Once Upon a Time

March 3, 2007

Today was my first time to skip class. When I stumbled off the bus this morning, I went looking for Indy. I found him sitting at a senior table with his girlfriend who seemed oddly familiar in looks. I drew him aside and asked him if we could talk. He smiled and nodded and told me to meet him at his car at eight. I grimly agreed. I didn’t really want to miss first period—but we ended up watching a movie, so whatever.

I walked out the front door and strolled right up to Indy’s car, acting like I knew what I was doing. I stood awkwardly at the car and waited for Indy to come. I didn’t have to wait too long. About three minutes later, he came jogging out of the school and grinned at me. He jingled the keys in his hand.
          “Let’s go!” He said.
          “Wait, wait! Go where?”
          He gave me a puzzled look. “I dunno yet, but wherever I take you, you’ll have another piece of the puzzle.” He frowned, watching my expressions. “That’s what you want, isn’t it? An explanation?”
          I nodded. “Yeah…How’d you know?”
          He sighed. “You don’t just agree to skip class with your long lost brother unless you have a damn good reason. Seeing how you were so hard to convince, and maybe you still aren’t, an explanation is well deserved,” He cleared his throat, “Plus, I’d be a jerk not to explain.” He flashed that charming smile of his, the sun glinting off his white teeth. “Shall we?”
          I nodded. “Let’s go.”
          We climbed into his Mazda and he started the car.
          “So,” he asked, pulling the car away, “what’s your first question?”
          I drew in a big breath. What did I want to know the most? What was the most urgent?
          “Will I get in trouble for skipping school?”
          He laughed. “Only if you get caught.”
          “What?!” I exclaimed.
          Indy roared with laughter. “I’m kidding! You’ll be fine.” He glanced at me. “What’s your question, for real?”
          “Why are you just now telling me about this?”
          He sucked on his lower lip a moment. “Have you ever seen me around, Micky?”
          I shook my head.
          He nodded. “Because I’ve been going to another school. I just transferred here this semester.”
          “Meaning, you didn’t know I was here until two days ago.”
          He nodded. “I was hoping that you’d be here. I was fairly certain that Aunt Linda and Uncle Stewart still lived around here, but I haven’t spoken with either of them for eleven years.”
          “When you ran away?”
          He nodded. “Very good.”
          “Why did you run away?”
          He sighed and stared at the road ahead of us. “I…needed some time to be alone. I had to straighten out some things. Plus, you had just lost both of your parents. I decided that you would be better off if you just recouped on your own, without me. I wanted you to…live a somewhat normal life.” He glanced at me. “Er, at least have a chance to live a somewhat normal life.”
          I frowned. “What do you mean?”
          He squinted against the bright sun. “What do you remember about me?”
          I shook my head. “Nothing really. Except this dream that I keep having.”
          He narrowed his eyes suspiciously. “What about?”
          “It’s the day when Mom died and Dad got arrested,” I said. It felt weird acknowledging that we shared parents. After all, I barely knew the guy.
          He gave me a confused look. “How’d you…?”
          “I found a journal that I kept when I was younger. I was like three.”
          His green eyes widened and recognition flooded them. “A journal?”
          I nodded. “Yeah…it’s got lots of stuff in it I don’t understand.”
          He gave me that small secretive smile again and said, “Don’t worry. You will. All in good time…”
          I coughed into my sleeve and stared out the window. “Where are we going?”
          Indy shrugged. “I’m not sure yet…I was thinking of taking you to see her grave.”
          “Whose?”
          He turned his round emerald eyes to my sapphires. “Helen Brant’s.”
          “Is that my mother?”
          He nodded. “Best woman to ever walk this earth if you ask me.”
          I frowned. “Helen Brant? Brant? That means ‘Brant’ is my last name, too?”
          Indy nodded. “Yes, ma’am, you are Michelle Christina Brant, and I am Indiana Brian Brant.”
          I snickered. “Brian Brant…”
          He bristled. “Brian is our father’s name.” He said thickly.
          “What happened to him, Indy?” I asked, curiously leaning toward the dashboard and watching the cars behind us in the side view mirror. “What happened to our Dad?”
          Indy chewed him bottom lip. “He was sent to jail.”
          “I know,” I said impatiently, “Why?”
          He sighed. “He was arrested for sexually abusing you.”
          I choked on my tongue. “I was only three!”
          He turned away, lips set in a grim line. “It happens,” he said venomously.
          I watched his facial expression change from anger to something uglier. “What did he do to you?”
          Indy turned his face to mine, allowing for his twisted demeanor to imprint into my mind. He replied with repulsion, “He spawned me.”
          I was taken aback.
          “I hate him,” he continued, “because he couldn’t keep his fucking dick in his own pants and spawned me…the son he never wanted to have…the son he never meant to have.”
          I tentatively placed a hand on his shoulder. “There must be some misunderstanding.”
          He grinded his teeth together and said curtly, “You would wish that.”
          I huffed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
          His face relaxed into a small smile. “You are the splitting image of your mother—you have her eyes, her nose, her voice, her compassion, her love…She only wanted the best.”
          I chewed my cheek. “Oh.”
          Indy cleared his throat, pulled the car into a parking space and said, “Here we are…the Gibbs Memorial Cemetery.”
          My jaw dropped. I remembered this place.

Until this point, I hadn’t even recalled being to the cemetery to visit my mom’s grave. Aunt Linda and Uncle Stewart never take me there. But the moment I read the sign and saw the trees and tombstones, the memory jolted through me like lightning. Let me tell you the memory…

         A familiar pressure rested on my shoulder, and I felt cool fingers curl themselves around my collarbone. I looked up into the eyes of the cool fingers’s owner. I held my aunt’s gaze, leaving my face impassive. She dabbed at her leaking eyes and sniffed. Her lips, pointed downward in an effort to keep her eyes from bawling, pursed themselves together, forcing them to meet over and over again. I shook my too long bangs out of my eyes and fiddled with the edge of my dress, almost nervous underneath my aunt’s gaze. My aunt attempted to smile at me through the chilly, winter-like, spring weather. A wall of air rushed our dresses and almost succeeded in taking our hair with it. Aunt Linda resituated a barrette in her hair and then patted her black dress, smoothing out the wrinkles. I tugged at the hem of mine again and pushed my shiny black shoes’ toes together. I was fidgeting. Under normal circumstances that wouldn’t be so bad. But at a funeral, especially your own mother’s, fidgeting was preposterous. I wrung my hands. I couldn’t see or hear the preacher that so kindly and gently misled everyone about my mother’s demise. It made me sick. Just the thought of my mother being dead. Only one thing kept running through my mind: How?
         How had my mother died? My little, overwhelmed mind couldn’t comprehend, or even absorb, it all. I was drowning in a plot too big for me. I dug a little hole in the earth with my shoe. My whole chest felt like collapsing. I squeezed my eyes shut, unable to see her buried. My fingers slid over one another. My breaths began to jump into me without cause. My back shook. I had to get away. I had to escape from this. I turned to my aunt but decided against asking for permission to leave. I had to be alone, unaccompanied. The shaking traveled down my legs and rested largely on my knees. Suddenly lurching forward, I collapsed onto all fours. I slowly crawled away until I was safe under the nearest tree. I propped myself, using the tree for support. Placing one foot in front of the other, I steadily made my way farther from the funeral, from the sadness, the death. The death. In the cold shade, I shivered. A slow panic crept into my chilled body cavity. Then, I was consumed by a fever, a driving heat. My walk broke into a trot. My trot broke into a slow jog. Seconds later I was running. Sprinting. As fast as possible. Away. Far, far away. I blindly tripped over a stray root. My steps faltered but I recovered, wiping sweat and tears from my face. I continued running. I felt a change in the temperature and tried hard to see. My nose hit a hard surface. Bounding backward from the impact, I focused on the object through my tears. It was a man.
         The man peered down at me. His eyes twinkled softly. I immediately trusted the stranger and buried myself in his abdomen. I sobbed and hiccupped, tears rolling down my red cheeks and neck, some dripping off the end of my nose or sliding into my mouth. I tasted their saltiness. The bitterness slowly aroused me. I wiped my face with my dress, occasionally another tear escaping from my swollen red eyes. I took a deep breath and suddenly felt exhausted.
          “There now,” the man said, patting my back, “Are we all better?”
          I stepped back from him as he lowered himself onto his haunches. Now that he rested at my eye level I was able to get a better look at his twinkling eyes. I saw a vagueness I had never seen in a person’s eyes before. A glazy look that covered the eyes like a filmy sheet. This man was blind. The man smiled; I saw that some of his teeth had taken a permanent vacation. He had noticed my emotional change. I stuttered that I was sorry for bumping into him.
         The man just shook his head and said it was no big deal. He was used to colliding with people. I inwardly groaned at that, feeling guilty for being so careless. My hands met each other behind my back. I sniffed, lapsing back into silence.
         The man stood back up and asked me where my parents were. At the mention of my parents I began crying again and immediately spilled everything I had done within the last year of my life. The man’s face changed and turned grave. In a strict voice he told me that I shouldn’t spend a lot of time dwelling on these matters, rather, and look toward the future. But at the same time, be aware of the present and not book my future full without flexibility. He sounded disappointed in me about my history. He also told me to mind my thoughts and to sometimes take a step back from my life and read it like a book, editing it where it needs it, readjusting my course.
         “You never know what your pre-determined Future has already planned for you.” The man turned his face toward the ground and in a barely audible voice spoke, “Once upon a time, I too did a dastardly thing. It eventually cost me my eyes.” He smiled. “That’s right. I haven’t always been blind.” The man’s face deepened with lines of age, a certain sadness showing through. A sadness that only he knew.
         “I must’ve been about your age. I saw my father strike my mother for back-talking. It scared me clean out of my socks. I never forgot that day. Years later, when I was fifteen or so, I was walking home, and a couple of my-er, some bullies came up behind me.
         “They teased me about my parents. You see my father was pretty public about his behavior toward the lot of us. I had been taught to ignore them and keep walking. Usually I did that, and usually they went away. But not this day. They twisted the knife they had pierced my heart with. They said that they knew that my father often ran out and slept with his other wives. I blew my top at that madness. It was completely false. Through and through. Yet, I still swung around and knocked the leader to the ground. The three other boys helped him up and started to fight for him. But the boy I had just knocked down held up a hand, pushing them to stand aside. He stepped up to me and threw a rather good punch at me. I ducked, of course. I was a wrestler, you see. As was he. We often sparred together. We knew each other’s tactics backward and forward, and neither of us could gain an advantage that day. We continued right off the road onto a stony hill. We began to stumble but pushed forward, both of us eager to steal the upper hand and win the fight. I hastily jumped onto a flat stone. The weight was too much for it, and the stone went tumbling down the hill, overturning a snake. The other boy and I jumped to avoid the snake and to find stable ground. Once we regained our footing, I took a jab at his head. This time I squarely knocked him in the jaw, causing him to fall backward into the stony surface. The impact upset the whole wall of stones and sent us sliding, head over heels, down the slope.
         “When we finally came to a halt at the bottom of the hill and lay in the dusty road again, neither of us moved. The other boys came over and hauled us both out of the debris. They pulled me to my feet, not caring that they were supposed to be my enemies. I stood too quickly and was very disoriented. I couldn’t see. I dismissed it at first. But then my alarm grew. I wasn’t regaining my sight. Just like the other boy wasn’t regaining consciousness. I lay down in the dust crying, listening to the other boys grunting. They turned the boy onto his side and found a stone wedged in his spine and a four inch long gash on his scalp. The boy was dead; I was blind.” The man paused in his story and turned his face upward to the sun. I drew in a breath, waiting for the unmentioned.
         “That boy. The boy I killed that day. He was my brother.”
         I sucked in my breath and instinctively reached out for his hand. When I found it, he gripped mine with a strength that matched my own. I stared at the scarce grass growing in the shade of a large oak tree. I studied the pattern in which the ants moved, carefully avoiding droplets of moisture. Sounds of the man sniffing made me look up. The man was crying. I bit my lower lip, feeling tears of my own coming on. I sighed. It was inevitable. Together we cried. We cried until my aunt, uncle, and brother all came to retrieve me.
         My aunt gave a grateful thank you to the man for holding onto me. My uncle shook the man’s hand and explained what the rest of my family had been doing. Indy just studied the man’s face, not saying a word.
         My aunt took my hand, and I reluctantly let go of his. I felt so secure and at peace with this man. I didn’t want to leave. I felt my hand slide from his. I watched with sadness as he turned away. I softly cried, not knowing he was crying with me. I was on the brink of running back to him when another man walked up to my blind man and lead him away, the blind man’s hand forced into the crook of the other man’s arm. I stretched my hand out to him, even though it was useless. The man was gone. I was gone. The brief moment of safety had passed. Without knowing how I got there, I found myself sitting in the car, eyes still glued to the spot where I had met my blind man. I cried in the car, staring out the window in silence. I was unable to face my family. All I could do was think about the blind man. He never finished telling me what became of the rest of his family. He never even told me his name.

And there you have it. That is my Gibbs Memorial Cemetery memory.

I told Indy this memory and smiled at me, like he remembered it, too.
          “Come on,” he said, slamming his car door, “Let’s go pay Helen Brant our respect.”
          I followed him along a cobblestone path which wound through the rows of graves and shadows of trees. The path led us to what looked like a house. I guessed it was almost the front desk, so to speak…
          Indy pushed the glass door opened and flinched at the jingling bell which signaled a visitor. The man at the front desk glanced up, peering calmly at Indy. His thin lips stretched into a smile.
          “Ah, if it isn’t the marvelous Indy Brant,” he said jovially, “What can I do for you today?”
          Indy grinned. “Hey, Gibbs, I wanted you to meet my little sister, Micky.”
          The older man turned his attention to me and I squirmed beneath his gaze. “I remember you,” he said, “I believe you ran into me a few years back.”
          I frowned and looked at Indy who nodded for me to reply. “Uh…” I said uncomfortably, “yeah…”
          I took a step closer and then recognition hit me. It was my blind man! At first glance, his filmy eyes appeared tranquilly blue, but I realized that they were indeed sightless. I reached out a hand, but he didn’t respond. “How...How did you know it was Indy?” I asked him.
          Indy grinned at me as Gibbs replied, “He has a very distinct smell and sound and his footsteps…I know this young man very well. He could be sitting in the corner of a room when I walk in and I would immediately know he was there.”
          “Really?” I asked in amazement.
          He nodded. “And if you come around here as often as your brother, I’ll learn your presence as well.”
          I smiled. “Cool...Uhm, how often does Indy come here?”
          He chuckled. “He probably visits here about twice a week.”
          “Wow,” I said, “How long have you been coming here?” I asked Indy.
          Indy shrugged. “Since I knew how to ride a bike well enough to survive riding along the highway,” He scrunched his brow, “so I was probably about nine.”
          I thought. “You had already run away by then.”
          He nodded.
          “But you were that close?”
          He shrugged and coughed. “All right, Gibbs, well, I want to take Micky to go see Helen.”
          Gibbs nodded and continued reading his book, passing his calloused fingertips across the pages.
          Indy motioned to me, and I started off after him.
          “Gibbs is a good man.” Indy told me. “You can trust him with your life.”
          I grabbed at the leave of bushes, unsure of what to say to my newfound brother.
          Indy took a big breath. “Micky?”
          I looked at him. “Yeah?”
          He cleared his throat. “I know this is probably hard for you…reliving the past…I just wanted to say that…I hope…you can eventually come to terms with the truth.”
          I chewed my cheek. “Indy, what on earth are you talking about?”
          He sighed. “You’ll understand eventually.”
          I rolled my eyes. “You’re so mysterious, Indy.”
          He nodded once. “Yeah...”
          I turned to him. “When do you think we’ll be done? I don’t want to miss much class.”
          Indy halted by a grave and frowned at me. “Impatient, aren’t you?”
          I shrugged. “I hate missing school.”
          Indy snorted. “Welcome to life.”
          I gave him an annoyed look. “Can’t you ever be serious?”
          He huffed. “I am!”
          I rolled my eyes. “I mean about important stuff!”
          Indy grinded his teeth together. “How can you say that?”
          I motioned to the picturesque scene before us. “Why is my mom’s burial site so important that I have to miss school to go see it? Why is talking to you so important that I have to miss school?” I crossed my arms and said, “Why are you more important than school?”
          Indy grimaced. “I suppose it’s fair for you to react this way. I mean, I shouldn’t expect you to have the same zeal about this as I do.”
          I frowned. “Zeal about what?”
          Indy flashed his playful eyes at me. “Why bother telling you?”
          I clenched my teeth. “You’re a jerk.”
          He smiled. “You have no idea.”
          I huffed and counted to ten, staring at a budding flower.
          “Better?” He asked.
          I nodded.
          “So…ready to listen to me yet?”
          I swallowed. “You really think this is more important than school?”
          “You really think it’s less important?” He gave me a disappointed look. “What happened to the Micky I knew?” He reached a hand and brushed it against my cheek. “What happened to the Micky I loved?”
          I jerked my face away. “She’s not in at the moment. Please leave a message at the tone.” I blew a raspberry at him and stalked off.
          Indy caught my arm. “Micky, wait.”
          I spun around. “Why? I just want to go back to school. I don’t care about Mom’s grave. It’s just a hunk of land!”
          Indy shook his head and said, “You’re so wrong. You have a connection to this place, to your Mom’s grave…to me.” He dropped his gaze.
          I felt a little remorse and apologized, “Look, Indy, it’s not that I don’t care about Mom or you or my past…I do.” I cleared my throat. “I just think that all this can wait. It’s not going anywhere.”
          Indy raised his soft eyes to mine. “You’re so wrong.”
          I threw my hands up in disgust. “All right! If I’m so wrong, why don’t you tell me what the hell is going on here and maybe then I’ll change my mind. Just flat out telling me that I’m wrong is only going to make me argue with you more.”
          Indy smirked. “So you will listen?”
          I nodded. “I swear.”
          He straightened his shoulders. “We’re gonna need a better place to talk.”
          I hesitated. “Like where?”
          He smirked again. “My place.”
          I began to object, but he cut me off, “You swore that you’ll listen. You’re gonna listen…at my place.”
          I glared at him, mad at myself for being a fool.
          He smiled. “Don’t worry…you know this place, too.”

He took me home. Not here…not to Aunt Linda’s and Uncle Stewart’s house. He took me home. He took me to the house I don’t remember. The house he inherited. The house from my dream.

          “What do you remember about Dad?” Indy asked me, dropping his keys on the kitchen counter.
          I paused in studying the downstairs. “Uhm…not much to be honest. I mean, other than the whole arrest thing, I don’t know anything about him.”
          Indy reached into the refrigerator and extracted a Mountain Dew. He offered me one.
          “Do you have anything else?” I asked him. He grinned and pulled out a Fanta orange. I gratefully took it from him. “Thanks,” I said.
          He shrugged. “No problem.”
          “So, why’d you ask me about Dad?” I prompted.
          “Oh, right,” Indy said, gulping down a mouthful of Mountain Dew. “How much do you know about sentences?”
          I frowned. “Like compound-complex and stuff like that?”
          Indy roared with laughter. “No, no, no…not those kinds of sentences.” He gave me a dazzling smile. “I mean prison sentences…Punishment may be a better word?”
          “Oh,” I said, feeling slightly embarrassed at my folly, “no.”
          He placed his Mountain Dew on the counter next to his keys. “Well, if you are arrested for sexually abusing a child and are jailed for it, then you can be in jail for up to ten years.”
          “Oh?” I asked.
          He nodded. “And that’s how long Dad’s sentence was.”
          “Was?”
          Indy leaned toward me. “Dad was released this morning.”
          I blinked.
          Indy waited for me to say something.
          “I…I,” I muttered,
          “You are speechless.” Indy finished.
          I shrugged.
          Indy sighed. “Perhaps we should jog your memory a little. Follow me.”
          He opened the door to the basement and flipped the light on. I cautiously followed him down the stairs. When we reached the bottom, Indy paused and turned the basement lights on. The basement was suddenly bathed in fluorescent light. I blinked against the harsh light, taking in the odd scene before me.
          There were microscopes and machines and gadgets and stuff…It was a lab. I frowned. Why was there a lab in the basement?
          Then, it all came back to me. All the memories. All the pain. Everything.
          I remembered.

----

Gurrrr…Aunt Linda needs me to help her with dinner. I’ll be back.

All right…where was I? Ah, this morning…at my old house…I had just remembered everything about my past, in one giant brain blast. It made me faint. Next thing I know after that, I’m in Indy’s arms, his gentle fingers brushing my tears away, his calm voice shushing my fears into silence, his warm green eyes promising a redoubt.
          “It’s okay, Micky,” he whispered into my ear. “Everything is okay.”
          I struggled to sit up. “No, Indy, it’s not. I remember everything.” I looked up, frightened, into his eyes. “I remember.”
          He nodded. “And that’s okay.”
          I adamantly shook my head. “No.”
          He pursed his grimly set lips. “What’s wrong, Micky?”
          “I…I…I hate him.”
          He frowned. “Who?”
          I grinded my teeth together. “Him,” I hissed, “my father.”
          Indy’s facial expression smoothed out, leaving his face emotionless.
          “And,” I continued, “it hurts…my insides—everything. I hurt like hell.”
          Indy nodded. “I apologize.”
          I shook my head. “I can’t believe…I can’t believe we…did that.”
          Indy gave me a small smile. “But we didn’t succeed, did we?”
          My eyes widened in realization. “Mom!”
          He nodded. “Yes…it’s rather a sad…incident.” He tucked a loose stand of hair behind my ear. “Now do you understand why her grave site is so important?”
          I nodded. “It’s a place of forgiveness.” I moaned and felt new tears build up.
          Indy sighed. “Ah, well…what’s done is done. We must move forward.”
          I hastily sat up. “You’re not walking away, are you?”
          He glared at me. “Hell no! This is just the beginning!”
          I smiled. “So…we will succeed this time?”
          Indy nodded. “I swear.”

Uhn! I AM NOT HUNGRY, AUNT LINDA! LEAVE ME ALONE! Hmph…she is a bitching pain in the ass. <groan> I gotta go eat dinner. I’ll be back. Again.

----

Whew! All right! Finally alone! Let’s see…where was I? Oh, yeah!
          “When?” I asked him, jogging up the basement stairs on his heels.
          “He should get here around noon.” Indy glanced at the clock over the oven. It read 10:47.
          “Are we gonna wait for him?” I asked confused.
          Indy shook his head. “We’ll come here after school.” He smiled at me. “We’ll surprise him.”
          I grinned. “You’re so devious.”
          Indy scoffed. “I know!”
          “So…we’re going back to school?”
          Indy nodded. “You finally get what you want. Happy?”
          I chewed my cheek. “I dunno…I mean, how can I focus when I have this on my mind?”
          Indy ruffled my hair. “You’ll be fine.”
          I giggled. “Yeah, probably.”
          He grinned. “Meet me at the Mazda after school?”
          “Wait, I can’t.” I said, my heart falling.
          “What?” He asked, concerned.
          “What about Aunt Linda and Uncle Stewart?”
          Indy frowned. “Hmm…I hadn’t thought about them.”
          “I’d have to call them.”
          He shook his head. “If they know Dad’s out, they’ll want to invite him over for dinner and have a big hoo-hah at their house. If they know he’s out, then they’ll be suspicious if he goes missing.”
          I nodded. “So…now what?”
          Indy took a swig of his Mountain Dew and said, “We gotta get you out of that house.”
          I sighed. “Good luck with that.”
          Indy grinned. “Don’t worry. We’ll come up with something.”

With that, he took me back to school and checked us in. Our excuse was a dental appointment. The lady at the front desk was confused because she didn’t know we were siblings. Join the club. We went to class and the rest of the day was normal.

Now, I’m sitting here, writing to you, and trying to think of how to get away…Hopefully, something will come to me. Keep your fingers crossed.

I’m dead tired and haven’t touched my homework. I’ll write later.