my memories of Stephen are gone, replaced with his sad, haunted eyes. In my dreams and thoughts of summers past, there will always be these dying leaves that I trample on as I walk, this chill wind that bites through to my soul.

  A little further and I swear the wind has grown colder. It slips beneath my sweater, tickles along my skin. I should’ve let Dan come with me. He could hold my hand right about now, or drape an arm around my shoulders and hug me to him, keep me warm. Five minutes, my ass. I haven’t been out here half that yet and I’m ready to turn back. I’d get my car and drive to Grosso’s but that’s something my mom would do, a waste of gas, and with all those vehicles parked in front of Evie’s house, I’ll be lucky if I can even maneuver out of the front yard. It’s like a u
sed car lot back there and if I do manage to get out, what happens when I can’t pull in again?

  No, I’ll walk. I’m already halfway there, the house out of sight behind me or I really would turn back, for Dan or the car or both. What the hell am I doing out here anyway? For milk…damn, like I can’t live without it for one day. Though, truthfully? I think I just needed to get out for a bit, out by myself, away from my family and my lover and the ghost of my great-aunt that I feel in every room of that house, in the yard, by the creek. Evie is still here, despite the fact that her body lies in a cold steel vault down at Morrison’s. She was too large in life to just disappear.

  The road curves away and I follow it around, out of the leaves if I can help it. Out of the shade that falls from the trees, too, and when I have to walk beneath the overhanging branches, I hug myself to ward off the chill. It’s still early, no one’s out, and if it weren’t for the whistle of the wind through the leaves, I could almost believe that I’m not really here. Maybe I’m still in bed, and Dan left the covers up when he slipped out, that’s why I’m so cold. Maybe this is still part of the dream I had when I fell back asleep, the one where Dan’s kissing me awake, making love to me while I’m only half-aware.

  That thought exhausts me. It would mean that I’d have to do this morning all over again, the whole sitting at the kitchen table thing, bickering with Ray and being the butt of Caitlin’s jokes—I don’t think I could handle a second round. No, this is real, I’m here, and I scuffle my feet through leaves that have drifted into a pile along the curb just to prove it. I keep to the edge of the road, around an empty wooded lot, pass a weathered and faded For Sale sign that I swear has always been there for as long as I’ve been coming, and Grosso’s is up ahead. A squat building with walls of white stucco brick that are the same sordid shade of dingy gray that they were the very first time I laid eyes on them. Small—the place is small, with metal bars on the windows that make it look like a prison, a neon sign in one of them that flickers Open at all hours of the day and night, even though the place closes at nine. No parking to speak of, just gravel strewn over the lot to tamp down the grass, and two antique gas pumps in front of the door, beneath a sagging awning. Grosso’s doesn’t sell gasoline—never has, and as far as I know, those pumps don’t work. Just decoration, I guess, or ambiance, like the weeds growing around the steps that lead into the store, or the shingles crumbling off the roof, or the tires stacked beside the dumpster out back. This isn’t 7-11, but it passes as such in Sugar Creek. You need eggs? Run out to Grosso’s. Milk, candy for the kids, an iced drink to combat the summer heat? Grosso’s has the coldest freezer in town. Condoms? Sold individually, for those special occasions. Cigarettes? For an astronomical price—tobacco isn’t native here, these aren’t Virginia smokes they sell. Beer and lottery tickets and fresh bait, sliced meats wrapped in white deli paper and pickles the size of your arm in a barrel by the door, deodorant and shampoo and razors if you forgot to pack them, flip-flops and nudie magazines and a squealing rack of paperback books like the ones I used to read. Grosso’s. Every city in America has a place like this, if you look hard enough down the back alleys and side streets. The kind of store you don’t want your kids to go into alone, but just the place that children adore.

  There are two cars in front of the store—one an aging rust-colored pickup that I remember from my youth, the owner’s car. The other is a newer model Saturn in a light mauve, polished to reflect the meager sunlight the way fog throws back the glare of oncoming headlights. New York plates, that stops me. Someone passing through, or a relative of mine? I don’t remember seeing the car in front of Aunt Evie’s, but that doesn’t mean anything. My mind has been spun out in a million different directions since the phone call Saturday night—I’m not the most coherent person right at this moment. I could’ve parked behind this car when I first got here, I wouldn’t know it. Maybe it’s Sylvia, just getting into town, and she stopped at Grosso’s first before heading to the house.

  It’s not my aunt, though. It’s not anyone I know—when I enter the store, there’s a woman by the magazines dressed in a gunmetal silk blouse tucked into black pants that flow around her legs like a skirt, a flamboyant hat on her head with dotted Swiss lace pulled over her face, large gold earrings that I can see from here and dark hair pulled into a severe bun beneath the hat. That’s not Sylvia. My aunt is almost impish, short and petite and sort of butch, now that I think of it, with hair cut close to her scalp. The type to wear combat boots, not high-heels, and I’ve never known her to wear a hat, ever, not even the white cap that’s standard issue in the Navy. I should’ve known it wouldn’t be her, actually. She’s probably driving a rental car, something sporty, not that purple-pink Saturn outside.

  As the door closes behind me, the woman glances over her shoulder then looks away before our eyes can meet. My half-smile dies on my face. An out-of-towner, definitely. Any local would’ve made a beeline for me, already apologizing for Aunt Evie’s passing as if her heart giving out was somehow their fault. Thank God she doesn’t know me.

  Inside the store, it’s cool and dark—Grosso’s has always reminded me of a secretive back room, one of those illegal betting houses maybe, or the front parlor of a brothel. The walls are covers in ads, most of them old enough to be worth something to collectors, Pepsi signs for 5¢ a bottle, Coca-Cola girls from the ‘50’s, Salem cigarettes and the Marlboro camel and even Spuds Mackenzie. Behind the counter, black and white glossies line up beneath a Miller’s Light sign, promotional photographs signed by celebrities passing through, people like Dirk Benedict or Linda Evans, people no one remembers anymore. There’s one photo of Mr. T even, in an angry, mudsucker pose, ready to fight—my gaze finds it instantly, in the same place it’s always been. When I was little, I used to dream of getting my hands on that picture somehow. Thwart a robbery maybe, and Mr. Grosso himself would hand it to me as if it were a key to the city, and I’d accept it with due gravity, something like that. Mr. T. I wonder how much I could offer the old man to part with that picture. I’m surprised I still want it after all this time.

  Speaking of Mr. Grosso, I don’t see him behind the register. It’s just me and the woman flipping through Family Circle down at the end of the aisle, and we’re both ignoring each other. I pass by a wire display of greeting cards on my way to the cooler, turning the stand so it squeals in the quiet store—the woman glances at me again and quickly returns to her magazine. I wonder if they still carry that porno rag I looked at all those years ago with Stephen. Those magazines have migrated to the top of the stand, I notice, out of the reach of little kids, and there’s a sign that hangs over that corner of the store, 15 Minutes Browsing Only, No Exceptions. That’s new. Back in the day, young girls would crowd around the magazines, giggle over pinups of Rob Lowe and Simon Le Bon from Duran Duran, and the nudies were on the lowest shelf, not hidden behind cardboard racks or wrapped in plastic like they are now. Back in the day—that makes me feel impossibly old.

  When I open the cooler door, cold air curls around me, easily twenty degrees lower than the wind outside. I grab the first carton of milk I see—if my mom were here, she’d tell me to take one from the back, but it’s too cold to stand here trying to find the one dated furthest into the future. Shit, with all those people at the house, I’m sure the milk will be gone tomorrow. I’ve already decided Ray isn’t getting any. I’ll drink it all myself if I have to. Let him come out here to get his own damn milk.

  I let the door go and the seal sucks shut. I look around for something to buy Dan, just a little knick-knack or candy bar or something, but other than coin-shaped condoms, I don’t see anything he might like. Nothing he needs, at any rate. By the counter, I pick over bubblegum, cigarette lighters, CD singles for pop songs I don’t know, energy pills…there’s a small display of tiny vials, the size of golf pencils, short and thin. The kind of plastic tube that I’ve seen pocket tool kits come in, or eyeglass repair kits, something like that. Only this vial has a tiny rose i
nside, silk of course, and the letters on the tube read, In Case of Emergency, Break Glass. Definitely something you buy at the last minute for your anniversary or Mother’s Day, and very girly, yes, but…what the hell. Without a second thought, I grab one of the vials, set it down beside the milk. What am I doing? He’ll look at that and ask, “What the fuck?”

  But it’ll make him smile. That alone is worth the five dollars. It costs more than the milk, Dan better like it.

  A door behind the counter opens and Mr. Grosso shuffles out from the back room, just as old and hunched over as I remember him. I swear he hasn’t changed a bit since I saw him last, same tufts of white hair sticking out over his ears, same gnarled hands, same hooked nose with the same John Lennon glasses perched on the bulbous tip. He doesn’t remember me, I’m sure, but he knows I’m not a local and he pushes his glasses up as he studies me. “You’re one of Evie’s kids, ain’t ‘cha, son?” he asks.

  Evie’s kids, I like that. “Yes, sir,” I say, pushing the milk and rose closer to show I’m ready to be rung up.

  Mr. Grosso shakes his head and clucks softly. “It’s a shame,” he murmurs, though to me it seems as if he’s shouting, his voice fills up the whole store. I glance behind me at the woman by the magazines and am not the least bit surprised to find her looking back. “A fine woman,” Mr. Grosso is saying—my attention snaps back to him. He turns the milk over in his hands, looking for a price or UPC, or something. Just hurry up, I pray. Don’t tell me how great she was, please. I already know that. “A real shame. Sudden, too.”

  He looks up at me and I nod just because I think he expects it. “Yes, sir,” I say again. “Real sudden.” Ring up the milk, is that asking too much?

  Finally he pushes the glasses up on his nose as he peers at the carton in his hand and types the UPC number into the register hunt-and-peck style. Thank God I’m not buying a shitload of stuff—it’d take me years to get out of here. In the middle of the number, he stops and looks at me over the top of his glasses. “So which one are you?” he wants to know.