Adam

                                                                Adam



    It’s not enough to say that we were inseparable; we were, in many ways, conjoined.  Not in the physical sense, but in an emotional, spiritual, almost supernatural way.  We were brothers; identical twins!
   
    Adam and Allen Park were our names, and the difficulty in distinguishing us apart, to define a singular characteristic, trait, or even a silly little quirk, was completely and utterly impossible for everyone; everyone except ourselves and our mother.
   
      Father hadn’t a clue.  He was by all accounts, a loving, caring and kind soul, but completely oblivious to even the subtlest of differences between Adam and myself.  He was not an ignorant or stupid man by far.  In fact, his wit was quite sharp and had gotten the best of many.
   
      But, our mother knew.  She knew that my brother Adam was very intelligent and I was, well, not.  She knew that Adam was as lovable and playful as a newborn kitten and that I was quite often sullen and quick to temper.  She knew I needed Adam, and at only nine years old, Adam already possessed the keenest of insight into the depths of that need.  She loved us both equally and we never once doubted it.
   
    We were poor folks.  An economic depression, deemed by leading economists a mere recession, had devastated the area.  The population of our town was dwindling rapidly and those who did, or could stay, were receiving some type of government assistance.  Most futures looked bleak.
   
    Not ours.  Adam and I had each other and by grace or mercy or, what our mother had called a full fledged miracle, our father had managed to find a job.  He began working at a local scrap yard.  The work was brutal and physical and we all knew it was taking its toll on him.  He made minimum wage.  “Gosh that’s a lot of money”, I said.  Father just smiled, wiped the tiniest tear from his eye and patted my head.  I was never told otherwise, not even by Adam. 
   
      Adam, either by instrument or design, was always there for me.  When I struggled with homework, mother had Adam help me.  I, like my father, was not stupid, just inclined to excel in other, less intellectual, arenas.  He would help me with my chores before doing his own, always finishing first.
   
      I never showed jealousy toward Adam.  Yes, I had quite often felt it, and was often depressed because of it, but that was one thing, possibly the only thing, that Adam did not know.
   
      It was during one of those moments that Adam, our childhood equivalent to a psychiatrist, prescribed to me a particularly pleasant form of antidepressant; mischief!  Never a child in history could resist the urge to run a muck, or explore some dangerous and forbidden passage.
Dangerous and forbidden was exactly the passage Adam had in mind.  “Let’s go play in the scrap yard”, Adam said.
“No, dad said never play there”, I shrieked.
“Dad won’t know”.
“Mom will”, I exclaimed!
“Who’s going to tell her?”
To me, his logic was sound.  It was Sunday; the scrap yard was closed.  Mom and dad never searched for us unless we were late for supper.  Most importantly, at least to me, Adam would be there to supervise.  What could go wrong?
   
      The fence surrounding the junk yard was hardly more than rusty tin sheets and barbed wire. Knowing the gate was locked, we searched the perimeter for any separation between the tin sheets.  As with any junk yard, there were plenty.  We chose an opening at the back.  Completely concealed from sight by a line of trees and heavy brush, it was the perfect portal.
“You go first”, Adam said.  He always made me go first.  Mom said it helped to build confidence.  Whose? 
“Okay, but you stay right behind me.”
“Always”, Adam said.
I slid, feet first, through the opening, and sat upright in front of it.  “Okay, your turn.”  I waited for a reply from Adam, but one was not forthcoming.  “Come on Adam.”  I stuck my head through the portal.  Adam was gone.  “Adam, come on.  It’s not funny.”  “Adam!”
“Boo!” Adam yelled as he grabbed me from behind.  He had entered the junk yard through another opening and couldn’t resist a maliciously innocent scare.  I threw my head back violently, slamming it into the jagged edges of the tin, causing two huge gashes on the back of my head.  The wounds were superficial, but as head wounds will, they bled profusely.  Adam saw the blood and panicked.  As he turned to run, his feet became entangled in a role of old wire, causing him to fall.
   
    There were so many broken bottles and so many lacerations that my wounds were immediately forgotten.  “Don’t move Adam, I’ll get dad!”
“No!” Adam screamed.  “Don’t leave me here!”
“I gotta get dad!” I yelled.
“No, take me home!” he cried, “Don’t leave me here.”
Mom always said to listen to Adam, so my choice to do so was based solely upon her logic.  To me, this decision seemed flawed. 
   
    There was a surreal tint to the events that followed.  The bright blue summer sky faded to the palest of grays.  Adams’ cries, as I dragged him down the alley to our house, drowned by the wild pounding of my own heart, hushed to mere moans.  All our surroundings seemed to lose color except for the long trail of blood which became incrementally less noticeable as Adam finally ceased.
   
      I was not privy to his passing and tugged incessantly at his lifeless body until we reached our back yard.  Dad was just coming out the back door.  His usual glow and inviting smile were replaced by a seldom seen façade of anger.  We were late!  “Where you boys been?” he yelled, when he first saw us.  As the evidence crept slowly upon him, I fully expected to bear witness to an expulsion of anger and violence that sometimes manifests itself even in men like my father, and bearing the weight and gravity of the circumstance, forgiveness would have been granted even before the transgression.  Instead, he stood stoically, frozen in a moment, a waterfall of thoughts and emotions racing through him.  He saw the blood drying on my scalp and my clothing and the bloodied, lifeless corpse of my brother lying on the lawn.  I could feel the massive cords of muscle trembling as he placed his arms around me.  Tears welled in his eyes, and at the threshold, the very verge of discharge, one simple phrase, “It’s okay, you did the best you could, Adam.”




                                                                    The end