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By Root 398 0

his first bicycle under the tree. His happiness deflated when his mother and father said he was too big for training wheels. He could still feel the terror and the humiliation of those wobbly trips back and forth along the sidewalk with his father running behind while he held on to the back of the seat, trying to keep his huge son balanced. And then his father’s disappointment every time he let go and the bike careened out of control. It was eventually easier on them both to just quit. And then one day he looked out the window and saw his younger brother being pushed down the street. His father let go and Dennis kept pedaling triumphantly ahead, ownership his, as always, by achievement.

I’m not a good man, he thought, staring at the sheer, still curtain. My brother needs help and I know I should care, but I can’t. I don’t. He was still trapped, but here there were no guards, no one on the catwalks, and the only locks opened from the inside.

Gordon was scraping patches of peeling paint on the back of the house. His resolve to call Delores and apologize grew with the rhythm of the work. Maybe they couldn’t spend time with each other, but they could at least talk on the phone, he would tell her. What would be the harm? The adoption people wouldn’t know. And then when she passed all the tests and finally did get May Loo, they could see each other again. He carried the step stool around front, relieved to see more blistered clapboards. Work was his refuge. He began to scrape, working through the layers, not once gouging the wood. He didn’t know why he’d lost his temper and spoken to her that way. Maybe he’d never know how to deal with people. How could he be part of a relationship when he didn’t even know how to be a friend? Friendships had always been for other people. It had always been easier to not have feelings, to just go through the motions, but he was tired of being alone. Even pain and anger might be better than this. Climb down now, then, and call her, he kept telling himself, but he was afraid. He could feel his resolve weakening. He went inside and picked up the phone. What if Delores wanted him to leave her alone but was too kind to say it? Maybe May Loo was her best excuse for getting rid of him. The number he dialed was Dennis’s.

“Dennis? Gordon’s here.”

Lisa slowly opened his study door. His brother’s greeting was a dim smile. It was Lisa who told him to sit down, who said Dennis had missed him and was glad to see him. She said she’d be right back with coffee for them. Neither wanting to be left alone with the other, each declined, but she left anyway.

The brilliant July morning seemed worlds away from this stale room dim with closed blinds and Dennis’s heavy silence. Gordon was reminded of his father’s morose visits to Fortley and the pain of their forced conversations.

He cleared his throat and shuffled his feet. “Lisa says you’re not feeling too good. Are you sick?” he asked. Had Dennis nodded? He wasn’t sure.

“I’m all right,” Dennis finally said in such a low voice, it was a moment before Gordon understood.

“You don’t look all right.”

Dennis sighed. “I don’t, huh?”

“No. You look . . . well, depressed.”

“You think so, huh?”

“Are you?” he said quickly, to parry the glint of threat in his brother’s tone.

“I said I was all right, didn’t I?”

“Well, that’s good.”

Returning, Lisa set the tray between them on the glass-topped table. Dennis waved off his mug. “Then don’t take it,” she said. “But Gordon might like some.”

“He already said he didn’t,” Dennis said with such contempt that Gordon couldn’t look at her. He squirmed, as unnerved by their strife as he had been by his parents’.

“But this is good,” he said with a quick, eager sip. “I’m glad now that I have it. I got up so early to start scraping before the heat that I didn’t get a chance to make any.”

“Scraping what?” Dennis asked.

“The house. It’s coming along good. Yesterday I got the back done. Now I’m starting on the front.” His next sip deteriorated into a slurp that sent coffee down his windpipe.

“What the hell’re you scraping the