drops her head back down and I stand there and I wish she’d love me but I know it would be like before with Leah. This random moment. I’d make her sick, she’d hate me, I’d cry for days. So I watch her fall asleep and she’s perfect.
I GO INTO the bathroom and Brett’s laid down sideways on the vanity, arms in one sink, feet in the other, torso across the flat middle. The long mirror at his back. I stare at him for a long time there in the sinks, watching him breathe and his breath is slow. His face flushed red. Stubble around his cheeks and mouth. And he’s got this small stream of blood running from his right nostril. It’s slow and dried on his upper lip. I take tissue and wipe his nose, his upper lip. Wait for the blood to come back. And when it doesn’t I bend down, put one arm under his legs and the other beneath his shoulders. Pick him up. He puts his arms around my neck, rubs his head into my chest. Leaves a red stain on my shirt. I take him into a bedroom, lay him down. Pull off his shoes. Put the pillow beneath his head. A trash can beside his face. I sit down against the wall and watch him. He stirs, cracks one eye and looks over at me.
Love you, man, he says.
Yeah, I love you, I say and then he’s sleeping again. Lamplight in one corner of the bedroom. The tissue still in my hands, I take a thumb and run it over the dried blood. Against the wall I watch my brother and I know now even more that I want to be with him at Clemson, be like we were in the picture. I decide then that I’m going to go to Clemson and I’ll pledge his fraternity. Even though something inside thinks it’s wrong, I make it quiet. I hold the tissue and watch my brother breathe until my eyes close.
I GET ACCEPTED to Clemson in early May. Brett comes home. Moves to the beach. I stay at my parents’. To earn money, I say. But really I don’t want to leave yet. I tell myself that I need the time because it’s all I’ve got left.
I take a job delivering flowers. To hospitals. Funeral homes. And all summer it’s me and death and sickness, opening the doors of hospital rooms, an old man or woman alone with the tubes and the machines clicking beside them and the smell like urine and disinfectant, I take the flowers, the vases, the cards, I place them on the tables beside the beds and leave.
At the funeral homes I pull up to the back, open the door for deliveries and it’s always caskets and flowers and pink carpet and old wood.
——
IN EARLY AUGUST, Brett and I leave for Clemson. On the interstate, fields fade to red clay and broken rock. Small towns named Pender, Union, and Newberry along the way. Every so often we pass crosses made from wood or PVC pipe and they’re topped with weathered plastic flowers. Skid marks nearby. A crumpled shoulder guard. The crosses are barely visible, placed at the edge of woods next to a scarred tree. Sometimes a name on a wooden sign attached to the cross. Sometimes none.
I am trailing my brother closely and my car rattles when it hits sixty-five. Brett doesn’t look in his rearview every so often like I wish he would to make sure I’m still here.
I KEEP THINKING about what Brett knows, how he’s leading me somewhere I need to be, and I feel like I’m doing the right thing. For a while I play the Clash really loud and it makes me feel good.
After I play four CD’s I turn on the radio. A NASCAR race is on and I don’t even like car races but it’s nice to listen to the voice and the occasional hum of cars. But the cars make me think about the crosses on the side of the road and how small they are and I can’t stop and I shake when I think about the place I’m going. Even though I think it’s a good move, I know I’m carrying this thing with me that will fuck me sooner or later. I clench my mouth and hold my breath, concentrate on the road. Clemson is seventy miles away but I can already see it waiting for me.
Part Two
The Star and Crescent shall
I GO INTO the bathroom and Brett’s laid down sideways on the vanity, arms in one sink, feet in the other, torso across the flat middle. The long mirror at his back. I stare at him for a long time there in the sinks, watching him breathe and his breath is slow. His face flushed red. Stubble around his cheeks and mouth. And he’s got this small stream of blood running from his right nostril. It’s slow and dried on his upper lip. I take tissue and wipe his nose, his upper lip. Wait for the blood to come back. And when it doesn’t I bend down, put one arm under his legs and the other beneath his shoulders. Pick him up. He puts his arms around my neck, rubs his head into my chest. Leaves a red stain on my shirt. I take him into a bedroom, lay him down. Pull off his shoes. Put the pillow beneath his head. A trash can beside his face. I sit down against the wall and watch him. He stirs, cracks one eye and looks over at me.
Love you, man, he says.
Yeah, I love you, I say and then he’s sleeping again. Lamplight in one corner of the bedroom. The tissue still in my hands, I take a thumb and run it over the dried blood. Against the wall I watch my brother and I know now even more that I want to be with him at Clemson, be like we were in the picture. I decide then that I’m going to go to Clemson and I’ll pledge his fraternity. Even though something inside thinks it’s wrong, I make it quiet. I hold the tissue and watch my brother breathe until my eyes close.
I GET ACCEPTED to Clemson in early May. Brett comes home. Moves to the beach. I stay at my parents’. To earn money, I say. But really I don’t want to leave yet. I tell myself that I need the time because it’s all I’ve got left.
I take a job delivering flowers. To hospitals. Funeral homes. And all summer it’s me and death and sickness, opening the doors of hospital rooms, an old man or woman alone with the tubes and the machines clicking beside them and the smell like urine and disinfectant, I take the flowers, the vases, the cards, I place them on the tables beside the beds and leave.
At the funeral homes I pull up to the back, open the door for deliveries and it’s always caskets and flowers and pink carpet and old wood.
——
IN EARLY AUGUST, Brett and I leave for Clemson. On the interstate, fields fade to red clay and broken rock. Small towns named Pender, Union, and Newberry along the way. Every so often we pass crosses made from wood or PVC pipe and they’re topped with weathered plastic flowers. Skid marks nearby. A crumpled shoulder guard. The crosses are barely visible, placed at the edge of woods next to a scarred tree. Sometimes a name on a wooden sign attached to the cross. Sometimes none.
I am trailing my brother closely and my car rattles when it hits sixty-five. Brett doesn’t look in his rearview every so often like I wish he would to make sure I’m still here.
I KEEP THINKING about what Brett knows, how he’s leading me somewhere I need to be, and I feel like I’m doing the right thing. For a while I play the Clash really loud and it makes me feel good.
After I play four CD’s I turn on the radio. A NASCAR race is on and I don’t even like car races but it’s nice to listen to the voice and the occasional hum of cars. But the cars make me think about the crosses on the side of the road and how small they are and I can’t stop and I shake when I think about the place I’m going. Even though I think it’s a good move, I know I’m carrying this thing with me that will fuck me sooner or later. I clench my mouth and hold my breath, concentrate on the road. Clemson is seventy miles away but I can already see it waiting for me.
Part Two
The Star and Crescent shall
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