The Bear: A Novel (5 page)

“Anna, do this?”

“What?”

She closes her eyes and opens them twice. “Take your brother for a canoe ride.”

“Just us?”

“It will be fun. You are big enough to paddle, right?”

“Yes.” I am proud and sit up. “Are you coming too?”

“Daddy and I will follow you.”

“Soon?”

“When it’s time, we’ll be there.”

“Now?”

“We will be waiting. Daddy and I will be there.”

Stick is
still sitting in the tent. He is on Momma’s sleeping bag and his poop in his pj’s stinks up.

“Come here,” I say to him. “Take off those pj’s.”

He doesn’t like his poop because he stands up and comes to the door. Usually he doesn’t do what I say because he only wants to listen to Momma. I pull on the bottom of his pj’s and they come down a little and the poop is inside and it makes me throw up a little bit in my mouth yuck. I pull them back up. They have ducks on them and they used to be mine but my legs got too long since I’m going to start grade one. Stick’s legs are still stumpy and his knees make me laugh. They are fat circles and they don’t knob out. They go straight into his legs. They tickle too and I use my hand to put a spider on his knee and make it walk around and Stick laughs.

“Ta-wick-ally,” he says.

That is a very Sticky thing to say. He can’t speak English like the rest of everybody but he uses his own secret language. Momma and Daddy and me know what the words mean like that’s tickle. When we meet a grown-up or we go to a party sometimes I have to tell people what Stick is saying because I speak the secret language and they don’t. When we were eating Popsicles with Mrs. Buchanan and Snoopy was shut inside so he wouldn’t lick Stick’s face Stick’s Popsicle dripped and then dropped. Mrs. Buchanan got a small bowl and put a new Popsicle inside the bowl so that Stick wouldn’t drop it again. He doesn’t touch Popsicles not even pink ones with his fingers because they are cold but he didn’t say that. He says “I wanna werk.”

Mrs. Buchanan doesn’t know what a werk is and she thinks he was talking about Daddy going to work because he goes through the back gate to get his car. Stick doesn’t remember going to his office so he thinks that Daddy goes and hides behind the gate all day. When Stick wants to see Daddy in the day he opens the back door and calls him. Then he thinks that Daddy stops hiding in the bushes at the end of the day and comes through the back door again. Mrs. Buchanan knows that joke so when Stick asked for a werk she thought he was talking about Daddy coming home and she said that he wouldn’t for another hour or two because it was still the afternoon. I speak Stick and I know that werk is kind of like “fork” and he calls everything he eats with a werk. He doesn’t say “spoon” ever.

And “copcorn” means Stick wants popcorn and anyone could guess that. When his socks are on and he wants them off and he always does in the summer, he says “My knees are stuck.” That means help get my socks off and ankles and knees are mixed up. He asks for “cupper” and my momma always thinks he is asking to get in the cupboard to get a cookie but it is really supper. Momma figured it before I told her but it went on for days and days and I worried that Stick might get a cookie and I wouldn’t so I hid behind the counter and waited to see. There are a lot more words that I know and other people don’t. Mrs. Buchanan doesn’t speak Stick and I do and so I know all that but I felt tired to explain and if I did I couldn’t eat my Popsicle and I had to quick because it was summer and my Popsicle was melting. Purple and with two sticks. I got both sticks and didn’t have to split because Mrs. Buchanan says I say thank you.

“Want to go on a boat ride?” I ask Sticky.

He looks at me and nods and he says “Momma.”

“Come on,” I say.

But he doesn’t move. He sits on Momma’s sleeping bag getting his old poop on it and he will get in trouble for that so I pretend I don’t see because the trouble gets me too.

I want Momma. I stand up and I look over and I see her foot sitting in the plants and I don’t want to go for a canoe ride even though that means I am big if I am allowed to go.

“Don’t wanna,” says Stick.

I stamp my bare foot and the needles don’t like it. They prick me back on my little toe. My feet are standing in the mess and I don’t like it. I want to make it not a mess but there is too many things to know what to do with everything. I look around and feel mad and I see a red bag. It has a big white cross on it and I know that is the Band-Aids. I am not allowed a Band-Aid unless there is blood and neither is Stick. Momma had blood and she needs a Band-Aid so I open the red bag and inside is a plastic bag that is hard to get open. I do a rip in it. That is bad because water can get in if the canoe gets tipped over. The bag isn’t in the water now so maybe Daddy can fix the bag before we put it around the water. I stick my fingers in the hole and find a Band-Aid.

I’m going to take the Band-Aid for Momma for her blood. She can’t get mad because that is a nice thing. I take two because there is a lot of cuts. I step over the mess and get to Momma’s foot again. She is still lying down like she’s on her bed but it’s the plants.

“I have you a Band-Aid.”

Momma doesn’t answer. Her eyes are still closed and she is sleeping. I bend down and push my cheek on hers again because it is her best thing. I keep my cheek there and I don’t talk and after a minute I see her eyes open. I know because I have my eye right in hers and her eyelashes give me a poke in the eyeball.

“Ow.” I sit away.

“Oh, Anna,” she says in a very whisper. “Be a good girl.”

“I have you a Band-Aid.”

She doesn’t look happy or like she means thank you. I hold the two Band-Aids up to her eye so she looks at them and I start to rip the paper on one of them. It is hard to get the Band-Aid out of the paper but Momma doesn’t take it from me like she does to help so I rip myself. The first rip means I can pull it and I feel happy about that.

“The canoe, Anna.” She takes a really tired breath. “Please; be a good girl.”

Momma closes her eyes and I put my finger on her cheek but she doesn’t open up. She looks very tired and maybe like when she is sick and I am supposed to take Stick and not wake her up. We are allowed to turn on the TV even if it isn’t Saturday or TV time. We can play dress-up in the closet and put on Momma’s high heels. I make Stick wear the black ones because the red are the best and shiny. I think of Stick in my daddy’s tie and my momma’s black high heels with his dingle sticking out because he was naked but I also think of the black dog too and my tummy feels shaky.

“Momma. Mom?”

She looks mad.

There is a bad sniff in the air and I don’t like it. It makes my tummy feel more shaky and I think the bacon ball from Stick’s mouth again and I’d like to sniff Gwen. She isn’t in my hand. I look over and see Stick is sitting in the door of the tent. He is holding Gwen and I don’t like it too.

“Sticky!” I stomp so that he knows I am mad and I grab Gwen from him. It is easy because his arms are fat and not muscle and I get Gwen and sniff to make sure she is still right. Stick tries to grab her back, but I stand up and hold her over my head so he can’t reach. I want Momma to come and get him away because Gwen is mine. I look over and see her foot standing in the plants and she wants me to get Stick in the canoe. If I can do that I am her strong girl and Daddy will come back to be in the family even though it’s not my fault and I can make it better if I am a super good girl and I am.

“Come on, Sticky,” I say still holding Gwen away.

“No.”

I take a few steps toward the canoe. “Come on.”

“Gimme.” He points to Gwen.

I will never but I look over and Momma is there. I hold Gwen because I am trying to do what Momma says.

“You want Gwen? Come to the canoe.”

Stick’s eyes open up and he thinks he is really lucky. And then his eyes go more shut because he knows I never ever give him Gwen and maybe he will come and get her and get a punch instead. I would like to punch him because I am mad at Momma for making me take him for a canoe. Stick makes a lot of trouble for me and I get in trouble instead of him. I feel mad and I’m not going to give him Gwen. No way. I pull her back and sniff and Stick sits back down in the door of the tent because he knows he won’t get his fat hands on Gwen. He can’t even say her name right. When I tell him to say her name he says “Glen” and I tell him wrong and he forgot the word “w.” He says “Wind” and that is wrong too.

Stick’s bum is back on Momma’s sleeping bag and I won’t get it off even though Momma said. I kick at the floor and my toe hits something. Ow. It’s the tin. And I pick it up and know that it’s the cookie tin and it now has a bunch of holes in the top and it has a bang and it must have been Stick trying to get a cookie. I look up and he is watching me and I know that he really wants a cookie because his little tongue pokes out of his mouth and he licks his lips. I shake the tin.

“Cookie?”

He nods his head yes.

“Come on.” I hold the tin out and shake it and start walking back to the water. I am calling him like I call Snoopy, holding the treat out and making my voice squeaky because it sounds not like me and more like a girl who is nice. “Come here.”

Stick stands up and puts one foot in the mess. He has to step to get around some eggs that are broken and a jar of jam that has the top on. Lucky. If the top was off Stick would have stopped to stick his fingers in it and lick. He likes the wax part that is on the top and he and I get to trade who gets to lick it when it comes off a new jar that is opened up for the first time. He knows he can’t get the jar open so I see him look at the jam but I shake the cookies again.

“Here, Sticky.” I call him like Snoopy.

He knows it is my Snoopy voice because he sticks his tongue out and puts his hands up near his chest and curls them like paws. Stick likes Snoopy and got jealous because Snoopy and I play and so Stick made an inside dog that lives in his head.

“Woof,” he barks.

“Good boy, Stick. Come on.”

He keeps walking and I go backwards and then my heel hits the canoe and it makes thump on the metal. Ow.

I look at the canoe. It is half in the water floating and half on a piece of dirt that turns into the water. There is also Daddy’s paddle lying in the dirt. I think eek because I see that it is broken. The long handle part is cracked in half and he will be so so mad. Momma gave him the paddle from Santa and a man made it exactly right. So so mad. I didn’t break it and I will need a paddle and I grab the side of the canoe to push it in with one hand. The canoe won’t move. It feels like when I put my hands on our car when it is in the driveway and try to push. I can’t lift or push the car and Daddy says that most people can’t. Even a big man. He says that sometimes small people have moved cars when they want to save someone like Superman. He gets special powers and can move things that they couldn’t before. I close my eyes and think about a laser beam coming to my forehead and the special powers flow into my head and they laser down to my chest and out my arms and legs and I take a big breath and I push.

Nothing happens. The canoe is too stuck for special powers even. Daddy pulled it up enough so that it won’t float away. He should come and help.

“Daddy!” I say.

He doesn’t call back to tell me one minute and he doesn’t come. I have to ask Momma to do most things and I look up and am about to tell her to come and get the canoe out and I see a foot. Stick starts barking in my face and he has his hands on the tin and he pulls it. I tell him to go away and I try and push the canoe with my leg but it is stuck. I push Stick back and try again but no. It is stuck and I need Daddy. When I push with Daddy it slips on the sand. Stick falls and goes plop on the sand on his bum and then he looks mad. Like when he got stung by a bee and his face went all red and twisty. He yells and stands up again and tackles me. He wants the tin. I throw Gwen in the canoe so she won’t get ripped. He grabs the tin and turns to run away. His legs take many steps but I only have to take two and I have my arms around him and my chin over his head. His foot sticks out the back and he gets it tangled between mine and we fall. The tin is the hot potato except that we both want it and it’s under Sticky’s belly on the ground so I have to flip him and grab it back. I get it in my hands and go back to the canoe and he comes and tries to grab it again. He is mad and not crying but growling and yelling.

I hold the tin up above my head. I still need it to make him do things. He won’t stop and he gets his claws out and scratches my face hard. Stick is small but he can be mean and I am not supposed to be too rough but he doesn’t care. I scream because it feels like blood on my cheek and I jump up with the tin up high and he is still clawing. He is hurting me and I shout at him to stop and he doesn’t so I throw the tin. He keeps clawing me because he doesn’t know that I’m not holding the tin and I hear clang clang clang and it stops us both. We look and the tin has gone into the front of the canoe in front of Momma’s seat. Stick shoves me back and grabs the edge of the canoe. I know he wants the cookies and doesn’t care but my face hurts and I put my hand on the scratch. Stick puts his belly on the side of the canoe and flops his head inside. He pulls on the bar and slides on his belly and the canoe nearly tips but it doesn’t and only his body tips inside. His head is on the ground and his legs plop in after but he doesn’t care because all he cares about is cookies. He gets up and steps over my bar and walks back up to Momma’s seat. He sits and keeps the back of his head to me and I see he has the tin in his hands and he is trying to open it. I don’t care because my cheek hurts and my feelings hurt too. I have my hand on the canoe. I feel my hand on the canoe move up into the air a little bit.

And wait a minute the canoe is loose on the sand and I can take a step forward and it comes with me and the canoe is swimming. Stick’s bum in the back made the front float up from the dirt. I get excited because I got the canoe in the water and I didn’t think I could and I didn’t even need Daddy or Momma to help. Stick sits in Momma’s seat and wrestles with the cookies and can’t get them open and I try and get my leg up over the side of the canoe. I can’t because now the canoe is swimming, it is high up. I can pull it easily and see a rock like Momma showed me. I pull the canoe to the rock and Stick doesn’t care because all he thinks is cookie cookie cookie. I step on the rock and it is a good choice of rock because it isn’t a slippy and my foot sticks to it. I step over the side and into the middle like I should so it’s not tippy. My pj pants pull down and my bum smile is out so I have to reach and pull them up. The canoe wiggles but not much and we float a little and I look at the water and remember no paddle. I don’t have a life jacket on and that is trouble. I look for a yellow spot and there is no life jacket on the floor and I need a paddle. I look back at the sand and a paddle is lying there. I think it is two paddles but it is one and broken. Daddy’s paddle is broken I remember. So so mad.