I got in early -- well, about ten pm. I didn’t want to do anything ‘fore the eleven o’clock news, so it wouldn’t make headlines till tomorrow. So I stopped near my mom’s house. She was livin’ in Altadena, north of the 210, with her shit of a husband. But I didn’t care about that; I was lookin’ for my little brother.
Last I’d heard, he’d be graduatin’ from college right around then. It’d taken him five years. Mom an’ the SOB’d made him work his way through; their “real” kids took preference. I just wanted to see if he’d made it. But no way was I gonna knock on that door. No fuckin’ way. So I sat there an’ waited. An’ hoped he’d happen to show up an’ send me a sign or somethin’ on how he was doin’.
Funny, my wantin’ that. We’d talked about crap like that the last time I really saw him. I mean, we’d talked on the phone a couple times -- when he answered it instead of my mom or the SOB. But I hadn’t really talked with him since just before I was sent to Mid-State. Shit, almost eight years ago.
It was just before my trial. He was fifteen. At a bus stop, on his way home. I’d been waitin’ for him, an’ when he saw me drive up, he wasn’t surprised.
“Hey,” was all he said.
“Hey. How’s it goin’?”
“It’s goin’. You comin’ to see mom?”
“Fuck that. I just wondered -- well, you wanna grab a bite or somethin’? I’m payin’.”
“Sure.”
He hopped in the car an’ we hit an “In an’ Out Burger” just down the road. He wolfed down a double with fries an’ four refills on Dr. Pepper.
“Shit, don’t mom feed you?” I asked.
“Healthy shit,” he said with a shrug. “Crap that tastes like cardboard. But the girls love it since that’s all they know.”
“They’ll learn. Listen, I...uh, I may be gone for a while. Three years, maybe. Dependin’ on how things go.” I was a real optimist, back then.
“Oh.”
“Didn’t want you to think I forgot you.”
“You want me to come visit?”
God, he was a sharp kid. “They won’t let you without mom, an’ she won’t let you.”
“Okay. I’m sorry.”
“Me, too.”
We sat quiet for a while, then I asked, “How’s school?”
“Okay.”
“You think you’ll go on to college?”
He grinned. “I’m already workin’ on it. Doin’ an AP.” I must’ve given him a full blank stare, ‘cause he added, “That’s Advanced Placement. Good for college credit.”
“Shit. You always were smart.”
He shrugged. “I figured it’s necessary. Sort of a preemptive strike. Mom let me know, all I’ll get is room an’ board if I go on. This’ll cut the cost.”
“Fuckin’ bitch.”
He shrugged.
“So you’re goin’ on, then.”
He nodded. “I like English. Lit. I mean, all lit. Literature. I’m thinking I might write. Maybe work at a paper or some online news, something like that. Who knows?”
“You won’t let nothin’ stop you, right? Right?”
He just looked at me then focused on the last of his fries. They were swimmin’ in ketchup in the little cardboard holder. He picked some out an’ licked ‘em off his fingers. An’ suddenly I was hit by how good-lookin’ he is. Sandy hair. Dark eyes. Clean face. Startin’ to fill out, just I did at that age. All of a sudden, I hurt for him.
“I mean it. Don’t let anything stop you. Not mom’s shit. Not that son-of-a-bitch she married. Nothin’.”
I was close to cryin’.
He looked at me. “Y’know, we’re studying Russian literature, right now. Short stories, mainly. By Chekov. He’s all about man trapped in his fate, so no matter what he does, he can’t escape it.”
“You believe that?”
“I dunno.”
“You know what I think? I think we got more control than we think. But we’re too dumb or too lazy or too lost in stupid shit to see it. Me, every time I’m about to fuck up, a little bell goes off in my head an’ this voice says, ‘don’t do it.’ An’ every time I’ve done my crash an’ burn, it’s been when I tell that voice to fuck off. So you -- you got that voice in you?”
“Sometimes.”
“Listen to it.”
“Okay.”
“No, promise me you’ll listen to it! Please! Please.”
He finished his fries an’ slugged down the last of his DP. “Thanks for the meal.”
I knew I was pushin’ too hard, so I just said, “It’s nothin’.”
I drove him up the hill to about a block from the house. As he was gettin’ out, I said, “Y’know -- you’re gonna be okay.”
He looked at me. “Will you?”
The question shot right through me. He’s the only person who ever asked me that. The only one who ever really honestly gave a shit. An’ I didn’t have any answer. All I could do is shrug. He just nodded. Nothin’ more to be said.
I watched him trudge up the hill to where he lived -- I refuse to call that fuckin’ place a home. He didn’t look back. Didn’t wave. Nothin’. Just walked into the house.
So there I was, just down the street, waitin’ for -- shit, hopin’ for a final glimpse of him. Waitin’ for somethin’ to show me how he’d done.
Y’know, I’m not gonna bullshit anybody here ‘bout how this sounds. Comin’ from me. Knowin’ what I’ve done an’ how little I’ve fuckin’ cared about the aftermath of it. But I know if anyone’d ever done to him any of the things I’ve done to -- to some guys, I’d have killed the motherfucker. If I’d found out Wayne an’ Lenny’d made him one of their boys, I’d have tracked ‘em down, cut
