Bruiser (13 page)
Authors: Neal Shusterman
SUBTERFUGE
Grandparents everywhere talk about how they walked five miles to school each day in the snow, barefoot, and chased by wolves; but it's not like that anymore. Most everyone we know drives or gets driven. But Tennyson and I had recently taken to walking to school, even though it's almost a mile. The thing is, if we walked we got out of the house earlier. If we walked we didn't have to sit in a car with Mom and wonder whose awful cologne we were smelling. If we walked we didn't have to sit in a car with Dad, who used to be talkative but now had adopted a code of silence while driving. At least Tennyson and I talked to each other as we walkedâeven if it was only to argue.
“Dad seemed okay last weekend,” Tennyson said as we made our way through a drizzly morning. It was Friday, the day after Brew's big night out with my friends and me, so I was
still riding a good mood.
“When?” I asked.
“We were playing basketball. Brew was there.”
I thought about it, and wished I could have been there to see Dad being his old selfâand to see Brew play ball. His workouts with Tennyson have definitely been defining his body, and, okay, I'll admit I had a primal kind of desire to see those muscles in motion.
“Dad was like his old self,” said Tennyson, “but there was something about it⦔
I didn't know where Tennyson was going with this, and I don't think he knew either, because he never finished the thought.
Up ahead, when we were just a couple of blocks from school, we saw a tall, lumbering form in a leather bomber jacket. He had on a sweatshirt underneath and the hood was over his head, but I didn't have to see his face to know who it was.
“Brew!” I called out.
He turned to look, but just for a second. Then, instead of waiting for us, he picked up his pace.
“Look, he's running away from you!” said Tennyson. “I really like this guy.”
I ran to catch up with Brew, both annoyed and confused. For all those big strides, he wasn't moving very fast; and I caught up with him in about a block. I grabbed his arm,
and he turned his shoulder away, so I tugged on him harder, until I got a glimpse of his face beneath the hood. What I saw almost made me stumble into traffic.
His lips were swollen, and he had smudges of makeup on his face, clearly trying to conceal a black eye.
“Whâ¦what happened to you?”
He shrugged. “I was having a catch with Cody and missed the ball.”
“You're lying!”
He didn't deny it. “So?”
Now I could see that it wasn't just his eye; it was also in the way he held himself, the way he walkedâlike there wasn't a single part of his body that didn't hurt. I wanted to hold him but was afraid holding him would hurt him, too. “Did your uncle do this to you?”
He stayed quiet for a second and looked toward the school. “No,” he said. And then he said, “Yes.”
He seemed even more surprised than me that the word
yes
had come out of his mouth. I could tell he had every intention of keeping it secret forever. Suddenly he became pale with very real terror. Fear of me. Fear of me knowing.
I wasn't really prepared for the truth eitherâI was more stunned by it than anything else. Across the street a few kids laughed. They weren't laughing at us, but still it bothered me. How dare they laugh within a hundred yards of this truth?
“What about Cody?” I asked.
“Cody's fine. He's better than fine.”
“You have to tell someone.”
“I just told
you
.”
“I mean someone important.”
“Who? The principal? The police?”
“Yes!”
By now Tennyson had caught up with us and was just staring, stupefied. The bell rang at school, but I didn't care. Lateness was not a concern.
“If I tell anyone, then they'll take us away from my uncle,” Brew said. “And things will get a whole lot worse.”
“What could possibly be worse than being beaten within an inch of your life?”
He didn't answer meânot verballyâbut there was an answer in his eyes that had such a high windchill factor, I actually shivered.
“I can handle it,” he said. “I've got it all worked out. In a few months I'll turn sixteen, and I can become an emancipated minor. I'll move out, take Cody with me, and Uncle Hoyt won't be able to stop me.”
“That's assuming you're still alive!”
“I'll be fine. But if we get taken away from my uncle now, Cody and I will get put in a homeâ¦we'll probably get split up. And in a place like that there's no way I can hide what I can do. People will know. And once they know⦔
Again a blast of those windchill eyes. I wanted to argue him
to the ground on this one, but that icy gaze shut me down.
“Who knows,” Brew said. “Maybe my uncle will change.”
Then Tennyson, who I totally forgot about, chimed in. “Bullies don't change unless they want to,” Tennyson said. “Trust me, I know.”
We had to go to the authorities. We had to. This was a textbook case of abuse, and turning the man in was the right thing to doâno question. Except that this was Brewster Rawlins. If this were anyone else but Brew, I'd have gone straight to the Powers That Be and ratted out his uncle in an instant; but all the rules of normalcy and right and wrong broke down around Brew. What do you do with a textbook case when no one's written the textbook?
Suddenly I flashed to something I learned in biology. There are some animals that die without explanation if you take them out of their familiar environment. Even if they came from a horrible, hostile environment, they still die.
“You have to trust me,” Brew said. “Please⦔
What could be worse than his uncle? Only Brewster knew the real answer to that. And even though it went against everything I knew to be right, I reluctantly entered into his conspiracy of silence.
And I guess I wasn't the only one.
“You have to come up with a believable story or the teachers will be all over you,” Tennyson told him. “If anyone
asks about your eye, tell them that I beat you up for dating Brontëâand if I have to back it up, I will.”
I gaped at Tennyson, unable to believe the suggestion. “No!”
“Well, do you have a better idea?” he snapped.
But I just looked away, because I had nothing but misgivings.
Brew, on the other hand, was genuinely moved by Tennyson's offer. “You'd do that for me?”
And Tennyson said, with his typical smirk, “Sure. What's a friend for if he can't take credit for punching you out?”
Â
Brew took Tennyson up on his offer; and before lunch, people were buzzing with the news that Tennyson had beaten him senseless. My friends came out to console and support me, calling Tennyson every name in the book; and in turn, Tennyson's friends supported him, giving him kudos and high fives that he had to accept or else risk tainting the credibility of Brew's story. Suddenly Tennyson and I were at war with each other in the eyes of our classmates, and no one but Brew knew that it was all fakeâa tricky, nasty subterfuge designed at throwing everyone off the track.
I couldn't help but feel I'd made a terrible, terrible mistake. There were so many times during that awful day when I held my phone with 911 dialed in, ready to hit Send, but in
the end I didn't do it.
I don't know how things would have been different if I had made that call. Maybe it might have saved Brew from what happened next. On the other hand, it was going to happen one way or another, no matter what any of us did.
EMBOLISM
(I)
Where sorrow waits,
With cold and clammy hands,
Shaking in grim anticipation,
Is where I must return.
Home.
A house in a fallow field,
Losing its battle with time,
The wreck and ruin,
And the man inside,
Who never laid a hand on me,
Yet left me battered.
My uncle.
Nothing ever changes,
But the fear fermenting to dread,
As Cody and I go home.
(II)
“Do ya think he's calmed down?”
“Do ya think he got his job back?”
Do you think, do you think, do you think?
“I don't know, Cody.”
Â
What I mean to say is I don't care, because my uncle has cut my soul from my body, leaving bitterness behind; a stretch-lipped grimace of futility, because whatever happens to my uncle happens to me.
Even as his own hope is strangled, so is mine, beaten like a blunt boot to my ribs, snuffed like a candle with too short a wick, and not even Brontë can rekindle it.
Â
What he's done is unforgivable.
“Maybe he'll be okay.”
“Maybe he'll be sorry, ya think?”
Maybe, maybe, maybe.
“We'll see, Cody.”
Â
I creak open the rusty gateâfrom here it's thirty-eight steps across the field to our door, steps I take slowly, in no hurry to know the answers to Cody's questions, when suddenly a jagged sound peels at the edge of our awareness, stopping us in our muddy tracks.
“Did you hear that?”
Something has shatteredâa tinkling, muffled by closed windowsâthen another smash of a different, finer timbre. The first smash was glass, the second china, and Cody now looks to me with the wide eyes of fear mercifully cushioned by innocence.
“What's he doing in there, Brew?”
Reaching deeply into my pocket, I scavenge a few crumpled bills and hand them to Cody, telling him to go to Ben & Jerry's; and, grabbing the bills, he backs away from another, louder crash inside.
“Guess he didn't get his job back.”
Cody runs to smother his fear in Cherry Garcia, and I go to face my uncle alone.
(III)
I'll never understand how a man can live his life
With his finger on the self-destruct button,
Holding it there day after day,
Blinded by an obsession to press it
But lacking the conviction to do even that.
This was my Uncle Hoyt before today,
But today, the auto-destruct sequence is engaged,
And counting down.
My uncle has taken up batting practice with dinnerware.
A minefield of broken china and glass
Litters the floor in every room.
He lobs a gravy boat into the air,
I believe it was once my grandmother's,
Then he swings the Louisville Slugger,
Detonation in blue and white shrapnel.
I can smell scotch everywhere
And wonder how much of that amber poison
Is pickling his brain.
He hurls a teacup, swings, and misses,
Taking out the hanging kitchen lamp instead. And he mumbles,
“Close enough.”
I should turn tail,
I should just let him be,
But if I'll ever make a stand,
It must be here; it must be now,
And though I know I'm not wired for war,
The time has finally come to fight my own nature.
I'm ready for this dance.
(IV)
A swing of the bat, the sound of my voice,
Tentative, timid, a catch in my throat,
I must take command, I must take the lead,
A swing of the bat, a shattering glass.
I move through the madness and reach for the bat,
Wrench it away from his white-knuckled hands,
I toss it behind me and don't miss a beat,
Time for my uncle to learn a new step.
He turns like a scorpion ready to strike,
But his stinger is dull and his venom is weak,
His eyes blaze with anger, his soul burns with bile,
Like the world is to blame for all of his misery.
“Go get your brother; we're leaving tonight,
There's more work up north; there's more hope than here,
You'll do what I tell you; you'll do what I say,
You'll go pack your things, 'cause we're leaving right now.”
The room is in ruins, his bridges are burned,
And Cody and I are still chained to his fate,
His life lies in ruins; his life is not mine,
He gave me these shackles, but I can break free.
And I say to him
“No”
with a break in my voice,
“NO!”
sounding much more commanding,
“We're not going anywhere; neither are you,
You'll back off right now, or you'll feel my hand.”
“So do it,” he says with a strange, slanted grin,
I dare you to hit meâgo on, take me down!
What are you waiting for? Knock yourself out,
But don't start a fight you can't finish.”
A line in the sand, a dare there between us,
My hand is a weapon; my blood's in a boil,
I strain to move mountains; I strain to swing free,
Denying my nature, I raise up my arm.
Let me, for once, be the bruising brutality,
Let me at last be a fist in the face
Of the vicious injustice my brother and I
Have endured at the hands of our uncle.
But my fist is still fixed by invisible shackles,
The mountain won't move; my hand won't swing free,
I cannot deliver; I only receive,
And he gloats at his victory, laughs at my shame.
“You're weak and you're worthless, that's why you need me.
You're helpless and hopeless; your brother's the same
You'll remember how lucky you are that I'm here.
So you'll take what I dish, and you'll like it.”
Then he shifts with a slouch and slumps in a chair,
Something is wrong with him, wrong with me, too,
I can't feel my arm, and I can't move my shoulder,
Feet start to tingle, and skin starts to itch,
My hand's still a fist that I cannot unravel,
My face has gone loose, like an avalanche slide,
My tongue becomes rubber; my lungs barely breathe,
I fall to the ground as my left leg gives way,
And there in the chair Uncle Hoyt is the same,
Our eyes are now locked in a clear understanding,
What falls on my uncle rebounds out to me,
Oh, my Godâhe's having a stroke!
(V)
“TakeItAway, TakeItAwayFromMeBoy, ThasWhyYerrHere, IKnowThatNowâ¦ThasWhy Y'Came SssoManyYearsAgo, WhyYerMomDid WhutSheDidâ¦NowYerr MySssecondLife, MySssecondShance, SssecondShance TahMakeSssomething A Mysself, TahDoItRight, NoMore YearssA LivinOn TheEdge A MyOwnLoussyLife, NeverNothin More AnClosedDoorss An MishedOpportunitiessâ¦ButYerrChanginThat, you're ChanginThat RightNowFerMe, Brewshter, you're Makin' It all all right, My BrokenSpiritBecomin' yours, My SsorryBodyBecoming yours, I CanFeel it happening, FeelinBetter, TalkinBetterâ¦SpongeItAll away, boy,
'CauseYouCareAbout me, YouCare and can't deny it, I KnowIt In MyHeart, you KnowIt In yourss, all these YearssA Putting a roof OverYer head, food in yer stomach, have all GottaCount for ssomething, not perfect, no, NeverPerfect, but a family, RealAndTrue, lookin' out ForOneAnother like you're lookin' out for MeRightNow, and so what if I GetFoul from time to time, who don't, ButYouCan forgive it right, becausse you understand, YouCare, and I'm grateful for it, Brewâ¦grateful 'cause today you KnowYourPlace on this good earthâ¦your place and YourPurpose, and that's to ssave me, YourPoorOld Uncle Hoyt, I can feel it all DrainingAway, the numbness, the heavinessâ¦steal it all away, Yeah, That's Itâ¦and I won't forget it, Brew, and I'll GiveYou the biggesst shiny marble headsstone and Cody and I will visit WhenWe can, and flowerss on your birthday, and the doors of heaven, they're flung OpenWide for you 'cause of what you're doing today, so take it away, take it away from me, Brew, like you're supposed toâ¦that's why you're here.”
(VI)
I try to speak but my tongue is now fat and lazy, and life starts trailing away, my body giving inâ¦. This can't be my purposeâto die in my uncle's place, my flesh shutting down, left leg, left arm, half of me gone, and the other half beginning to follow, a catastrophic collapse, because I care just enough to be trappedâand the thought of him walking out of here free and clear is too much for me to bearâI do not
want thisâI want MY life, not HIS death, and my only hope is to stop caringâto kill in the depth of my own soul the pity and compassion I feel for the man who raised me for half my lifeâcan I do that to you, Uncle Hoyt, now, when it's either you or me? Can I find it in my heart to NOT find it in my heart? I dig down, down, down, to make the numbness taking root in my body invade that place in me that still cares about you and purge it so that I can leave youânot love, not hate, but leave you dark and indifferent, in an Arctic coldâI don't care about you, not now, not anymoreâ¦and nowâ¦and nowâ¦I can slowly feel sensation coming back to my faceâI don't care what happens to you, Uncle HoytâI can twitch my legs nowâand as your fate sinks back into you, you reach out to grab meâbut with my one good hand I do what I could not do beforeâI swing my fist and connect with your jaw, and you fall awayâI see your faceâhow it's losing muscle tone as the stroke returns to you, sinking inâa mud slide seeking low groundâI have both my arms backâmy legs are still not strong enough to carry me, but I scramble for the door on all fours as you wail incomprehensible furyâyour fate is your own againâand if I can get far enough away and keep myself from caring just long enough, your fate will stay bound to youâso I drag myself out the door, falling off the porch, dredging through the mud, still unable to stand, but the farther away I get, the easier it is, until I can rise to my feet, until I am at the edge of the range of my giftâuntil
I can't feel you anymore, Uncle Hoyt, no, I can't feel you at all. I can walk nowâwith a limp, but I can walk, and I stride powerfully across the field toward the gate. Your death is yours alone, Uncle Hoyt; it's what you created, what you've earned. And you'll know soon enough if God truly has mercy enough to forgive you. Because I can't.
(VII)
I look for Cody,
One foot almost dragging,
And as I cross into a parking lot,
I have to squint from the neon glare of the strip mall,
And yet I'm relieved to be doused with light.
In the ice-cream shop,
Cody stirs a molten mess the color of a storm,
Watching as I make an emergency call
On a borrowed cell phone,
Then says nothing as we leave the shop,
Nothing as we turn toward home,
Nothing, even as distant sirens draw closer.
“Hold my hand, Cody.”
“I'm not a baby.”
“I said, hold my hand!”
Because it's not just for him.
It's for me.
(VIII)
Cody and I go home,
With fear fermenting to dread,
For everything has changed.
My uncle.
Who left me battered
Yet never laid a hand on me,
The man inside,
A wreck and ruin,
Losing his battle with time,
In that house in a fallow field.
Home.
Where I must return
Shaking in grim anticipation
With cold and clammy hands
Where death waits.
