My first time - be gentle
Well, I left a lot of obscure promises I feel like keeping, so here's what my creative writing class turned out. I got a bit of feedback, and my teacher feels that a part of the end is a bit cliche and that I should try to develop the last character a bit differently. So, this isn't the final draft...but I thought I'd get feedback here and simultaneously get some additional feedback.
The Big Brother
A voice rang out on the other side of the house, one long cry that only seemed to end when its broadcaster finally had to stop for short, uncontrolled breaths. Mary looked up and saw a small blonde child running out to meet her in the dining room. She looked over from her work, and examined her son. His eyes were puffy and full of tears, and he had a red mark on his forehead, slowly swelling into prominence. The boy’s brother walked out from the same room moments later, looking sullen and pensive. He had dirty blonde hair, and stood several inches over his younger brother. She thought about him for a moment, but looked back down at the child in her hands. This was the one crying, so this was the one that needed her. “Michael, what’s wrong? Did you hit your head?” she said, looking down at her youngest. Michael looked back up pleadingly, sobbing still, and then nodded. “Ga..ga..Gabe knocked me off of the b..bed, even though I told him n..not to.” Mary looked up at Gabriel, still towards the back of the room. He was twisting his mouth scornfully before he started talking.
“We were playing on the bunk bed, and we were supposed to jump off into the pillows on the floor. I was going to go first, but he kept whining that he wanted to go first, but when he got to the edge, he didn’t want to do it. I told him to get out of the way, but he wouldn’t, and he wouldn’t jump, so I just nudged him over the edge because he was taking too long.” He tried to fit as many words into his sentences as possible, hoping that if he explained himself well enough, his mom would see that it wasn’t his fault. It was that stupid baby’s fault. If Michael hadn’t gotten scared, it wouldn’t have happened, and now he was going to be punished because his little brother was a tattletale.
He was right, of course. The mom took one more look at Michael and sighed. “You have to watch out for your younger brother. You’re the oldest, and it means that you make sure he’s ok. If he didn’t want to jump, you should have waited for him. Now look…” she said motioning to his forehead. “He’s hurt, because you couldn’t wait a few seconds for him to do it on his own.” Gabe looked over the bruise for a moment. However, if it had any effect, Gabe didn’t make any show of it. He dropped his jaw into an annoyed pout, and looked off to the side. Mary sighed, and then raised her voice. “Gabriel Mitchell Taylor, you go back to your room and think about what you’ve done. I’ll go once I’m finished here, and I don’t want to hear one peep out of that room until then.” She said, letting her emotions get a little more tied in than she’d have liked. Gabe stomped off at hearing his full name, making sure to make each footstep audible as he walked back. Mary turned back to Michael, and began wrapping herself around him. He continued sobbing quietly for a few minutes while she rubbed her hands over his forehead and shushed him into silence.
About twenty minutes had passed before Mary walked in. Pillows and blankets had been scattered all across the floor, presumably still in the positions set by the boys. Gabe was sitting on the lower bunk, sulking. His eyes glowered and he shot a baleful look at Mary. He had been resigning himself to his punishment the entire time, though with one look she could tell he didn’t believe it was justified. Mary sat down on the bed next to him in one smooth, methodical motion. She arched her back a little so that her head wouldn’t hit the top bunk. “You want to tell me your side?” she said in a low voice. Gabe cocked his head to the side away from his mother “Why? It doesn’t matter anyway; you’re just going to believe whatever he told you.” The mother sighed looking over at her son. “If that were true, I’d be punishing you already.”
The son shook his head a little, his eyes fixated on a spot on one of the pillows. “If he wasn’t going to jump, he should have just got out of the way. I let him have his way, and he still wasn’t happy.”
“Your brother is younger than you. He doesn’t always know what he wants, and sometimes he gets scared. He wasn’t doing it on purpose. You’re the bigger brother, you have to be more mature.”
“I’m tired of always having to take care of him. When I was his age, I didn’t do stupid things like that!”
The mother held her tongue for a moment to let him continue.
“And then he goes and runs off to you! He always does that. Anytime something happens, he runs off to tell you or dad, and you listen to him because he’s the youngest. He’s the favorite.”
The mother’s brow furrowed “He’s not the favorite Gabe. We don’t have favorites.”
“Yes you do! I always have to watch out for him. I always have to take care of him, and make sure that he’s alright. I didn’t have anyone like that! I didn’t get this kind of attention.”
“You got more attention than he does…you didn’t have a brother. He’s younger than you, and I don’t think it’s too much to ask that you help watch out for him from time to time.”
“How come someone never watches out for me?”
“I know you might not think this right now, but he’s going to be the closest friend you’ll have for the rest of your life. He’s not always going to be little.”
“He’ll always be littler than me.”
“Just watch, someday he’ll be taking care of you too.”
---
Gabe stared up at his younger brother, the thick taste of iron on his lips as a small trail of blood streamed down his chin. “And who the hell needs you anyway?!” Michael looked down at him, his own blood running hot. He wasn’t bleeding like his brother, but there was a dull ache in his ribs that would probably leave a mark in the morning. “Well, if you don’t have the sense to figure that out, I guess I should have let you handle them alone then!”
Gabe spit on the ground next to his brother, not taking his gaze off until long after they both heard a wet slap hit the pavement. “Earl’s not gonna let us into his bar for weeks now, all because you had to hit someone with some piece of shit flowerpot.”
Not backing down Michael looked at his older brother, “He was drawing a knife! And there were three of them! What kind of thick half-wit picks a fight with three guys? They were standing around ready to tear you to pieces. You’d be lying in that alley over there bleedin’ if I hadn’t hit that guy from behind.” Michael made excited motions to the alley at the side of the building, its presence more poignant by the warm smell of rot and piss.
Gabe hadn’t meant to start the fight, not at first at least. He’d been going to that bar for years, and those three had walked in and wandered around like they owned the place. He’d been there after a particularly bad day, and simply wasn’t in the mood when they started harassing him to sit further down after he was already good and miserable in a couple mugs of beer. He knew his brother was there, of course, but they hadn’t spoken in weeks. Sheer stubbornness had kept them both going to the same bar afterwards. They’d both assumed that the other one would give up going first, or that’s the reason they told themselves anyway.
“I could have handled them! They weren’t even from around here, just some prissy idiots who needed to be dropped down a peg or two. Where the hell did you even get a flower pot?” Gabe said, adjusting his jacket and taking a step backward. He didn’t need this. He had enough crap today without having to take more from his brother. And now Earl’s, his one haven from all of this, was closed off to him. Earl had been a friend of their mother’s for years, so it was only natural that he ended up being their friend too when they grew up, they didn’t see much of him before that. He’d been on edge already tonight, and the two of them starting a fight didn’t help things. Michael shrugged and replied. “It was that one Earl filled up with flowers, daffodils or something. You know, he keeps it by the window.” Gabe didn’t look at Michael as he responded, and instead leaned down to pick up a bottle of whiskey, a leftover from the fight.
Michael kept looking at his brother, his features softening a bit as his voice got lower. “I heard about Johanna. John called me and told me about it.”
Gabe’s eyes smoldered as he looked back. “That had nothing to do with it. John needs to learn how to keep his mouth shut.”
Michael sighed and rubbed over his face once before asking “You heading back to your apartment?”
Gabriel looked at him defensively. “Might as well, I have nowhere else to go now.”
“I’ll walk you home…”
--
The streetlights shone lifelessly as the two walked down the street. It was close to ten, and most of the activity had died off. Gabe liked the streets like this, quiet. It let him feel like he had the whole world to himself.
Michael broke the quiet. “So, what happened with Amy?”
Gabe looked up at his brother for a moment, trying to consider how much he could hide from his brother, and how much to tell him. He wasn’t about to break down, not in front of his little brother. It took a few moments, but he realized that he had to say something or Michael would just start making assumptions. “She said that she couldn’t handle this anymore. That she’d never shared me with another woman before, and she wasn’t about to start now. She gave me that crap about how I needed to wake up and get on with my life. She was always like that…trying to tell me how to live.” He stopped for a second, collecting his thoughts. A smile rose on his lips and he continued “I got into trouble at work today, and got into a huge fight with my boss. I think that’s what set her off finally.” He paused for a moment. “As soon as she gets her things out, I think I’ll enjoy the single life for a while. Maybe I can sleep around this time, you know find me a chick with nice…” he cupped the air in front of his chest for emphasis before giving a wink and a laugh.
Michael laughed too. It had started as sort of a low chuckle, but soon grew unrestrained as he wrapped himself around the train of thought. “Yeah, get you a nice top-heavy girl to fiddle around with…of course, you’d have to give up all of your alcohol for her though. Nothing like that would dare touch you while she was sober.” He made a gesture to the bottle of whiskey to emphasize his point. Gabe looked down at the bottle of liquor, staring at it thoughtfully before pulling the cork off and smiling back. “Well, I guess I’ll just have to make do without the women then.” He said before taking an extended chug of the warm golden tincture. As he finished he looked back at his brother and they both laughed. They laughed, and soon after they had their arms slinging over the other’s shoulder to support each other from doubling over. The laughter echoed through the empty street, and continued for what seemed like hours. The joke faded away, it wasn’t important anymore, the laughter now self-sustaining, its own joke.
However, as they raised their eyes to look at each other, the laughter faded back as they steadied themselves. The laughter was consumed by the night, until it faded to a lingering chuckle. They began walking again, slowly weaving their way through the streets. They each took a look back at the spot they’d stopped at, briefly smiling as they made their way forward.
“So, have to been by recently?”
Gabriel looked up at his brother before shaking his head. “I thought about it, but…I don’t know if I can go back right now.”
Michael looked ahead and spoke tonelessly. “It’s been 3 months, you know…”
Gabe looked at one of the passing stores to the side. “Well, in a couple hours, it’ll be three months and a day actually.”
Michael’s eyes shifted down to look at his brother again. “You don’t think we should go? It’s not far.”
Gabe looked up at his brother. “I don’t need to go. I know what day it is.”
“Well, then I need you to go. I need to go, and I’m not going to go alone.”
Gaberiel’s eyes rolled away mercilessly. “You’re such a baby. Can’t you go anywhere without someone else holding your hand?”
Michael continued staring, not responding one way or another to his brother’s taunt. Gabriel wouldn’t look him in the eyes, but he could feel the gaze burrowing into the side of his head. The two seemed to be at a standstill until Gabriel finally looked back. “Fine…you’re such a pansy..” he said, offering his whiskey up to the younger brother.
Michael took the bottle and smiled at his brother. “And you’re a prick, but I have to deal with you.” He took a swig.
--
Their walk seemed to stretch on longer and longer as they continued forward, the time between footsteps working its way into infinity. In reality they had only travelled a couple of blocks, standing by an unlit plot of land near the riverfront. It was fenced off from the rest of the world with an iron bar gate centered on a stone wall. The bars sprung up from the ground, shooting into pointy tops partially marred and rusted by time. The top of the gate used the same iron design, and spelled off the words “Murrell Home Cemetery.”
The two brothers stared up at the closed gate, already chained off. Gabriel briefly thought about turning back, but he already knew what his brother would say. Hell, he was the one who taught him to jump fences in the first place. Instead of complaining, he took the bottle of whiskey, and slid it through the bars. Then he bent over and clasped his hands together, forming a way to boost Michael up. Michael smiled and said “Hey, don’t you think I should be boosting you up. I am the bigger brother now after all.”
Gabe merely glared up at Michael, snapping at him with “I’m always going to be the biggest. If you need a reminder, I’ll kick your ass any day of the week to prove it.” Michael chuckled to himself as he stepped into his brother’s hands, boosting himself up onto the wall and then reaching down to pull his brother up after him. Gabe smiled as he looked back down at the sidewalk. “You know, they really should invest in a better security system on thiss place. Any ol’ street vagrant could just wander in here ho’ever they like.” He said, his speech slurring a bit from some combination of alcohol and physical exhaustion. They smiled a bit before they both dropped down on the inside of the cemetery. Gabe walked over to the gate to recover his leftover whiskey, offering another swig to Michael.
They wandered around in the dark, not bothering to hide their presence. They wandered around in the dark, stumbling around the grave markers and headstones, the elevated plots and the offerings of flowers for the dead. If they noticed any of it, they paid no mind. When they finally arrived at their destination, they saw a grassy mound, buried for just enough time to be of little notice among the rest. Michael slowly made his way up to the grave at this, his legs growing between steps as a bouquet of yellow flowers came into view, resting on the front of the stone. Gabe approached from behind him, the bottle dangling precariously between his fingers as he stopped back several grave lengths away. He looked at his brother’s lowered head and then turned to look at the side. From the middle of the cemetery, most of the surrounding lights were snuffed out. He stared out at the streetlights in the distance, small earth-bound stars isolating him from the rest of the sleeping world. The next best thing to a pub was the walk home at 3 am after. It was then that he could see a part of the world that no one else got to see, his personal world without light.
Several minutes later, Michael looked back up. He turned around, face neutral, to see his brother. “Aren’t you going to say something?”
“I ain’t got nothin’ to say.”
“You didn’t say anything the last time either.”
“I ain’t got nothing to say.”
“You can’t keep holding it in like this.”
“I ain’t got nothing to say!” Gabe broke up each word, trying to make himself as clear as possible. He knew he was slurring a little bit, but it was more than that.
“I would think that after everything that happened, you’d have more to say than anyone.” Michael’s voice remained neutral, calm. He knew what he was saying though. He knew what would come next, though he was a little thrown back when it did.
The bottle broke against the stone permanence of one of the other graves, leaving a jagged edge in Gabriel’s hand. The bottle raised itself between them, pieces of broken glass still stuck to what remained of the label as they pointed to Michael. “What the hell does that mean?”
“You were with her, you know what it means.”
“Say it! What the hell does that mean?”
The bottle shook a little bit, almost quivering in rage. It stayed where it was, however, moving no closer to Michael, to the grave. Michael said nothing, instead raising his hands and taking a step away from the grave, closing in on his brother.
This was all that was needed, however, and Gabriel rushed him. He was drunk, however, and Michael was a little less so. Grabbing Gabriel’s wrist, Michael twisted his hand, leaving the broken bottle to fly off on its own. Gabriel retaliated with his free hand, twisting himself further into the joint lock in order to land a punch straight into Michael’s kidney. Michael groaned as he fell back, releasing the lock in order to cradle the sucker punch to his exposed midsection. Gabriel took a moment to relish the subsiding pain in his shoulder before he was on his brother again, making semi-wild punches that Michael barely had time to block. However, Michael soon decided to forego blocking altogether, accepting several punches as he charged back against Gabriel, knocking both of them to the ground. Michael tried to pin his brother’s hands, groaning softly as each moment his failed to do so resulted in another punch. However, he had been the larger of the two for a while now, and even though they hurt, he could take them. Grabbing each of Gabriel’s arms and pinning them to the ground, Michael looked down at his struggling brother, trying to pierce through the alcohol with his eyes. “It wasn’t your fault!”
“Will you shut the Hell up? How would you know?! You weren’t there. You didn’t see it!”
“I read the police report Gabe! He ran that light going way too fast. No one could have avoided it!”
“I should have! I should have, but I didn’t! You weren’t there…you didn’t see her…hear her…you don’t know anything!” Gabriel spat back, his eyes glimmering in the low ambient light.
“I know Mom wouldn’t blame you. I know that she wouldn’t want this for you. For Christsakes, it’s been three months! Three Months! You haven’t even looked at her grave once, but you’re letting this eat away at you. You drove your girlfriend off, you’re looking to get yourself fired, and you even tried to start a hopeless fight with three idiots in a bar. Mom wouldn’t want you ruining your life over losing hers!”
Gabriel suddenly managed to wriggle his arm free, and Michael felt a sharp pain as his sore rib cracked against his brother’s fist. Groaning loudly in pain, he rolled to the side, his body finally conceding to its limits. Gabriel lurched to his feet, thinking to kick his brother while he was down, only to restrain himself before going through with it. Instead, he simply watched Michael for a moment, his eyes reflecting so many things at once that they appeared blank. For a moment, he looked up at the grave, lightly adorned with yellow daffodils, and then turned away, fading back into the darkness away from his brother still rocking back and forth in pain.
Michael lay there for a while, partially because he was waiting for the pain to ebb away, and partially because he had no idea what to do next. His brother had walked off. He briefly remembered the last time they had talked. He’d walked off then too. But this time was different, Michael could feel it. He didn’t quite know how, but it felt different. He rolled over and looked at the gravestone, lost to his own thoughts. After a few minutes, he thought he’d heard footsteps coming from behind him. They were faint, but as he painfully rolled over, he could see the footsteps were coming from a light, rocking back and forth in the darkness. His eyes contracted a bit as the light centered on him, moving closer and closer to the gravestone, until there was enough light to see the silhouette behind it.
“See? I thought it was a bunch of kids making all this ruckus, looks like it was just some druggie bum instead.”
A middle aged groundskeeper came into view, pointing a small gun and a flashlight at Michael. Apparently the grounds had been better safeguarded than him and Gabe had originally assumed. He struggled to get to his feet, but the pain in his chest told him that he wouldn’t be able to do anything afterwards anyway. He wasn’t too worried about the gun, it was probably for protection. However, he’d been caught trespassing, and there was little he could do at this point to escape or resist. He briefly thought about talking to the man, but nothing he could say would make any difference. He struggled to sit up before the man lurched forward threateningly. “No! You stay right there on the ground. I’m calling the police. I’m tired of you people defacing good people’s graves, and now you’re gonna see the consequences of trying to disturb the dead.” He said, pulling a small cell phone from his pocket.
Michael could only look up at him from the ground helplessly. He started trying to explain, but the old man wrote him off and shushed him, holding him at gunpoint while he dialed the police’s number.
However, before he could hit the dial button, something hard and heavy smacked him in the back of the head. The man collapsed, crumpling to the floor, as Gabriel stepped back into the light.
“Weren’t you saying something about there not being enough security in this place?” he said, with a strange, half-serious, half-mocking look on his face. He dropped a well-sized rock and stooped over Michael, saying “If I’d known you were so fragile, I would have taken it easier on ya.”
Michael rose onto his brother’s shoulder with an annoyed grin. “Oh, get off yerself. You were the one talking about security, ya prick.” As he leaned over the mocking shoulder of his brother, he looked down on the cell phone and the man. “Is he going to be alright?”
Gabriel looked down at him nonchalantly, almost shrugging. “I dinn’t hit him that hard, and I’m sure he’s gotta be able to take a hit better than you.” He looked down at the phone for a moment. “If it’ll make you feel better though…” He leaned down, indirectly causing more pain in his brother’s side as he hit the send button on the phone. “It’ll take a while for the police to get out here, but we’d better get moving all the same. Mom wouldn’t want you to ruin your life getting arrested, now would she?” He said, smiling over at his brother. Michael wasn’t sure what to say in return, so he merely groaned every other footstep. Gabriel shook his head ruefully and said “All these years, and I still have to take care of you.” as the two walked off, shoulder to shoulder into the darkness.
- So, my teacher says that Gabe coming back to hit the groundskeeper was predictable, and I think that was the largest negative comment so far. He said I should write a scene with just the groundskeeper and Michael, and see where it goes, but originally the groundskeeper was just an in for Gabe to come back. Hmm...anyway. There's a few subtexts in here, and I wasn't really sure what names to use, so I just went with a semi-plausible theme and stuck with it. Actually, there was one name in the story that was important, but it's been changed, twice.
So that the name didn't stick out to someone who would recognize it. The new name is important too I suppose, but not in a real sense, just one that no one will recognize, and ultimately one that doesn't mean anything except that I'm a hopeless dreamer.
Anyway, I'm in OK for the week. I'll try to update more later on, but for now I think this is long enough.
Nicholas
The Big Brother
A voice rang out on the other side of the house, one long cry that only seemed to end when its broadcaster finally had to stop for short, uncontrolled breaths. Mary looked up and saw a small blonde child running out to meet her in the dining room. She looked over from her work, and examined her son. His eyes were puffy and full of tears, and he had a red mark on his forehead, slowly swelling into prominence. The boy’s brother walked out from the same room moments later, looking sullen and pensive. He had dirty blonde hair, and stood several inches over his younger brother. She thought about him for a moment, but looked back down at the child in her hands. This was the one crying, so this was the one that needed her. “Michael, what’s wrong? Did you hit your head?” she said, looking down at her youngest. Michael looked back up pleadingly, sobbing still, and then nodded. “Ga..ga..Gabe knocked me off of the b..bed, even though I told him n..not to.” Mary looked up at Gabriel, still towards the back of the room. He was twisting his mouth scornfully before he started talking.
“We were playing on the bunk bed, and we were supposed to jump off into the pillows on the floor. I was going to go first, but he kept whining that he wanted to go first, but when he got to the edge, he didn’t want to do it. I told him to get out of the way, but he wouldn’t, and he wouldn’t jump, so I just nudged him over the edge because he was taking too long.” He tried to fit as many words into his sentences as possible, hoping that if he explained himself well enough, his mom would see that it wasn’t his fault. It was that stupid baby’s fault. If Michael hadn’t gotten scared, it wouldn’t have happened, and now he was going to be punished because his little brother was a tattletale.
He was right, of course. The mom took one more look at Michael and sighed. “You have to watch out for your younger brother. You’re the oldest, and it means that you make sure he’s ok. If he didn’t want to jump, you should have waited for him. Now look…” she said motioning to his forehead. “He’s hurt, because you couldn’t wait a few seconds for him to do it on his own.” Gabe looked over the bruise for a moment. However, if it had any effect, Gabe didn’t make any show of it. He dropped his jaw into an annoyed pout, and looked off to the side. Mary sighed, and then raised her voice. “Gabriel Mitchell Taylor, you go back to your room and think about what you’ve done. I’ll go once I’m finished here, and I don’t want to hear one peep out of that room until then.” She said, letting her emotions get a little more tied in than she’d have liked. Gabe stomped off at hearing his full name, making sure to make each footstep audible as he walked back. Mary turned back to Michael, and began wrapping herself around him. He continued sobbing quietly for a few minutes while she rubbed her hands over his forehead and shushed him into silence.
About twenty minutes had passed before Mary walked in. Pillows and blankets had been scattered all across the floor, presumably still in the positions set by the boys. Gabe was sitting on the lower bunk, sulking. His eyes glowered and he shot a baleful look at Mary. He had been resigning himself to his punishment the entire time, though with one look she could tell he didn’t believe it was justified. Mary sat down on the bed next to him in one smooth, methodical motion. She arched her back a little so that her head wouldn’t hit the top bunk. “You want to tell me your side?” she said in a low voice. Gabe cocked his head to the side away from his mother “Why? It doesn’t matter anyway; you’re just going to believe whatever he told you.” The mother sighed looking over at her son. “If that were true, I’d be punishing you already.”
The son shook his head a little, his eyes fixated on a spot on one of the pillows. “If he wasn’t going to jump, he should have just got out of the way. I let him have his way, and he still wasn’t happy.”
“Your brother is younger than you. He doesn’t always know what he wants, and sometimes he gets scared. He wasn’t doing it on purpose. You’re the bigger brother, you have to be more mature.”
“I’m tired of always having to take care of him. When I was his age, I didn’t do stupid things like that!”
The mother held her tongue for a moment to let him continue.
“And then he goes and runs off to you! He always does that. Anytime something happens, he runs off to tell you or dad, and you listen to him because he’s the youngest. He’s the favorite.”
The mother’s brow furrowed “He’s not the favorite Gabe. We don’t have favorites.”
“Yes you do! I always have to watch out for him. I always have to take care of him, and make sure that he’s alright. I didn’t have anyone like that! I didn’t get this kind of attention.”
“You got more attention than he does…you didn’t have a brother. He’s younger than you, and I don’t think it’s too much to ask that you help watch out for him from time to time.”
“How come someone never watches out for me?”
“I know you might not think this right now, but he’s going to be the closest friend you’ll have for the rest of your life. He’s not always going to be little.”
“He’ll always be littler than me.”
“Just watch, someday he’ll be taking care of you too.”
---
Gabe stared up at his younger brother, the thick taste of iron on his lips as a small trail of blood streamed down his chin. “And who the hell needs you anyway?!” Michael looked down at him, his own blood running hot. He wasn’t bleeding like his brother, but there was a dull ache in his ribs that would probably leave a mark in the morning. “Well, if you don’t have the sense to figure that out, I guess I should have let you handle them alone then!”
Gabe spit on the ground next to his brother, not taking his gaze off until long after they both heard a wet slap hit the pavement. “Earl’s not gonna let us into his bar for weeks now, all because you had to hit someone with some piece of shit flowerpot.”
Not backing down Michael looked at his older brother, “He was drawing a knife! And there were three of them! What kind of thick half-wit picks a fight with three guys? They were standing around ready to tear you to pieces. You’d be lying in that alley over there bleedin’ if I hadn’t hit that guy from behind.” Michael made excited motions to the alley at the side of the building, its presence more poignant by the warm smell of rot and piss.
Gabe hadn’t meant to start the fight, not at first at least. He’d been going to that bar for years, and those three had walked in and wandered around like they owned the place. He’d been there after a particularly bad day, and simply wasn’t in the mood when they started harassing him to sit further down after he was already good and miserable in a couple mugs of beer. He knew his brother was there, of course, but they hadn’t spoken in weeks. Sheer stubbornness had kept them both going to the same bar afterwards. They’d both assumed that the other one would give up going first, or that’s the reason they told themselves anyway.
“I could have handled them! They weren’t even from around here, just some prissy idiots who needed to be dropped down a peg or two. Where the hell did you even get a flower pot?” Gabe said, adjusting his jacket and taking a step backward. He didn’t need this. He had enough crap today without having to take more from his brother. And now Earl’s, his one haven from all of this, was closed off to him. Earl had been a friend of their mother’s for years, so it was only natural that he ended up being their friend too when they grew up, they didn’t see much of him before that. He’d been on edge already tonight, and the two of them starting a fight didn’t help things. Michael shrugged and replied. “It was that one Earl filled up with flowers, daffodils or something. You know, he keeps it by the window.” Gabe didn’t look at Michael as he responded, and instead leaned down to pick up a bottle of whiskey, a leftover from the fight.
Michael kept looking at his brother, his features softening a bit as his voice got lower. “I heard about Johanna. John called me and told me about it.”
Gabe’s eyes smoldered as he looked back. “That had nothing to do with it. John needs to learn how to keep his mouth shut.”
Michael sighed and rubbed over his face once before asking “You heading back to your apartment?”
Gabriel looked at him defensively. “Might as well, I have nowhere else to go now.”
“I’ll walk you home…”
--
The streetlights shone lifelessly as the two walked down the street. It was close to ten, and most of the activity had died off. Gabe liked the streets like this, quiet. It let him feel like he had the whole world to himself.
Michael broke the quiet. “So, what happened with Amy?”
Gabe looked up at his brother for a moment, trying to consider how much he could hide from his brother, and how much to tell him. He wasn’t about to break down, not in front of his little brother. It took a few moments, but he realized that he had to say something or Michael would just start making assumptions. “She said that she couldn’t handle this anymore. That she’d never shared me with another woman before, and she wasn’t about to start now. She gave me that crap about how I needed to wake up and get on with my life. She was always like that…trying to tell me how to live.” He stopped for a second, collecting his thoughts. A smile rose on his lips and he continued “I got into trouble at work today, and got into a huge fight with my boss. I think that’s what set her off finally.” He paused for a moment. “As soon as she gets her things out, I think I’ll enjoy the single life for a while. Maybe I can sleep around this time, you know find me a chick with nice…” he cupped the air in front of his chest for emphasis before giving a wink and a laugh.
Michael laughed too. It had started as sort of a low chuckle, but soon grew unrestrained as he wrapped himself around the train of thought. “Yeah, get you a nice top-heavy girl to fiddle around with…of course, you’d have to give up all of your alcohol for her though. Nothing like that would dare touch you while she was sober.” He made a gesture to the bottle of whiskey to emphasize his point. Gabe looked down at the bottle of liquor, staring at it thoughtfully before pulling the cork off and smiling back. “Well, I guess I’ll just have to make do without the women then.” He said before taking an extended chug of the warm golden tincture. As he finished he looked back at his brother and they both laughed. They laughed, and soon after they had their arms slinging over the other’s shoulder to support each other from doubling over. The laughter echoed through the empty street, and continued for what seemed like hours. The joke faded away, it wasn’t important anymore, the laughter now self-sustaining, its own joke.
However, as they raised their eyes to look at each other, the laughter faded back as they steadied themselves. The laughter was consumed by the night, until it faded to a lingering chuckle. They began walking again, slowly weaving their way through the streets. They each took a look back at the spot they’d stopped at, briefly smiling as they made their way forward.
“So, have to been by recently?”
Gabriel looked up at his brother before shaking his head. “I thought about it, but…I don’t know if I can go back right now.”
Michael looked ahead and spoke tonelessly. “It’s been 3 months, you know…”
Gabe looked at one of the passing stores to the side. “Well, in a couple hours, it’ll be three months and a day actually.”
Michael’s eyes shifted down to look at his brother again. “You don’t think we should go? It’s not far.”
Gabe looked up at his brother. “I don’t need to go. I know what day it is.”
“Well, then I need you to go. I need to go, and I’m not going to go alone.”
Gaberiel’s eyes rolled away mercilessly. “You’re such a baby. Can’t you go anywhere without someone else holding your hand?”
Michael continued staring, not responding one way or another to his brother’s taunt. Gabriel wouldn’t look him in the eyes, but he could feel the gaze burrowing into the side of his head. The two seemed to be at a standstill until Gabriel finally looked back. “Fine…you’re such a pansy..” he said, offering his whiskey up to the younger brother.
Michael took the bottle and smiled at his brother. “And you’re a prick, but I have to deal with you.” He took a swig.
--
Their walk seemed to stretch on longer and longer as they continued forward, the time between footsteps working its way into infinity. In reality they had only travelled a couple of blocks, standing by an unlit plot of land near the riverfront. It was fenced off from the rest of the world with an iron bar gate centered on a stone wall. The bars sprung up from the ground, shooting into pointy tops partially marred and rusted by time. The top of the gate used the same iron design, and spelled off the words “Murrell Home Cemetery.”
The two brothers stared up at the closed gate, already chained off. Gabriel briefly thought about turning back, but he already knew what his brother would say. Hell, he was the one who taught him to jump fences in the first place. Instead of complaining, he took the bottle of whiskey, and slid it through the bars. Then he bent over and clasped his hands together, forming a way to boost Michael up. Michael smiled and said “Hey, don’t you think I should be boosting you up. I am the bigger brother now after all.”
Gabe merely glared up at Michael, snapping at him with “I’m always going to be the biggest. If you need a reminder, I’ll kick your ass any day of the week to prove it.” Michael chuckled to himself as he stepped into his brother’s hands, boosting himself up onto the wall and then reaching down to pull his brother up after him. Gabe smiled as he looked back down at the sidewalk. “You know, they really should invest in a better security system on thiss place. Any ol’ street vagrant could just wander in here ho’ever they like.” He said, his speech slurring a bit from some combination of alcohol and physical exhaustion. They smiled a bit before they both dropped down on the inside of the cemetery. Gabe walked over to the gate to recover his leftover whiskey, offering another swig to Michael.
They wandered around in the dark, not bothering to hide their presence. They wandered around in the dark, stumbling around the grave markers and headstones, the elevated plots and the offerings of flowers for the dead. If they noticed any of it, they paid no mind. When they finally arrived at their destination, they saw a grassy mound, buried for just enough time to be of little notice among the rest. Michael slowly made his way up to the grave at this, his legs growing between steps as a bouquet of yellow flowers came into view, resting on the front of the stone. Gabe approached from behind him, the bottle dangling precariously between his fingers as he stopped back several grave lengths away. He looked at his brother’s lowered head and then turned to look at the side. From the middle of the cemetery, most of the surrounding lights were snuffed out. He stared out at the streetlights in the distance, small earth-bound stars isolating him from the rest of the sleeping world. The next best thing to a pub was the walk home at 3 am after. It was then that he could see a part of the world that no one else got to see, his personal world without light.
Several minutes later, Michael looked back up. He turned around, face neutral, to see his brother. “Aren’t you going to say something?”
“I ain’t got nothin’ to say.”
“You didn’t say anything the last time either.”
“I ain’t got nothing to say.”
“You can’t keep holding it in like this.”
“I ain’t got nothing to say!” Gabe broke up each word, trying to make himself as clear as possible. He knew he was slurring a little bit, but it was more than that.
“I would think that after everything that happened, you’d have more to say than anyone.” Michael’s voice remained neutral, calm. He knew what he was saying though. He knew what would come next, though he was a little thrown back when it did.
The bottle broke against the stone permanence of one of the other graves, leaving a jagged edge in Gabriel’s hand. The bottle raised itself between them, pieces of broken glass still stuck to what remained of the label as they pointed to Michael. “What the hell does that mean?”
“You were with her, you know what it means.”
“Say it! What the hell does that mean?”
The bottle shook a little bit, almost quivering in rage. It stayed where it was, however, moving no closer to Michael, to the grave. Michael said nothing, instead raising his hands and taking a step away from the grave, closing in on his brother.
This was all that was needed, however, and Gabriel rushed him. He was drunk, however, and Michael was a little less so. Grabbing Gabriel’s wrist, Michael twisted his hand, leaving the broken bottle to fly off on its own. Gabriel retaliated with his free hand, twisting himself further into the joint lock in order to land a punch straight into Michael’s kidney. Michael groaned as he fell back, releasing the lock in order to cradle the sucker punch to his exposed midsection. Gabriel took a moment to relish the subsiding pain in his shoulder before he was on his brother again, making semi-wild punches that Michael barely had time to block. However, Michael soon decided to forego blocking altogether, accepting several punches as he charged back against Gabriel, knocking both of them to the ground. Michael tried to pin his brother’s hands, groaning softly as each moment his failed to do so resulted in another punch. However, he had been the larger of the two for a while now, and even though they hurt, he could take them. Grabbing each of Gabriel’s arms and pinning them to the ground, Michael looked down at his struggling brother, trying to pierce through the alcohol with his eyes. “It wasn’t your fault!”
“Will you shut the Hell up? How would you know?! You weren’t there. You didn’t see it!”
“I read the police report Gabe! He ran that light going way too fast. No one could have avoided it!”
“I should have! I should have, but I didn’t! You weren’t there…you didn’t see her…hear her…you don’t know anything!” Gabriel spat back, his eyes glimmering in the low ambient light.
“I know Mom wouldn’t blame you. I know that she wouldn’t want this for you. For Christsakes, it’s been three months! Three Months! You haven’t even looked at her grave once, but you’re letting this eat away at you. You drove your girlfriend off, you’re looking to get yourself fired, and you even tried to start a hopeless fight with three idiots in a bar. Mom wouldn’t want you ruining your life over losing hers!”
Gabriel suddenly managed to wriggle his arm free, and Michael felt a sharp pain as his sore rib cracked against his brother’s fist. Groaning loudly in pain, he rolled to the side, his body finally conceding to its limits. Gabriel lurched to his feet, thinking to kick his brother while he was down, only to restrain himself before going through with it. Instead, he simply watched Michael for a moment, his eyes reflecting so many things at once that they appeared blank. For a moment, he looked up at the grave, lightly adorned with yellow daffodils, and then turned away, fading back into the darkness away from his brother still rocking back and forth in pain.
Michael lay there for a while, partially because he was waiting for the pain to ebb away, and partially because he had no idea what to do next. His brother had walked off. He briefly remembered the last time they had talked. He’d walked off then too. But this time was different, Michael could feel it. He didn’t quite know how, but it felt different. He rolled over and looked at the gravestone, lost to his own thoughts. After a few minutes, he thought he’d heard footsteps coming from behind him. They were faint, but as he painfully rolled over, he could see the footsteps were coming from a light, rocking back and forth in the darkness. His eyes contracted a bit as the light centered on him, moving closer and closer to the gravestone, until there was enough light to see the silhouette behind it.
“See? I thought it was a bunch of kids making all this ruckus, looks like it was just some druggie bum instead.”
A middle aged groundskeeper came into view, pointing a small gun and a flashlight at Michael. Apparently the grounds had been better safeguarded than him and Gabe had originally assumed. He struggled to get to his feet, but the pain in his chest told him that he wouldn’t be able to do anything afterwards anyway. He wasn’t too worried about the gun, it was probably for protection. However, he’d been caught trespassing, and there was little he could do at this point to escape or resist. He briefly thought about talking to the man, but nothing he could say would make any difference. He struggled to sit up before the man lurched forward threateningly. “No! You stay right there on the ground. I’m calling the police. I’m tired of you people defacing good people’s graves, and now you’re gonna see the consequences of trying to disturb the dead.” He said, pulling a small cell phone from his pocket.
Michael could only look up at him from the ground helplessly. He started trying to explain, but the old man wrote him off and shushed him, holding him at gunpoint while he dialed the police’s number.
However, before he could hit the dial button, something hard and heavy smacked him in the back of the head. The man collapsed, crumpling to the floor, as Gabriel stepped back into the light.
“Weren’t you saying something about there not being enough security in this place?” he said, with a strange, half-serious, half-mocking look on his face. He dropped a well-sized rock and stooped over Michael, saying “If I’d known you were so fragile, I would have taken it easier on ya.”
Michael rose onto his brother’s shoulder with an annoyed grin. “Oh, get off yerself. You were the one talking about security, ya prick.” As he leaned over the mocking shoulder of his brother, he looked down on the cell phone and the man. “Is he going to be alright?”
Gabriel looked down at him nonchalantly, almost shrugging. “I dinn’t hit him that hard, and I’m sure he’s gotta be able to take a hit better than you.” He looked down at the phone for a moment. “If it’ll make you feel better though…” He leaned down, indirectly causing more pain in his brother’s side as he hit the send button on the phone. “It’ll take a while for the police to get out here, but we’d better get moving all the same. Mom wouldn’t want you to ruin your life getting arrested, now would she?” He said, smiling over at his brother. Michael wasn’t sure what to say in return, so he merely groaned every other footstep. Gabriel shook his head ruefully and said “All these years, and I still have to take care of you.” as the two walked off, shoulder to shoulder into the darkness.
- So, my teacher says that Gabe coming back to hit the groundskeeper was predictable, and I think that was the largest negative comment so far. He said I should write a scene with just the groundskeeper and Michael, and see where it goes, but originally the groundskeeper was just an in for Gabe to come back. Hmm...anyway. There's a few subtexts in here, and I wasn't really sure what names to use, so I just went with a semi-plausible theme and stuck with it. Actually, there was one name in the story that was important, but it's been changed, twice.
So that the name didn't stick out to someone who would recognize it. The new name is important too I suppose, but not in a real sense, just one that no one will recognize, and ultimately one that doesn't mean anything except that I'm a hopeless dreamer.
Anyway, I'm in OK for the week. I'll try to update more later on, but for now I think this is long enough.
Nicholas