The Bear: A Novel (2 page)

I hear
Momma yelling and I keep my eyes closed. Dreams aren’t real. I know that because my momma doesn’t yell. She has a soft voice that looks like a lily that tastes like sugar cookies at Christmas when you don’t put the sprinkles on. We made cookies and I was allowed to use the shiny stamp to make an angel. The wings broke off in the oven and then we tried again and we got perfect angels with wings. Stick wanted to eat his before Momma put the sprinkles on. He cried because he couldn’t wait for sprinkles and thought we were just taking the cookie from him. Momma gave him the cookie and he ate it and I put icing on mine. Red and green icing and sprinkles even though they blinked like the sun when I held them up. I got done and wanted to save my cookie to show Daddy and put it on a plate. Stick started to cry. He wanted my cookie. Momma said no. Stick cried more. Stick loves cookies.

Momma doesn’t yell about cookies and she doesn’t yell when I spill my glue on the carpet even though the glue was brand new and it was all gone. She says she only will yell if I am about to get hit by a bus. She says maybe sometimes people yell because things are hard but if you go past the things that are hard you can be very very strong. And now she is yelling. I open my eyes to see if a bus is coming. I will jump out of the way like a superhero, maybe one with a cape but maybe not. All I see is blue and I am lying on my side so it is hard to jump. The whole world looks blue and flappy. I give Gwen a hug and look at the flapping. It’s the tent in my face. Flap flap flap—it snaps and growls like a dragon. I better close my eyes so it isn’t so scary.

I think of my house in Toronto because I wish I am there. I like the woods too. The pine needles taste like spicy gum and I climb on rocks. I can swim like a dog when I kick hard. And I like coming out into the park near our cottage in a canoe with marshmallows and graham crackers and chocolate that we smoosh together and Stick gets it stuck in his hair and hands. He is Stick because he always has sticky hands. He used to have them more like every time he touched me on the arm his hand would stick on me. And he also plays with sticks all the time. He chops me with them and he pretends that they are cars or trucks or guys. I said one day that he was a sticky stick and Momma and Daddy really laughed because there is one word and he is both of them. That is how he got the name Stick and Daddy lifts his shoulders and says it just stuck.

Right now I like our house in Toronto more and it is brick and tall and skinny. My friend Jessica says hers is bigger. The kitchen is almost in the backyard where there is a tree that is the same age as me. We are growing thicker every year except it has more leaves and is way taller now. I want to catch up. There is a big long counter that I sit at to make cookies and eat cereal. Also Popsicles because in the backyard is where you go so they won’t drip. Sometimes I used to let my tongue melt it a little and let it drip into my tree. Now I don’t do that because the magic drip made the tree grow so fast that it is way bigger than me even though we are the same age. That’s why I like my kitchen but my favorite place in my house is my room. It has my puzzles and Lego and a carpet that tickles my feet. I go under the sheets with Gwen. We hide in bed when it is rainy outside the door or when I feel scared. I call and Daddy comes in to snuggle with me. He never talks. He gets into bed with mussy hair and wraps his arms around me. In the morning I wake up and he is gone.

When you have a dream and it feels real it means you might pee the bed. That’s what Momma says. If I am having a bad dream she says I should get up and pee. The bathroom light is always on. But I remember the tent. That is what is blue and very flappy. Flap flap flap. Maybe I am dreaming that too. The most important thing that Momma says I have to remember is not to dream I am going pee before I get to the toilet. It’s not my fault but I have to remember. If I don’t remember and I dream that I am peeing then I really pee but not in the toilet. Then I wet the bed and the sheet that makes a crunchy sound like cereal needs to be hung in the backyard on a string so I can hide behind it like the curtain for a play. Go to the toilet. There is no toilet when we are camping. I don’t need to pee.

And I don’t like the flap flap flap. I turn over and hug Gwen and snuggle into Stick and hope the sounds will go away. Momma screams like a monster is tackling her. That’s why I know it’s a dream so I should keep my eyes shut tight. It is dark behind my eyes. Momma never yells. Mostly not ever. Except sometimes.

Even though
my eyes are shut tight I can hear the rip of the zipper. I turn to look and see a crack of sky and it is really dark blue now and Daddy’s head is blocking most of it. He looks mad and I am in trouble. He is shouting and all I see is teeth. They are not very white teeth and big. He has pointy fangs and at the back he has even bigger teeth that are wide and look like they could be in a dinosaur’s head. Inside the middle of most of them is a piece of gold. That is where he keeps all our golden treasure so that it will be safe. If it is inside his mouth then no robber can sneak away with it. Or if a robber tries to take it in the night then he will also have to try to take Daddy’s teeth. That will wake Daddy up and he will chase the robber away. I duck down. Daddy scoops me up.

Daddy is hugging me but it’s not a snuggle. It is hard and squeezy and my breath shoots out of my body. The sky shakes. I see a long arm that is like a claw but big and it is a tree branch with needles. Daddy is running and the running is shaking me. The yelling won’t stop. I see Gwen’s head jumping up and down. She is in my arm and she will let go if I don’t hang on so I pull her tighter and try to sniff but her head is wiggling too much. Daddy jerks me back and I see things scatter all over the ground and I think that Daddy is making a mess.

Daddy moves away fast and I feel the ground go in my back. It is pointy and makes my breath go away. A pine needle pricks in the crack between my pj top and bottom. My pj pants are always falling down. I have to use my hand to pull them up at the back and sometimes when I am running it happens. Once a boy laughed and pointed because he said he saw my bum. He didn’t see my bum. Not the round part. Just the tippy top of the crack that peeks out from my pants. Momma says it’s my other-end smile. I like pants that stay on.

I want to reach to get my pants up but Daddy grabs my ribs again. He throws me like he does into the water at the lake but there is not water. I hit my head. I scream and it hurts and Daddy is so mad he is yelling. Except he made the mess not me. Or Stick might have sneaked out and made the mess but Daddy is still yelling. He pushes me and I wonder if he is going to throw me into the lake. He does this sometimes but we aren’t supposed to play rough in the water. We have to be laughing and everyone needs to be happy if Daddy is going to let me stand on his shoulders and jump or if he is going to throw me in. When I do jump I am not scared. I plug my nose and go in and the noise stops. It is quiet under the water. There are bubbles that I see and no sharks. They don’t live in our lake. Only little fish that nibble at my toes if I stand really still and even that doesn’t hurt. When it is quiet and I see the bubbles I know it is time to go up and I let go of my nose. I kick my legs and come back up and find Daddy’s arm to hold me up. The noises push back in my ears.

This time Daddy throws me and I don’t go in the water. There is something hard in my back and Daddy pushes at my stomach. It is not a game. We aren’t supposed to push so I tell him to stop and scream because he is screaming so many things that I don’t think he can hear me. He pushes again even though it is not allowed and it hurts my stomach this time so I curl into a ball around Gwen. He shoves me on the back and I feel the air rush around me. I hear a thump. Click.

I am in the black. And I am mad at Daddy. He is shouting and pushing and both those things are naughty and I wonder if he is getting in trouble from Momma. When Momma gets mad she doesn’t yell. She looks at me and she lets the sad drip up from her heart through her veins and into her eyes. Her eyes send the sad into my eyes and then it drips back down into my heart and makes it feel like a ball. But not a ball that bounces up high—one that is squishy because it needs Daddy to put in air. I won’t ask Daddy to pump my heart because I am so mad. I can’t see him anymore. It is so so dark. I don’t know if my eyes are open or shut. I think they are shut and I put my finger to see. I can feel my eyelid. After I know then I open my eyes and it looks exactly the same. My eye feels sad.

Momma leaves a night-light on when it is too dark. I stick my hand out. All I feel is a smooth wall. I know how it feels and it is Coleman.

The air goes whoosh and the light comes back from the sky. I see Daddy’s face. His eyes look like they are in a cartoon when a guy gets hit. Then I see Stick is in the air above me and he is coming down. His legs are curled up and his face looks like when he got stung by the bee in our backyard. He was in his high chair when he was a baby and the bee wanted his food. It ran into his forehead but the bee took the stinger away. Stick didn’t need a needle but his face went all red and it scrunched up into the middle. So now he maybe got stung by a bee and Daddy pushes him in beside me and I say “Hey” because there is not room and Stick’s feet are touching me. I try to push him away and Daddy gets even madder. He has snaky veins on the side of his neck under his skin and he yells so loud I cover my ears and hunch my shoulders up. I am bad. Very bad. Again. I didn’t wet the bed and I can’t remember what I did to get him so mad but I never really do.

“Stay in there,” he yells and sounds sick. “Don’t get out.”

Maybe Stick was bad.

Daddy squishes us down and it gets dark again. I feel the air whoosh and a thump and a click. Coleman shuts his mouth. The air from Stick’s nose goes in and I almost can’t breathe. And then it opens a crack and I feel the cool air again and take a breath. I see Daddy’s fingers and a rock. The fingers put the rock at the side of Coleman’s mouth where he has no teeth and it sticks there and Coleman’s mouth closes down. There is a click from the metal tooth at the front of Coleman and Daddy is yelling at me not to touch the rock and that it is my problem rock. Coleman can’t shut his mouth all the way because the rock is there at the side. Daddy moves away and now he is yelling at Momma. She won’t like it. I stick my ear to the crack of Coleman’s mouth and I hear Daddy yelling.

“The paddle…oh, my God.”

He says God, not Jesus.

We are inside Coleman. Stick’s toes stick into my leg and I don’t like it. There is not enough room for both of us. When we share a bed, Momma draws a line down the middle and no one’s toes are allowed over the line. I say there is a line and try to draw it with my chopper hand down the middle. I can’t draw the line without Stick’s bum leaking over. I kick him to get him on his side of the line and he cries and there is yelling and Momma is yelling back and Daddy is roaring and sounds like a lion with a big mane that shakes. I don’t like this Daddy that is shouting so much. I want the other Daddy back but he keeps yelling even though Momma isn’t. Momma doesn’t yell so I feel better. I like her quiet because that’s what she is.

I push Stick with my feet for more room. It is too squishy in Coleman for us. Now his bum is in my face and I don’t want it there. His nose breath is hot on me and I don’t want it there either. I put my head up to put my nose by the crack in Coleman’s mouth. I can see the rock is stuck between Coleman’s mouth like a tooth on the side. I am not allowed to touch the rock. I put my nose up to the air so that Stick doesn’t hog all mine. I can hear huffing and it might be the new Daddy. There is a huff and a growl and I hear Daddy talking like he is sad. He keeps talking and his voice is quieter so maybe my daddy is coming back and there is a snarl and a growl and I don’t know what it is. I try to push my head up but my forehead is tall. It stands up from my eyes until my hair so I can’t make my eyes get right in Coleman’s mouth to see through his lips. I am glad that Coleman isn’t a whale with a big tongue that would suck me back. Whales don’t have teeth so we could get sucked in on a waterfall that was really just how the whale eats. The whale doesn’t want to eat us but he doesn’t know we are there because he has no ears on his head and won’t hear even if Stick cries. A whale doesn’t eat people he eats trees.

Stick and I have to wait for trees to flow into the whale’s mouth. We sit in the middle. If a tree comes in and we catch it and maybe another then I could use a rope to tie the trees together to make a boat to float on top of. We could float out of the mouth when the whale was sleeping one day but then we would float back in by accident. But I can’t do any of my plan because Stick pulls my hair and I punch him back and I see that it is only Coleman’s mouth that we are in but I still feel shakes. There is no whale. Stick can’t swim.

I can hear things outside Coleman. My ear is close to his mouth so I can hear more than the inside sounds of Stick’s nose and whining. Outside I hear a growl and a nose breath that isn’t Stick’s. It’s from a longer nose like Snoopy’s. He is a dog that lives next door and usually he is behind the fence and he barks at Stick and me when we play with a ball. At first when I met him I got scared because Snoopy is big. His name was wrong because he didn’t look like he does in the TV. He is black and tall and inside his mouth there is black. He stared at me like I would be a good dinner or my arm is a chew toy. My momma said hello to Snoopy after a while and then we were friends. Now Snoopy gets in our yard and takes my ball but I share. Only with Snoopy not with Stick. Snoopy will run after my ball and bring it back again and again and again. He is the only person who will play ball with me for a long enough time because Momma only throws twice or one more time and then that’s all the times and I’m alone and that isn’t so good. And Stick’s hands are too fat to catch so Snoopy is the best. I can hear Snoopy outside of Coleman and it’s not Toronto but Snoopy came to visit near the cottage and maybe doesn’t like it because he growls. Mrs. Buchanan must miss Snoopy or maybe she came to see me too. Snoopy’s voice is low and he makes a woof woof woof. And I hear Daddy talking and I wonder why he has so much to say to Snoopy when usually he does not. Except for if Snoopy makes a poo and leaves it in our yard.