justanother homecoming

JUST ANOTHER HOMECOMING


It's Saturday morning, cartoons are over and I am underfoot. I'm standing in the kitchen threshold my toes touching the little metal line between the battered wood of the dining room and the yellow flower linoleum. The warm steamy swelter sticks to my face. She's making the lasagna.
The big pot gurgles, steams and spits over flowing and hissing on the blue flame. Noodles jitter and dance in its rapid growing bubbles. The sauce pops red splatters on the wall. Aromas rise and mingle in the air. The spell holds me there.
Inevitably she sees me and is annoyed at my presence.
"What do you want Billy?" She commands
"nutten"
"Well than go watch cartoons I'm trying to make your brother's dinner"
"Cartoons are over"
"Well than go outside and play it's a beautiful day, if it were raining you'd be moaning you want to go outside.
"Can I grate the cheese?" I grab the grater not waiting for an answer.
She yanks it out of my hand taking a small bit of my flesh with it but I don't notice. I am reaching with my other hand to grab one of the blocks of cheese anticipating the moist rubbery feel of it shoving through the grater. Mom takes it away before I touch it and puts it out of reach.
"No" she says "go out and play"
There was a stress in here voice that told me not to press. I left the kitchen threshold hesitating at the front door. Mom is stirring the sauce. The steam has shined the cheeks under her eyes like tears. There is a sense of stillness as if we were in a photograph. A faded picture yellowed by the sun. Dust motes floating lazily in the shafts of light settling on my father's empty chair.
I find Ross and Gil on the hill the hill was unfinished dirt road two lanes wide, and one block long overgrown, potholed and bumpy. Cars avoided this road only adding to its appeal to us. It was a boy's paradise dusty and unkempt and unwanted by grownups its steep slopes could make our bikes airborne or hide us from rampaging dinosaurs or Provide cover from enemy soldiers. That was its function today. Today it was a battlefield.
Gil is lying at the bottom of the hill. His green banana seat three speed lay sprawled out beside him. A steady click click click from the playing card in the spinning tire spokes slowly winds down. Just past his fingertips is a light blue plastic pistol. His right hand is clutching his chest. His leg is twitching against the ground in a last death spasm. Standing over him at the top of the hill Slaughtered in the sun plastic machine gun in his hand is his killer, Ross
"Hey Billy" Ross says to me "we're playing war."
"Which war is it?" With Ross it was always important to know witch war you were fighting because his dad and granddad were both in the army.
"Double you double you two" He said "Gil's a Jap I just killed him."
Gil suddenly jumps up grabs the pistol and yells "ya missed me I was faking" then he makes the sound of a hail of gunfire at Ross.
"I was too close to miss, your dead." Ross said unaffected by Gil's lethal barrage.
Gil grabs his bike and starts to ride away one arm hangs limply at his side.
"Nuh uh I Was just wounded."
Ross, accepting the compromise, aims the machine gun and fires. It makes a rapid clicking noise. Gil swerves his bike to avoid the bullets.
Ross picks up his bike and slings the gun strap over one shoulder.
They were gonna leave me
"Where's your bike?" Ross said.
"broke."
"Ah man that sucks" He said "Maybe my dad can fix it"
"My brother's gonna fix it" I said with more emphasis then I intended.
"I thought he was going to do that last week"
"He was but they canceled his leave"
Ross rolls his eyes and get really angry "That's cause he's in a war a real one not just pretending and he's a hero so he can't always come home when he wants too"
Ross's face squinches up "Geez don't be a spaz about it"
I feel ashamed. And Ross rides away.
I walk after them my ashamed of my anger and the shame making the anger stronger. Each footstep hits hard on the street sending shocks through my legs. I hate not having my bike.
My brother John will fix it though, when he gets back. He can fix anything.
Just before he went into the army he had fixed the car. It was a big ugly Pontiac. It had sat in the back yard for so long that it was buried in grass. All the tires were flat. The carpets were mildewed and a spider had spun webs from the steering wheel to the seat and down to the floor.
It had broken down before Dad had left and he never came back for it. He never came back for anything. Some of his clothes were still in Mom's closet.
One day Johnny said he was gonna fix it. And that's just what he did. He started reading mechanics books and worked on it every day after he got home from school and his job. Sometimes he let me help. Mom watched us from behind the screen door sometimes until one of us would see her and she would quickly go back into the house.
When we finally got it running Mom was so happy she cried. I could never understand that but Johnny said its girl thing and I never would.
Then the war came and he went away. The house just sort of got quiet after that. Mom would come into my room sometimes really drunk and cry. She would say over and over that she loved me like she forgot that she had just said it. She would lean over and kiss me sometimes unable to hold herself up and crushing me under her weight. I always pretended to be asleep but she would just keep on talking until I really did fall asleep. A couple of times I woke up and she was still there sleeping at the foot of my bed.
On Johnny's first leave home I asked him about the war. Mom was in the kitchen making the lasagna. He was sitting on the bed smoking. I had hoped he would tell a story like Ross's dad. He told really cool war stories.
Johnny didn't say anything for a long time. He sat there staring at the floor the ash from his home made cigarette getting ready to drop. His head slowly turned and he looked at me. He had never looked at me like that before and for some reason I felt scared.
"It's just a game to you isn't it?" he said in a weird whisper. "All pretty and exciting on the TV John Wayne and..."
He leaned back and took a long drag off his cigarette. And held in the smoke.
"How's school?"
"It's alright"
He blew out a stream of smoke followed by two smoke rings. I suppressed the urge to cough.
"You getting good grades?"
I didn't answer.
"You need to keep your grades up" he said leaning forward. "You don't want to get stuck like me."
Stuck?
"When I get out of school I'm gonna join the army like you"
"No you won't"
"No really"
"No you won't!"
"Whatever" I said and started to walk away. He grabbed my wrist squeezing really hard.
"You're not joining the goddamn army, Billy"
His grip tightened. I struggled to get free but he pulled me closer wrenching my arm. A squeak jumped out of my throat.
"You think it's a game." He yelled you think it's a fucking game don't you." You want to be like the kid's over there walking around asking for candy offering to do chores just looking for the change to blow yourself to bits for the glory of your shithole country."
His face was all contorted and his eyes were bigger than I had ever seen them.
"Is that what you want?"
I started bawling I couldn't stop myself. Mom rushed into the room I was screaming now my eyes were tearing up so much my vision blurred over the buzzing sound in my head my brother just kept shouting "Is it! Is it"
Mom shouted his name. She dropped down on one knee grabbed his face and shouted again.
Johnny let go of my arm. I fell back with the sudden release.
My wrist was all red. Pain throbbed with my pulse. My crying had turned to a struggle for breath
My brother was staring at me he looked confused like he didn't know who I was.
Tears poured out of his eyes and he crumbled in on himself his whole body was trembling.
Mom pulled him toward her and held his head. His breath came in short choppy sobs his body convulsed
I don't know how long we had stayed there like that, everyone crying, Mom stroking Johnny's hair and me alone on the floor. Why was she was holding him when I was the one hurt.
I finally catch up to Ross and Gil. We're not soldiers anymore we're spies. We pass bits of paper back and forth and shoot at each other until it starts to get dark and I have to go home.
When I get home the lasagna is in a casserole dish covered in tin foil. My brother hasn't got home yet. He doesn't come home that night.
It's the next day that the soldiers come. They are wearing their dress uniforms. One of them I recognize as the one who came by last week.
Mom's hand is on my shoulder. She pushes me back away from the door. Her hand tightens when she sees who it is.
"Billy" she says "go to your room."
"Are you in my brother's platoon?" I ask.
"Why don't you do like your mother says son" one of them says smiling.
I try to look past them to see if my brother's coming up the steps. Mom holds me back.
"I want to..."
"I told you to go to your room" Her voice cracked.
I go to my room and look out the closed window to the porch. I can't hear what they're saying. The second soldier hands my mother a folded flag.
She is falling. Both soldiers jump forward one catches her lumped form. Her face, her face is lifeless. My skin tightens. I run out of my room.
The soldier is helping mom into the living room. She is walking along with him limp mechanical movements like a puppet being put back in its box.
"Why don't we sit down here ma'am?" The man stutters.
She complies passively her eyes are wide she is staring at the wall I look where she is looking but there is nothing there.
"Ma'am" the man says.
She doesn't say anything. Her eyes remain fixed upon the wall.
A long, low breath comes out of her, so long and so strained that that her body trembles when it's done. Her hands slide up her and her fingers dig into her shoulders.
The other soldier notices me.
"Hey little man." he says nervously.
The other turns around. He looks afraid.
"Your mommy's...not feeling well. We're going to need to get some help for her. Can you take care of her for a bit?"
He doesn't wait for my answer. He gets up and walks out the door. The other one hesitates for a moment then follows.
Mom is holding herself, still staring at the wall; she starts to rock back and forth with her breathing.
"Mom?"
She doesn't answer me.
"Mom what happened?"
I start to ask about my brother. But suddenly it's something that can't be said in that moment my brother becomes a taboo subject that I know without knowing without question or thought it cannot be said.
I can't get mom to answer me she just keeps holding herself staring at the wall rocking slowly.
In the kitchen the oven door is open. But the kitchen is no longer warm.