Tyler is close to twice my size, standing on that grimy old boat, holding the day’s catch. We almost look like twins, except my height and Tyler’s haunted look of age. In fact, Aunts and Uncles usually say we look identical but that I was the twin that shrunk in the wash. Looking up at my eighteen-year-old brother his shoulders are broad, manly and his chest is thrust out, proud of the large bass he holds. But his face betrays him, unshaven and rigid, the smile is unnatural. His hair unkempt, falls over his forlorn, shadowed eyes. The ups and downs of the night have left him exhausted.
We pose on the small deck of that terribly kept boat, held together by duct tape and luck. Old netting is strewn across the sides and catches our feet at a final attempt of their forgotten job. A mixture of bait and sea water sits in the corners staining the white paint. Rust has begun to encroach, no longer fought off by the boat’s captain. Tyler has given up on it, and the boat now shows what his smile tries to hide.
As the camera shutter snaps shut Tyler sighs and his shoulder slump. He knows the shutter is not all closed off to him. The day is over and it is time to go home. A tear rolls down his face, cutting a line through the dirt of his unwashed face. Mom and Dad will be waiting, I will go home, but Tyler already is. I’m to young to know why; all I know is my brother no longer lives with me. And for that last moment we stand beside each other, as two brothers always will.
Fishing Trip: May 29, 2007
Fireworks: July 4, 1956
The family is all outside in our backyard talking about work, their houses or, in the case of Uncle Johnny, another one of those quick-fix ideas he’s swindling grand mom. They all migrate towards the back of the yard where Lois set up all the food, but in the front of me is Michael holding tight his bright red ball. He never goes anywhere without that ball, along with Lois’s protest because he tends to break things. But that’s my boy, the future pitcher for the New York Yankees.
The sun is blinding or the heat is making the air shimmer because Michael’s face seems hazy, almost obscured from sight. You can make out his hair, cut short and parted to the side, an obvious sign Lois had gotten to it earlier trying to make him presentable for the family. His cheeks are a faint pink and freckled giving him a boyish quality that will probably last him his whole life. But his smile has disappeared, the one I called his fighter’s smile because he had just lost his first tooth. And those clear blue eyes the one’s that will drive the girls wild when he grows up, you can’t see them at all.
He stands restless next to me, fidgeting, excited to take part in the night’s festivities. He jumps up and down and swings his arms back and forth, calling to the family to get ready. Was it all the excitement that he wanted my attention, or maybe just another accident Lois always feared? That little red ball leaves Michaels hands flying straight for the just lit firework he had picked out on his own. It flies past his face and bursts blue and white for the Yankees over our neighbor’s yard. He falls to the ground, clutching his face, screaming out for Lois. No girl will ever fall for those eyes, he will never look down the pitcher’s mound of Yankee’s Stadium, you can’t see his eyes; but I always will.
Disappointment
“You had to open the window and ruin my hard work,” my father tells me.
Standing in my doorway, screaming at me as if I had committed a great atrocity, my father glares down at me. My shoulders slump forward as I sit on the edge of my bed, partially because of the lecture but mainly because of my bad back. As I grew up my spine had curved giving me both scoliosis and kyphosis. It usually doesn’t hurt me unless I am very tired or very hot. That was why I had opened the window, to cool my room down, but my father would not listen.
When I was ten years old I remembered him yelling at me. I had spent most of the day riding my bike, but as I placed it in the garage I had scratched his car. The scratch was nothing big, located at the bottom of the side bumper I assured myself he would never see it. Later that night as I cowered in my room, gripping my pillow, a loud slam and my name yelled out stopped my heart. My father thundered into my room, grabbed me by the neck, and pulled me into the garage. Now, my father borders on obsessive to an unhealthy degree when it comes to his car. This is a man that can yell, red-faced at a three year old for putting a finger on the window and making a smudge.
Leaving me cowering against the garage wall, my father returned into the house and came back with a notebook of great importance to me. Filled with hundreds of Pokemon cards, some worth quite a lot, my father began shaking them out of their protective covers. Stepping on a few for good measure with his favorite red slippers, my father told me if I did not respect his things he would do the same for mine, and then left telling me to clean up the mess. Crying and shaking from fear, I picked up the cards thinking only two thoughts. One, that the breeze coming from the garage door felt good against my back, and two, that my father must love his car a lot more than he did me.
“You have nothing to say, nothing at all? It’s like you don’t care, like you’re some sort of sociopath,” my father tells me.
Months before, having come home for winter break, I lay in my bed asleep. Someone sitting on my bed and pulling at the covers woke me up. It was early morning, and being the weekend I did not want to be up, so I paid no attention to them. Nudged a few times and asked if I was asleep I grunted my reply. I turned over to see my father sitting there in shorts and his favorite red slippers. Not wanting to talk or even see the man, I turned back over and closed my eyes.
The day before he had yelled at me, scolded me and said terrible things, simply because he thought I had made a wrong choice. In all my life I have never gotten into that much trouble, my parents never grounded me once; but that was over. The day before he told me that he owned me and because he paid for my college, I would live under his rules until after graduation. He told me that my life for the next four years was to be focused on schooling and nothing else, no relationship; nothing.
As I lay there holding on to my pillow, hoping a cool breeze would help my aching back, I refused to answer him. He tried to get me to understand what he did was out of love and that he meant the best for my future. He told me he did not want me to be upset or depressed but I had brought this upon myself. Evidently when I was older I would understand, but until then I had to trust the man that ended my life. I was filled with anger and hate, and I would not give him the satisfaction of a reply.
“You can leave this house if you don’t want to be part of this family,” my father tells me.
As I lower my head, I notice my father is still wearing his favorite red slippers. I can almost see the green bow I had placed on them years ago on Christmas Eve. Sitting on my pillow on the floor beside the tree Christmas morning, I can feel the cold air wrap around me as I finished opening presents. Reviewing everything I had gotten that year, I looked under the tree to see the unopened presents. Each was my father’s, who was working that Christmas at the hospital. As a child it seemed unfair, Christmas was a time for the family but year after year my father requested it for his holiday coverage.
I had picked out the soft, red slippers on my own, and felt proud having been able to pay for them with my own money. But they would remain there until the next day, where he would open them without me, returning home early to see his presents under the tree. I brought my legs up to my chin and shivered as a cold breeze wrapped around my back. I would wish every year he would be there that Christmas, but every year he seemed not to be part of the family; exempt.
“He has become such a disappointment,” he tells my mother.
