Sympathy Between Humans Part 22

"I shouldn't have said that four-letter word in front of you," he said. "That's a bad word, I know." He pressed $20 into her hand. "How about ordering pizza tonight, so you don't have to cook?"

Daddy's back had been hurting of late, Marlinchen decided later. That was probably behind his short temper.

Another year pa.s.sed, and another. She was taking on more and more responsibility around the house. Despite the fact that he wasn't teaching, Daddy seemed busier than ever, staying behind his study door for long hours, working on the new book. Outside, the other kids looked to her not only for meals but for homework help, reprimands, discipline.

All except for Aidan. He was a help. He watched Colm and Donal- Liam was already well into his love affair with books- when she needed to study, playing catch with them or taking them for rambles along the lake. And Aidan was her friend in a way the other boys weren't. They shared jokes and secrets, and when Daddy went to bed early with pain in his back, sometimes they'd stay up together and watch forbidden R-rated movies on cable.

Aidan alone among her brothers could be described as tall. And when they were both 11, her brother had a growth spurt. One day, while the family was a.s.sembling around the dinner table, she'd noticed Aidan standing at the open refrigerator door, his maimed hand resting casually on the side of the appliance, looking in. It hit her suddenly how tall he was, how his arms were beginning to take on that smooth ripple of muscle that men had. He looked older than 11.

And then Marlinchen noticed her father. He was looking at Aidan, too, and his blue eyes were oddly narrow. He didn't say anything. In fact, he was quiet all that night.

Dad had been quiet a lot of late. Marlinchen began to suspect his writing wasn't going well, and she knew his ulcer was acting up. He spoke tersely and was short-tempered. It was around that time that the Photo Incident occurred. Marlinchen always thought of it like that, like some historical event that would be capitalized in a history textbook.

Daddy had put Marlinchen in charge of the family photos from long ago; she enjoyed making alb.u.ms. She'd given Aidan a photo that was too big for an alb.u.m, an eight-by-ten of their mother holding him in her lap under the magnolia tree. Aidan had never done much to decorate his half of his and Liam's room, but he bought a frame for the picture and hung it up next to his certificate for being the fastest miler in his grade at school.

It had been up for two days when Dad, pa.s.sing the older boys' room on his way out, saw it.

"That photo doesn't belong to you," he'd said to Aidan, "and I don't like seeing it in that cheap drugstore frame."

"The photo's mine," Aidan had insisted. "Marlinchen gave it to me."

Dad had simply walked over and picked up the photo and the frame.

"That's mine," Aidan repeated.

Dad pulled the photo free of the velvety backing. "You can have the frame," he said. "I believe you when you say you bought it. The photo isn't yours."

"Yes, it is," Aidan said, one last time, but Dad had ignored him, walked away.

The next day was the anniversary of their mother's death. They always went to put flowers on her grave on that day, every year. It was a family tradition.

This day, when Aidan went to the garage with everyone else, Dad had laid his hand on the car door when Aidan reached for the handle, and shook his head. "You're staying home," he said.

"What?" Aidan's throat had worked, as if he'd misheard.

"You know, you've been doing poorly in school again this year," he'd said. "Your teacher suggested I restrict you from outings and family trips until your work improves. I think she's right."

Marlinchen's eyes had been trained on her twin brother's face. She knew how much their mother's memory meant to him. Aidan had waited, as if Dad would relent. Then, color flooding his cheeks, he'd gone back to the house.

It wasn't for two days that Dad realized what Aidan had done with his time alone in the house. That afternoon, Dad came out of his studio and down the hall to find Aidan laboring over his homework.

"Where is it?" he'd demanded.

"Where is what?" Aidan asked.

Aidan had taken the photo from his father's study, and wherever he'd hidden it, Dad couldn't find it. He'd torn Aidan's half of the bedroom apart, he'd searched the bathroom and old hiding places around the house, but without luck. He refused to ask Aidan again where the photo was, but his black mood hung like a cloud over the house. Aidan said little, his face closed, but Marlinchen was deeply frightened.

"Can't you just give the photo back?" Marlinchen said.

"No," Aidan told her. "It's not here anymore."

"You're provoking him."

"He took something that was mine," Aidan said. His voice was changing, and for a moment she heard a man's timbre, his future voice.

"If you just give it back, things will be all right," she had said.

Marlinchen had better grades than Aidan. She helped him with his schoolwork. But now he was looking at her like he knew something she couldn't grasp.

"No, it won't," he said. "It's not about the picture."

When the beatings started, Marlinchen and her younger brothers dealt with it by pretending that it wasn't happening. It wasn't that hard. Most of the hostilities were staged away from their eyes. When they heard something through the walls, Colm would turn up the volume on the TV set. Liam would put on the headphones of his Walkman and read. Marlinchen took Donal outside, to walk by the lake. Aidan himself never spoke of it in front of them, and he disguised the bruises from both them and his teachers.

The younger boys were changing; Marlinchen saw it. They began pulling away from Aidan, as if afraid that the lightning that struck him regularly might strike one of them as well. Colm, who had once followed Aidan like a shadow, became rude and oppositional to him. At dinner he pointedly sat as far as possible from Aidan, echoing his father's opinions and ideas. Liam grew quiet and nervous, retreating into the stories he'd begun to write.

One day, in late spring, they were all outside, enjoying the first good weather. Colm was tossing a baseball around with Donal. Marlinchen was sitting at the outside table, finishing a book she needed to write a school report on. Aidan was working on Marlinchen's bike, the lovely metallic-orange one she'd just gotten and was still growing into. They'd taken the handlebars off and put them back on reversed, and Aidan was worried about the brake tension.

Colm made a long throw to Donal, who was standing near the deck stairs with his fielder's glove. The throw went wild and hit the porch railing about four feet from Aidan, who put a hand up to field it a second too late. The baseball ricocheted off the wooden railing into the kitchen window. Gla.s.s shattered.

They were all statues for a moment. They knew Dad was upstairs, and he would have heard.

"s.h.i.t," Aidan said, getting up off his knees and walking toward the window. They all cl.u.s.tered around it, in time to see Dad enter the kitchen, observe the broken gla.s.s on the floor and the baseball that had rolled to a stop by the refrigerator.

"Who did this?" he said, when he'd emerged onto the deck, his eyes taking them all in. There was silence for a moment, then Colm said, "Aidan did."

"What?" Marlinchen protested. "Colm." "Colm."

"Aidan did," he insisted, nervy defiance on his face. Aidan, like her, was staring uncomprehending at Colm, who was looking only at their father.

Dad spoke to Aidan. "Get upstairs," he said. He didn't ask if what Colm said was true. Marlinchen knew that he wouldn't, not now and not upstairs.

"Colm," she said when Aidan was gone, "what did you do that for? It wasn't Aidan's fault."

"How do you know?" Colm said mulishly. "You were reading. You didn't see." Then he went inside the house, retrieving his baseball.

Marlinchen watched him go, and as she did, she realized that there was a poison spreading through her family. What Colm did once, he would try again, because it had worked. Marlinchen was afraid of how things would change from there. But what happened next was far from what she'd expected.

It was perhaps a month later that their father called Marlinchen and Aidan into his study. "I've been in touch with your aunt Brigitte, your mother's sister," he said to both of them. "She's generously offered to let Aidan live with her."

Why? Marlinchen wanted to ask. They didn't even know Aunt Brigitte. She had never visited Minnesota, and the family had never traveled to her home in Illinois. Marlinchen wanted to ask. They didn't even know Aunt Brigitte. She had never visited Minnesota, and the family had never traveled to her home in Illinois.

Instead, she said, "For how long?" Summer was here; that must be what her father had in mind, a summer away.

"We'll see," her father said. He tapped a narrow folder on his desk with a Northwest Airlines logo. "You leave as soon as school's out," he told Aidan, who swallowed hard and left.

"Dad," Marlinchen said softly, but she didn't know what else to say. Marlinchen said softly, but she didn't know what else to say.

"Help him pack, would you?" her father said. "Boys are hopeless at that sort of thing. And, honey"- he turned back from booting up the computer-"tell your brothers, will you?"

Upstairs, Aidan required no help in packing, and he seemed to have already adjusted to the idea that had so shocked Marlinchen.

"Don't worry," he said quietly, pulling out his suitcase. "I'll be fine."

"But we've never even met met Aunt Brigitte," Marlinchen protested. Aunt Brigitte," Marlinchen protested.

"Yes, we did," Aidan said. "We were down there once, at her place in Illinois."

Marlinchen gave him a quizzical look. "I don't remember that," she said. "Besides, Dad doesn't even like like her." her."

"Then she's probably all right," Aidan said bitterly.

"It's just for the summer, I bet."

"Don't worry about it. I don't care where I live," Aidan said.

"But-"

"Just drop it, okay?" Aidan said sharply. "And get your cat out of my suitcase."

Marlinchen saw s...o...b..ll happily digging her claws into the clothes Aidan had laid in the open case. She got up from Liam's bed. "s...o...b..ll isn't my cat; she belongs to all of us," she said.

"No, she doesn't," Aidan said. "s...o...b..ll is your pet, and you're Dad's pet. Why don't you just leave me the f.u.c.k alone?"

Aidan had never thrown it in her face before, her special status with their father. Tears welled in Marlinchen's eyes.

"Linch," Aidan said, relenting, but she fled, into the hallway, into her own room.

On the day of Aidan's early-morning flight, Marlinchen got up at 5 A.M. to make him pancakes. Her reflection in the blackness outside the kitchen window looked like the pinched face of an old woman whose hair had failed to go gray. Aidan ate only a third of what she'd made him. of Aidan's early-morning flight, Marlinchen got up at 5 A.M. to make him pancakes. Her reflection in the blackness outside the kitchen window looked like the pinched face of an old woman whose hair had failed to go gray. Aidan ate only a third of what she'd made him.

She got up again at seven to make a second breakfast for the boys. Dad wasn't home yet. Liam cried at the breakfast table, and Donal followed suit. Colm's face was set and hard.

Marlinchen called Aidan a few times on the phone, until one day her father left the phone bill on her bed, with the Illinois calls outlined in yellow. She knew he didn't want money for the calls, and a cold feeling coalesced in her stomach. She started making the calls from pay phones, when she could, but opportunities were few and far between. Aidan told her he was all right, and that Aunt Brigitte was nice. After that there was little to say.

When school started, Hugh didn't bring Aidan home. Marlinchen started several times to ask her father why not, but the words froze in her throat. When Aunt Brigitte died in a car accident, and Aidan was sent farther south to live with an old friend of their father's, Marlinchen heard nothing about it until it was over and done with. When she finally found out, she understood that Aidan was never coming home. Their father was never going to change his mind. started, Hugh didn't bring Aidan home. Marlinchen started several times to ask her father why not, but the words froze in her throat. When Aunt Brigitte died in a car accident, and Aidan was sent farther south to live with an old friend of their father's, Marlinchen heard nothing about it until it was over and done with. When she finally found out, she understood that Aidan was never coming home. Their father was never going to change his mind.

I have to do something. I have to talk to him. I can't let Aidan live down there with someone we've never even met.

But she didn't say anything, not right away. If Marlinchen was afraid for Aidan, she was just as worried about her father. He'd been under pressure for so long, financial and otherwise. His back had flared up, and he was moodier than ever. Once, he'd said he'd had something important to tell her, and led her down to the magnolia tree to say it.

All the way down there, her heart had raced. What was he going to say? I have cancer, I'm dying? I have cancer, I'm dying? When they'd arrived, he'd been at a loss for words. He'd looked down at the ground and out at the lake, and finally told her about how much he'd loved her mother, how much he missed her, how important the kids were to him. When they'd arrived, he'd been at a loss for words. He'd looked down at the ground and out at the lake, and finally told her about how much he'd loved her mother, how much he missed her, how important the kids were to him.

Still frightened, Marlinchen had hurried to say, I understand, Daddy, we love you. I understand, Daddy, we love you. She hadn't understood what he meant by it. Was he still depressed over Mother's death? Could he be trying to tell her he was having suicidal thoughts? For nearly a month afterward, Marlinchen hadn't been able to sleep through the night. She'd gotten up at least once to creep down the hall and look into his bedroom, making sure he was all right, his chest rising and falling under the bedspread. She hadn't understood what he meant by it. Was he still depressed over Mother's death? Could he be trying to tell her he was having suicidal thoughts? For nearly a month afterward, Marlinchen hadn't been able to sleep through the night. She'd gotten up at least once to creep down the hall and look into his bedroom, making sure he was all right, his chest rising and falling under the bedspread.

Not long afterward, something happened that changed everything.

At school one afternoon, during PE, she saw Aidan on the other side of the chain-link fence. He raised a single finger to his lips. When she left the campus that day, he fell into step beside her. The school-bus driver didn't notice as Aidan climbed aboard with everyone else.

For two days, Marlinchen hid him in the detached garage. She sneaked him food and brought him a blanket so he could sleep stretched out on the backseat of Dad's old, defunct BMW.

The second day, she told Liam. After dinner, they brought Aidan his food, and afterward, the three siblings sat and talked. Mostly Aidan spoke, telling them about Aunt Brigitte, who had been nice, but almost too sweet and clingy. He said Pete Benjamin was okay, but he was a total stranger, and after two weeks, Aidan had been too homesick and lonely for his siblings to stay any longer. He told them the story of his late-night escape, funding a bus ticket with money he'd saved from an allowance Aunt Brigitte had given him, of the night highway unfurling under the bus's headlights, of walking all day to Marlinchen's school. In the twilit world of the garage, the miseries of Aidan's life took on the character of adventures.

Then the door had opened, Colm in the breach. "What's going on?" he'd said.

Three faces turned to him, and Colm's gaze came to rest on his oldest brother. For a moment he was startled, then his face hardened, and he said, "I'm telling Dad."

"Colm, no!" Marlinchen had jumped to her feet, but her younger brother was running for the house.

Their father was almost frighteningly still and quiet when he came to stand in the doorway, looking down at his estranged son, nodding as though he weren't surprised.

"Dad-" Marlinchen began, trying to speak although her throat was turning to stone.

"It's okay, Marlinchen," Hugh had said. "I figured he'd turn up here."

Then he'd addressed Aidan. "You're going back in the morning," their father had said. "Until then, come up to the house. You can sleep on the couch downstairs tonight."

Relief had filled Marlinchen; she'd expected much worse. That night, she'd made up a bed on the couch for her brother, and fell asleep instantly upon returning to bed. The tension of the last few days, of hiding Aidan, had taken its toll on her. Now it was over, and exhaustion claimed her.

But only an hour later, she'd awakened to m.u.f.fled, familiar sounds of anger, from downstairs. Chest tight with apprehension, she crept downstairs.

It had never been this bad. Aidan sat on the kitchen floor, back against the refrigerator, his face b.l.o.o.d.y from the nose down. He was trying to stem the tide of a bleeding, broken nose, and his eyebrow was split. Her father was on his heels next to him, a handful of b.l.o.o.d.y hair in his fist, his face alien with anger.

He spoke close to Aidan's ear. Then he let go and stood.

With painful difficulty, Aidan got to his feet as well, and spit blood and saliva into his father's face.

Marlinchen felt a surge of raw fear at what would happen next, but her father only wiped his face and walked away.

Marlinchen stumbled back into the darkness when her father pa.s.sed by, and he never saw her. For a moment, she sat with her arms wrapped around her knees in the darkness and fought back tears. From her low vantage point, she saw something she hadn't before. She looked into the forest of chair legs under the small breakfast table and saw shining eyes staring back at her. Donal. He was five years old. His face was blank with shock.

Immediately, she knew what had happened. Donal had sneaked downstairs for something he wasn't supposed to have, probably a piece of the lemon cake Marlinchen had made earlier. He'd hidden under the table when he'd thought he was going to be caught. He'd been under there the whole time. She didn't know what had sparked her father's rage at Aidan, but she knew Donal had seen everything.

It was at that moment that Marlinchen made her decision.

It was for the best that Aidan was leaving in the morning, that he lived a thousand miles away. Otherwise, things would only deteriorate. The younger boys would witness things like this, and worse, and G.o.d knew Aidan wouldn't be safe here, either. In Georgia he would. No matter what Pete Benjamin was like, he was better than this.

She came out from her hiding place, walked past Aidan, who had slipped back down into a sitting position, trying to stem the bleeding from his nose, and went to Donal.

"It's all right, baby," she said, "come on out." Even though he was too big to be lifted up by someone her size, she managed it. Donal was limp and acquiescent in her arms. Marlinchen had expected tears, but he didn't cry.

The young are resilient, she decided as she tucked him into bed.

She did not go back downstairs to Aidan.