by Cote Smith
My mother sat in between Rick and me, so I could have the only working seat belt. After we got on the road, Rick put his arm around my mother and pinched my neck. “I thought testicles traveled in twos. Where’s your bro?”
“At home,” my mother said.
“Doing what?”
“Waiting.”
“Oh, I get it. You’re bonding with the baby,” Rick said, and flicked my other ear, much harder than my brother ever would.
“Cut it out!” I yelled.
“Whoa, look at this guy. Look at how upset he gets when he’s away from his brother. Do not separate the two.”
My mother put her head back and closed her eyes. “Rick, my head is killing me.”
Rick sniffled. At the golf course he always complained about his allergies, saying you had to be pretty stupid to make someone work a job they were allergic to. Then he’d laugh and say, but hey, that’s the government for you.
“You didn’t let me finish,” Rick said. “I was gonna say him and his bro are lucky. I had a brother growing up, but we weren’t thick as thieves like them two.”
I tried to imagine a younger Rick, a Rick with a brother. I pictured the two of them riding around in Rick’s cart, chucking water balloons at little girls and laughing.
“We were always at each other’s throat. My dad used to throw shit at us, we got so loud.” He sniffled again, wiped his nose on his arm. “My mom said we would grow out of it, but we never did. I hated my brother and I still do. I don’t know where he is, and I don’t care. If I saw him today, all he’d have to do is grin that shit-eating grin and my hate would be just the same.”
We took a right at a stoplight, onto Limit Street. When we were a couple blocks away we saw a police car’s reds and blues lighting up a family’s driveway. An officer was talking to a father on the front step. A boy and a girl watched from behind the screen door, clutching their pillows as if they were precious treasure.
“Did your brother visit you in prison?” I said, and I could feel my mother open her eyes, alarmed at my question.
“No,” Rick said. “Nobody did. That shit only happens in movies.”
“What about your parents?”
“You don’t have to answer that,” my mother said to Rick. “He’ll be quiet now. Won’t you?”
Yes, I said, and we were silent the rest of the way. I put my cheek to the window and shut my eyes, not sleeping but not thinking either, until I heard the turn signal click and felt the familiar dip of our apartment’s lot. My mother pushed me out, and we walked halfway to our building’s door before she told me to stop.
“You didn’t thank him, did you? Run back and thank him. Hurry.” I asked her if I had to, and she said yes. He helped us, didn’t he? Since when do we not thank those who lend us a hand?
I ran to Rick’s car, idling in the parking lot. He was watching us, waiting to see that we got in safe.
“Thank you,” I said.
“Wasn’t a thing,” Rick said. He put the car in drive, but kept his foot on the brake. He leaned his head out the window and looked past me, at my mother. He sank back into his seat, gripped the steering wheel tight, like it was a balloon that would fly into the sky if he ever let it go.
“You’ve got a good mother,” he said. “You like being with her, and so do I. But if you think she’d ever visit you or your brother in prison, you’re dead wrong.” He turned up the radio, reached for a seat belt that wasn’t there. “Nobody wants to see living proof of the mistakes they’ve made.”
nine
THE STRANGER STORY was ruined by the storm. It had slipped my mind until we stepped inside our building, the halls and stairwell buzzing with lights and things unseen. But as we made our way up the stairs, I remembered what we were returning to, my seething brother, waiting with closed fists for me, the liar. I pushed my hand into my pocket, so I could have the editorial ready to show him before he pummeled me. Here, I would say, hands up in surrender. Don’t shoot. Don’t shoot. In reality, what I pulled out of my pocket wasn’t paper. It was a watered-down wad, a spitball that came apart in my hand when I tried to unfold it. I sighed. My evidence, my chance at forgiveness, was gone.
None of that mattered, though, at least not right away, because when we opened the door to our apartment, there was no brother. No lights were on, and when my mother called my brother’s name, all we heard in return was the hum of the fan. I didn’t wait for my mother to bolt our door and find a place for her purse and keys. I went into the living room to see if my brother had made camp there. He hadn’t. A blanket was in the right spot but there was no brother. The first place my mother looked was our room, but he wasn’t in there, either.
“He’s probably just hiding,” I said, to punish us for leaving him for so long, coming back empty-handed. But I knew what I said wasn’t true. I could tell my brother wasn’t here. He was somewhere with Chris. Where, I didn’t know. For now, it didn’t matter. Because I wouldn’t tell my mother anything. The next half hour our apartment was a one-man movie, starring me as the world’s biggest liar.
“Show me all his spots,” my mother said. “Show me where he could be.”
I followed and helped her search, acting surprised when my brother wasn’t behind the clothes in my mother’s closet, or cocooned in her curtains.
“I don’t know,” I said. “He should be here.”
While my mother searched the rest of the apartment, looking in desperate, silly places (inside the oven, under the kitchen sink), I opened the sliding glass door to let the air in. I gazed in the pool’s direction and pictured the way it would look now. The automatic lights would have kicked on, giving the water a warm, sugary glow. All the chairs would be empty of belongings, except maybe one.
My mother came into the living room and asked what I was doing. I should be looking for my brother, she said. What kind of brother was I? She told me to recheck every spot I could think of.
“We have to keep searching, OK?” she said, and went to the phone. She picked it up, returned it to the wall. “I’m going to check with the neighbors. You stay here and search. Don’t go anywhere.”
I said OK, but when she left I stayed by the sliding door. I imagined what it would be like to swim at night, to break the first pool rule. You would want to stay in the water, I thought, where it was warm. The sun wouldn’t be there to comfort you, if you were just a spectator, a lowly stableboy. If you were on the diving board, you’d better know what move you wanted to do. You wouldn’t want to spend too much time up there, exposed, where the air was free to get you.
I dazed off until I thought I heard a splash, so soft I wasn’t sure if I had imagined it. I tried to get a better view of the pool. I slid open the screen door all the way and stepped onto our porch. Another splash. This one was louder, deeper. I stepped up on the porch’s lower rail, leaned over the edge. I’m so close, I thought. Just a little higher. If I could get on the top rail, I could see it all.
“What are you doing, dummy?” a voice said.
I jumped down and turned around. It was my brother. He was not in his swimming suit. He had the same clothes on as before. He was dry, and I wanted to hug him.
“Mom is going to kill you,” I said.
My brother smiled. “She’d never get away with it. Not in this city.”
“Where were you?”
“You better get inside before Mom comes back,” he said, and went inside and lay down in front of the fan. I sat on the couch, arms crossed.
“Where were you?”
“Nowhere.”
“You’re lying.”
“You’re right. What can I say, runs in the family.”
He closed his eyes like he wanted to rest. As if wherever Chris had taken him, the two had traveled long and far. To what secret kingdom, I knew he would not say.
“I read a thing about the Stranger,” I said.
My brother breathed deeply, his mouth open, and at first I thought he was asleep. “So?”
“So don’t you want to know?”
“Know what?”
My mother returned. I heard her check our room again, then call from the hall, asking if I’d had any luck. I didn’t answer. I let her step into the living room and see the scene herself. That’s what I would have wanted, if I were her. I wouldn’t want anyone to ruin the ending.
Her face twitched like it couldn’t be sure of what it was seeing. After the shock passed, she ran to my brother. She told him to stand up so that she could give him a hug.
“Where have you been?” she said.
My brother pushed her arms away. “I waited for you. I stayed up and waited.”
I watched his face closely, to see if it flickered when he started to lie. I couldn’t tell my mother my brother’s secrets, but maybe I could give her a clue.
“I’m sorry,” my mother said, and she told him what happened, about the van and about Sandy. “But where were you when we came home? You weren’t here, were you? As soon as I opened the door, I could tell the apartment was one boy short.”
“I waited as long as I could.” He put his head down. He wasn’t answering the question.
“Stop ducking the question,” I said. “He’s ducking the question.”
“You need to stay out of it,” my mother said, though she seemed to take my point. “You were supposed to stay in your room.”
My brother sat back down and faced the fan, turning his back to my mother like some proud villain. “I waited. But no one ever came to get me. I thought you forgot.”
I rolled my eyes, mumbled, Give me a break.
“Then I got thirsty in there. So I came out for a glass of water.” He paused there, either for effect or to give himself time to form his lie more fully. “That’s when I heard the siren.”
“Siren?” my mother said.
“Yes, I thought there was a tornado or something, so I went down to the laundry room, like you told us.”
My mother looked at me. We had been outside for most of the night. If there was a siren, we would have heard it.
“We didn’t hear anything,” my mother said. “Are you telling me the truth?”
“I don’t know,” my brother said. “I don’t know why you didn’t hear anything, but that’s what happened.” The corner of his lip dipped a bit, almost forming a smile. “I swear.”
His lip stayed dipped. He was lying, and he knew he would get away with it.
* * *
Our dad picked us up on Friday again, and again he was early. He came to the door and this time our mother was still around, though she had already started getting ready for work. Still, she moved aside when our dad politely asked if he could come in, and the two sat at the kitchen table sipping cups of coffee in silence until he asked about the van breaking down again.
“How’d you know about that?” my mother said.
My dad coughed, took a sip of his coffee. “I have my sources.”
My mother didn’t mention anything about my brother, his disappearance. Maybe she didn’t want my dad to worry. Or maybe, like me, she wanted to wait until the investigation was closed before making any judgment, releasing information to the public. But she did tell my dad to keep an eye on my brother. That he’d been acting out.
“Is that right?” my dad said. He took out a check, already made out to my mother. For the van, he said, and whatever else. My mother looked like she got socks for Christmas.
“Did you hear what I said?”
“Yes,” he said. “Don’t look so happy.”
“How’d you know how much it costs?”
“I owe you,” he said. “I want to owe you.”
“Just watch him,” my mother said. “OK? And don’t expect anything in return.” She magneted the check to our fridge, beneath a drawing my brother had done in school and our electric bill. Both were stamped Outstanding. “How’s work? Anything on you-know-who?”
“I don’t want to talk about work,” my dad said.
“Then don’t.”
“Nothing’s going to happen, Ag. Everyone thinks this guy’s gonna come after their family, but that’s never the case. I’m sure he couldn’t care less.”
“Yeah, but what about your job?”
“That’s my problem. Nobody else’s.”
My brother stomped sleepy-eyed into the kitchen with his weekend bag, asked if we were going or what. My dad told him to wait his turn to talk, but my mother was already on her way to the front door.
“You’ll pick them up before church?” my dad said, hanging in the doorway as my brother and I ran into the hall.
“In the morning. Yes.”
“Hey, if the van isn’t fixed, you know I can give you a lift on Sunday. I’m available for rides, or whatever else you need.”
“I appreciate that,” my mother said. “But the check is enough for now. I don’t want you doing anything you don’t want to do.”
I looked at my dad. Her words hurt him, but he didn’t take us and walk away. He stood in the open door and rebounded with a smile.
“Lucky for you I’m becoming a new man. All I do now are things I don’t want.”
“Ah,” my mother said, “so you’ve been rehabilitated.”
“Yep, the system works. Ask anybody at the station.”
My mother looked at me, though I don’t know why. She kissed the top of my head, rubbed my brother’s back. “I just wonder if it’s one of those things,” she said. “Where it’s meet the new, same as the old.”
* * *
After we grilled out for dinner we didn’t go to the video store. Our dad came downstairs in jean shorts and a polo shirt with our city’s emblem on it. Holstered on his hip, for everyone to see, was his gun.
“Get in the car,” my dad said. “I want to show you something.”
He drove us out to a part of the city I wasn’t familiar with. We sped past the fenceless baseball fields and the city’s water tower, the trailer park where no one owned a shirt. My brother and I kept our eyes out the window, watched the falling sun flicker through the trees. Eventually we asked our dad where we were going, but were glad when he wouldn’t tell us, when he said sorry, it’s a secret.
We pulled into a small, loose-gravel parking lot packed with squad cars. Again we asked where we were. He waved us on and said to follow and be quiet. We walked up a hill on a worn dirt path, me trailing my brother, my brother my dad. When we got to the top, we saw a crowd of policemen standing around with their guns out. Some were cleaning their clips, others practicing taking aim. In the field behind them was a row of shadow-shaped targets, hovering like ghosts.
“Stay close,” our dad said, leading us to the other officers. Out of the seven policemen, only three were in uniform, but they all had bulletproof vests strapped to their chests. Alan came up to my dad, grinning. He asked my dad how he was doing, and if he was going to come out to throw darts tonight. He didn’t say anything about seeing us the other day, whether or not they caught the burglar.
“Can’t,” my dad said, “got the boys.”
“Bring them along!” Alan joked. “We could always use another DD.” He patted me on my shoulder and it stung. “Seriously, though, we’ve missed you these past couple weekends. And we’re not the only ones. I know a couple ladies who put out an APB.”
My dad stepped away from Alan and whistled for everyone’s attention. The officers gathered around him, holstering their guns, and waited in silence for my dad to speak. My brother and I stood at my dad’s side, like we were his best lieutenants.
“The Chief couldn’t be here tonight. He had a council meeting with the mayor. But because we’re all trained professionals…,” my dad said, and paused to let his men snicker, “… I know you all will be on your best behavior. Don’t make a fool of me in front of my boys, OK?” He put a hand on our backs and I felt my face redden. “All right, let’s line up.”
Once everyone was in the proper place, lined up against the wooden railing, my dad explained how the drill would go. Eac
h officer would empty two clips. The first would be freehand. Upon my dad’s order, the officers would aim the gun at the shadowy bad guy and fire like it was any regular daytime shootout. But for the second clip, the officers would have to wait until the sun set. At that point my dad would give a signal, and the officers would flick on their black flashlights to light up the dark target, the unseen threat.
Our dad came over with two pairs of plastic earmuffs. “Take these,” he said. I put the earmuffs on, but they were too big and kept sliding off my head, onto my neck. “I want you guys to watch from over there,” he said, pointing to a splintery wooden bench, far away from the railing.
“That looks crappy,” my brother said. “Why can’t we stay by you?”
“These are live rounds.”
“So?”
“Listen, you’re not even supposed to be out here to begin with. But the Chief’s gone and I thought you’d might like to see this, see your old dad in action.” My dad blinked his eyes, waiting for us to say something like cool or oh yeah. “You know, if your mom found out, she’d probably kill me. You’d have a dead dad on your hands.”
He walked back to his men, the sun blinding him into a silhouette. I thought about his words, a dead dad on my hands. I imagined a miniature version of my dad. An action figure, small in my palm, the sad ending to one of my brother’s warped plots.
We sat on the bench and watched our dad get everyone in position, help them settle in their stances. When everyone was in their proper place, he shouted, “Ready!” and the officers raised their guns, pointed them at the targets. For a second, I felt bad for the targets, the black, faceless blobs. They weren’t holding a gun or a knife, or anyone hostage. What had they done? What was their crime? But before I could say anything, my dad yelled fire and, again, it was too late.
The sound wasn’t the sound from our stupid movies. It was a long-lasting pop, one that blasted my ears and rattled my chest, making me feel hollow. It was the sound from the Stranger tape, and with it came everything I tried not to think about. I immediately put my hands to my head, pressing the earmuffs as hard as possible to shut out both thoughts and sound. But this trapped the noise inside me, so that the booms circled from my head to my heart in one continuous terrible loop.