It was also because of Cathy Ann that we had to move away from our little bungalow on Pine Avenue. Two bedrooms weren’t enough now. Not with a boy and a girl. Had they chosen another boy, I would’ve not only had a brother to play and share a room with, but also we wouldn’t have had to move. But they picked the little blond monster and now we were packing up our belongings and transferring them across town to Chelsea Avenue where we unloaded them into a bigger house, a white two-story with three bedrooms and a big yard.
One of the first things my father did was hang an old tire from the tree in the front yard, something to keep me occupied. I spent hours at a time on that thing, seeing how high I could go, twisting it as much as possible and seeing how fast it would unwind and just how dizzy I could get. I loved that swing. Hell, I loved everything about that new house. The big rooms, the huge front and back porches, and especially the large closet in the downstairs hallway. It became my hiding spot, the place where I went to get away from Cathy Ann. I’d take an armload of army men and a flashlight into the tiny room, closing the door behind me. Sitting on the floor, I used the beam of a flashlight to set up a war scene and then quickly tear it apart, making bomb noises with my mouth. From the other side of the door came the pitter patter of Cathy Ann’s little feet as she ran through the house. I ignored her, playing with my toys as if she wasn’t even there and I was still an only child, which is the way it should’ve been.
As she got older, she figured out how to open the door and come inside the closet. She destroyed my war scenes before putting the army men in her mouth and slobbering all over them. She did the same thing whether I was in my room or outside. It didn’t matter how well I thought I was hidden, she always found me and interrupted my play time.
There was only so much of that I could take. In the beginning, I told my mother that she was bothering me. Her response was always the same.
“She loves you, Lester. She just wants to play with you.”
Well that didn’t matter to me. I wanted her to leave me alone. Seeing that my mother was no help, I decided to take care of it myself. From then on, whenever Cathy Ann bothered me—which was almost always—I would push her down and say mean things, like how ugly she was or how much I hated her. I’d smack her hands when she reached for my toys. If she picked up something of mine, I’d snatch it from her chubby little hands and tell her firmly, “No.” Sometimes I even smacked her on the butt, spanking her as if I was her parent.
All those things had virtually no effect on her. She was so damned stubborn.
She bit me several more times over the next few years. I tried to make her stop by biting her back. That did nothing except make her cry, which brought my mother running. When she saw the bite marks on Cathy Ann’s arm, my mother asked me what happened.
“She bit me so I bit her back,” I said casually, foolishly expecting her to agree with my punishment.
“You bit her back?” The look on my mother’s face was sheer confusion, as if she couldn’t understand what I was saying. “Why ever would you do such a thing?”
“Because I wanted to teach her not to bite.”
“And you thought the way to do that was by biting her?” She scooped up Cathy Ann and stroked her hair. The pouty little girl laid her head on my mother’s shoulder and sniffled, looking directly at me as she did it.
“Lester, don’t you ever bite your sister again. Do you hear me?”
She wasn’t firm with me often because I rarely got in trouble, but it broke my heart to hear the rough tone in her voice as she spoke to me then. After she left the room, carrying the sniveling Cathy Ann with her, I cried, feeling as though I’d been punched in the gut. That was the day I began to truly hate Cathy Ann.
I always wondered if maybe I would’ve handled my sister better if I’d had more friends, more people to keep me busy. But it wasn’t easy for me to make friends. Not with the red hair and the pale skin and the freckles. All those damn freckles. Every time I started feeling down about the spots that covered my body, my mother would tell me to be proud of them.
“Everywhere you have a freckle is where an angel kissed you before you were born,” she said.
Angel kisses, she called them. That was bullshit and I knew it, even back then. If they were anything, they were devil sprinkles. There was no way angels would be so cruel as to force me to live my entire life with those ugly spots all over my body.
Because of my appearance, I was the butt of many jokes, teased and tormented by kids whose feet were too big for their bodies or whose knees were too knobby or whose teeth were crooked. Kids who had plenty of their own physical defects but chose to seek out and humiliate me because of mine. I couldn’t really blame them. Shining the spotlight on my flaws meant the attention was off of them and theirs.
While making fun of me brought the other kids closer together, it left me lonely. No one wanted to be friends with the red-haired freak who was the laughing stock of the school, the kid who sometimes ate his boogers but never offered any to the rest of the class, the kid whose face looked like it had been accidentally thrown into the washer with bleach and came out all splotchy. Occasionally though, a kid would come along and for whatever reason, we’d hit it off and become friends. At least for a little while, until the kid either came to his senses or moved away.
When I was ten years old, I made a fort in the backyard. I’d spent a solid week getting it just the way I wanted it, cutting up and placing cardboard boxes and tree limbs, old sheets my mother had given me, and anything else I could find that would be of use. It was finally ready to reveal to my friend at the time, Joey. He came over after school one day to see it, and I couldn’t stop beaming. I was so proud of myself.
The two of us were sitting inside the fort with our scrawny legs stretched out in front of us as we talked and giggled. I heard her coming, dragging her feet through the grass and talking to herself. I cringed, but decided to try to ignore her. I didn’t want Joey to know just how big of a snot my sister could be.
I could see her shadow on the white sheet that served as the fort’s door, cast there by the afternoon sun. Her spindly legs, her dress flared above those knobby knees, and her stupid pigtails swinging in the breeze. I willed her to go away, to just turn around and go inside, but she didn’t. She just stood there.
Finally she said, “Lester?”
Joey stopped talking and looked at me. I rolled my eyes and shook my head. From the tin box where I kept all my valuables, I pulled the handful of special baseball cards I’d been dying to show him. Ignoring the adorable terror at the fort door, I passed the cards to Joey and began pointing out the reasons they were special.
“Lester, let me in.”
“Go away,” I said.
“No. I wanna play.”
“Go play by yourself.”
“No. I wanna play with you guys.”
“We don’t want you in here, now get lost.”
“No.” For a five year old girl, she was stubborn as a mule. “Let me in.”
Joey looked at me and grinned. I shook my head and whispered, “She’s so stupid. She doesn’t even know she could just come in. It’s just a sheet.”
He giggled. I didn’t. It wasn’t funny to me. After four years of putting up with her, I didn’t find it funny at all.
“I’m gonna tell Mom,” she sang.
Her threat made me angry. I’d been mad before, almost always at Cathy Ann, but never before had I been that angry. It was pure, raw fury mixed with full-blown hatred. “Go ahead and tell her, you dumb bitch,” I shouted.
“That’s it. I’m telling!” She turned and ran for the house, undoubtedly to spill the beans to our mother, who would surely chastise me and warn me that I was in for it when my father came home. The same thing had happened many times over the last year, and every time was because of Cathy Ann tattling on me.
I glanced at Joey, who sat staring at me with his mouth hung open. He’d clearly never seen such a thing, had probably never even h
eard a boy our age cuss like that. His family was comprised of faithful church-goers. Well it looked like he’d have something to pray about come Sunday.
“I’ve gotta go,” he suddenly said. Before I could protest, he was up and out of the fort, running down the street toward his house.
I didn’t move. I sat in the fort with my head in my hands and waited. The tears welled up in me, came to my eyes, but I didn’t let them spill. I swallowed them back down, determined to never cry because of that stupid little girl again. She wasn’t worth my tears. She was a bothersome pain in my ass and not worth a second of worry.
A minute later, my mother appeared at the fort. “Lester, get yourself out here right now.”
I pulled back the sheet and crawled out, squinting against the sunlight. I stood before my mother, staring up at her with a set jaw and steely eyes.
“What did you say to your sister?”
“Nothing.”
“What did you say to her?”
“Nothing. She said she was going to tell on me for not letting her in the fort and I said go ahead.”
She crossed her arms over her chest as Cathy Ann clung to her leg. “That’s all? That’s all you said?”
“That’s it.”
“She said you called her a bad name.”
“Well I didn’t.”
For several seconds, my mother and I said nothing, just stared into each other’s eyes, neither blinking. The way I saw it, whoever blinked first was the loser and that wasn’t going to be me.
After my mother blinked, she uncrossed her arms and said, “You just wait until your father gets home.” She grabbed Cathy Ann’s hand and marched her across the yard and into the house through the back door.
I crawled back into my fort and waited for my father.
My mother must’ve either believed that I hadn’t said anything to Cathy Ann or forgot about it because nothing else was said on the matter. We ate dinner like we always did without a word about what had happened. They didn’t even notice the hateful glares I shot toward the blond bother on the opposite side of the table.
That became my sister’s new nickname. The Blond Bother. Of course I never called her that around my parents. They wanted us to get along and love each other, which would’ve been fine and easy to do if they’d brought home a boy instead of the pesky and annoying girl who felt she just had to be around me all the time. I don’t even know why she wanted to be around me in the first place. We had nothing in common. My toys were for boys. They were men, action figures that went off to fight wars so her stupid girl dolls could buy more frilly outfits. My toys were cars and trucks that rolled through dirt and gravel. Unlike her imitation china dishes and her dumb baby dolls. There was nothing tying us together. Yet there she was, constantly underfoot.
Joey never came back to my house. In fact, he rarely talked to me at school after that. I had to make a new friend, which I did eventually.
My new friend Charlie came over a lot. At least two days a week, he got off the bus with me and we played until dinner time, when he had to walk the three blocks to his house. As usual, The Blond Bother was there, trying to hone in on my play time.
For a while, Charlie didn’t mind Cathy Ann bothering us. He had a sister at home so he knew the drill. But eventually it got to him, and he started saying things.
“Doesn’t she have any of her own friends she could play with?”
“Does she always have to be around us?”
“Why is she here?”
“Your sister is annoying.”
“Can’t your mom make her go play somewhere else?”
My sentiments exactly.
Though I complained to my mother, nothing was done. As usual, she defended The Blond Bother by saying she only wanted to be near me.
“You should let her play with you, Lester. She would really enjoy that.”
“But, Mom,” I protested. “She’s a girl. We do boy things. She’ll only get in the way.”
“Lester, please. There’s nothing you boys do that she can’t do too.”
To prove to my mother how wrong she was, I started doing the most boy-oriented things I could think of. Charlie and I rode our bikes as fast as we could, up and down the street in front of my house. Cathy Ann couldn’t keep up on her little bike, but she was right there, trying. We played in the dirt, getting as dirty as we could. We scooped up the dark earth by the handfuls, sometimes flinging it at each other. Sometimes we added water and had mud fights. I even threw fistfuls of mud directly at Cathy Ann’s face, coating her eyes and nose, matting her blond bangs with the thick goo. She laughed, but she didn’t leave. Chasing her with live, wiggling worms didn’t bother her either. She giggled and thought it was a game.
Undeterred by her strong will, I was determined to break her from wanting to be with my friend and me.
We began climbing the tall trees in our back yard. Being boys, we weren’t afraid to go all the way to the top. The Blond Bother tried her best to keep up with us, but she never made it far up the tree before her fear took over. She clung to the lowest branches, begging us to come back down.
“Lester, please,” she whined. “Play down here with me.”
“No. Go away.”
“I don’t want to. I want you to come down here. I’m scared.”
“Then go back inside and play with your stupid dolls.”
“My dolls aren’t stupid,” she said. “You’re stupid.”
“If I’m so stupid, how’d I get all the way up here?”
She didn’t say anything for a little while. Then she started again with, “Please, Lester. Come back down.”
Finally Charlie said to me, “Maybe we should go back down.”
“Nah. She’ll get tired and go away.” I knew that wouldn’t happen, but I didn’t want to go back down. If I went back down, that would mean she won and I wasn’t about to let her win.
“Lester, please,” she begged.
“I don’t think she’s gonna go away,” Charlie said, staring down at her through the tangled mass of limbs and leaves.
I felt the rage building in me again, all of it directed at her. If she wasn’t there, I could play with my friend in peace. We could climb all the trees we wanted, have all the mud fights we wanted, do anything we wanted without listening to her whine.
“We better go down before she cries.” Charlie started down, carefully maneuvering from the highest branches to the lowest.
I wanted to tell him to stop, to stay at the top with me, but it was too late. He was already on the move. Left with no other choice, I followed quickly and angrily, gripping the branches much harder than necessary on my way.
On the lowest of the branches, Charlie carefully worked his way around Cathy Ann. I raced down the branches and didn’t bother trying to go around her. I went straight at her, wanted to punch her in the mouth and knock out her stupid teeth.
The Blond Bother was sitting on the lowest branch, legs dangling over one side while her butt hung off the other. She had one hand on the tree trunk, the other on the limb beside her.
As I approached, Cathy Ann’s eyes lit up. She’d gotten her way and was happy about it, almost gloating that she’d won. She smiled at me and asked, “Will you help me down?”
“Sure,” I said.
Quickly, I put both my hands on her chest and pushed. She let out a screech as she went backward over the tree limb, legs and arms flailing as she fell to the unforgiving ground below.
From the other side of the tree trunk, I heard Charlie gasp.
I watched as Cathy Ann fell, watched as she hit the earth below, and waited for the crying to begin, for the threats of her telling our mother what I’d done. But there were none. No sound. No movement. Nothing from The Blond Bother.
“Oh my god,” breathed Charlie. “Oh my god.”
“Cathy Ann,” I called down. “Are you okay?”
Charlie jumped down from the tree and ran over to Cathy Ann. He dropped to his knees and stared at her
. His arm slowly reached out as if he was going to touch her, but he didn’t. Instead, he pulled his arm back and looked up at me.
“I think she’s dead,” he said.
My mouth went dry. Was it true? Had I killed her?
Her blond pigtails lay limply on the ground beside her head, a head which was at an awkward ankle to the rest of her body. The pink dress she wore was hiked up, revealing the pink panties beneath it. Looking down on her, I realized just how fragile she really was. Small and thin, so easily broken.
I came down out of the tree and went over to Cathy Ann. Unlike Charlie, I wasn’t afraid to touch her. I put my fingertips to her neck and then realized I didn’t know how to feel for a pulse. Either that or there wasn’t one to feel. I put my hand flat on her chest, over her heart, and waited to feel a thump from inside. I felt nothing. I flattened myself out on the ground and focused on her chest, trying to see if there was a rise and fall with each breath she took. There was no rise, no fall, because Cathy Ann wasn’t breathing.
“You better go tell your mom,” Charlie said. His voice had already taken on the funereal tone that people often used to speak around the dead. Immediately, I hated that tone. I couldn’t stand the false empathy and the thick sorrow that it carried. But he was right. I needed to go tell my mother that her daughter was dead.
She didn’t take the news well. She was cooking dinner when I walked into the house to tell her what had happened in the back yard. It was a regular evening ritual that was about to be interrupted in the most awful of ways.
“Mom?”
“What is it, Lester?” She faced away from me, her attention trained on the food on the stove. Pork chops frying in the pan, potatoes boiling in a pot.
“You need to come outside.”
“I can’t right now. I’m busy. What do you need?”
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