the stairs two at a time, hurling swear words behind him.
Goddamnbitchbastrdfuckincuntl He screamed it like a single word, like the words he and I made up and said as fast as we could so no one would know we were swearing. I bent the glue cap back and wedged the scissor tip inside the slit. I pushed it around making the hole bigger and bigger until the cap gaped open.
Nicky slammed past my room, kicking my door a few times before stomping into his own room. Once there he was quiet, but downstairs Sylvia’s voice was still going, the same up-and-down pleading and insisting and demanding and probing. She wasn’t loud anymore; I could no longer understand any words. It was eerie. She continued as if she wasn’t alone, as if Nicky’s outburst had never happened and he stood, head bowed, in front of her as she combed his hair.
Soon the ranting ceased and Sylvia called us for dinner. Her voice was sweet, inviting.
“Hurry up,” she added. “We’re having barbecue. Your father is finishing up the hot dogs.”
I put my paper, scissors, glue and wood back into the box and opened my door. Nicky stood outside, his cheeks flushed and his eyebrows forked over his nose. I couldn’t condone his kicking my door and wasn’t ready to be friends yet, so I shrugged and pushed past him into the bathroom.
He was close behind. He brushed my arm as he stretched his grime-streaked hands under the running water. Usually when we touched it was by accident and it was a contest to see who would be the first to recoil and brush away the germs. This contact was no accident. I didn’t move away. Nicky squeezed closer and we stayed that way for a long time, leaning over the sink, hands under the hot tap that always ran lukewarm. We used our thumbs to rub away glue and dirt, but when we were done we kept our hands under the water, to feel its warmth on our skin, to listen to it rumble up through the pipes and splash out of the tap over our hands and down the drain. Right then, standing arm to arm and washing hands was the best thing in the world.
Soon, the hot water kicked in; I yelped and jumped back. Nicky’s forehead was smooth and brown and he looked small. I reached past him to turn off the tap then sat on the side of the bathtub to wait. I didn’t want to look at him anymore so I inspected my fingers, rubbing and peeling off the remaining glue.
“I’m not even hungry,” Nicky said, his hand on the doorknob. He wanted me to laugh.
I met his eyes. “Why did you have to call her a bitch?” It was words like bitch that made my mom act strange. It scared me that my mom did whatever she could to make people say the words she hated so much. If she could make even Nicky say those words — Nicky who never got mad, Nicky who let me do anything I wanted to him — then maybe she was strange all on her own. But Nicky had yelled at her and I too had yelled at her three days ago. Nicky and I must just be bad. But Nicky was worse. He swore.
Nicky put his hands on his stomach and seemed to pull himself inward. He bit his bottom lip and his ears reddened.
“That just shows what you know,” he said. “You’re the one I should call the bitch!”
He looked ready to spit. He opened the door, pushed his fist hard against my shoulder and clomped down the stairs. It wasn’t even a punch, and it certainly didn’t hurt, but the meaning was there. I stood limp, aware of the throbbing shoulder but unwilling to feel anything. I listened for the commotion I was sure Nicky would arouse downstairs but it didn’t come. The longer I heard nothing, the weirder it seemed.
The only light on in the kitchen was the one above the stove. Nicky sat at the table, his lips pinched white, a dirty triangle of burnt meat on a plate in front of him. The table was bare, without tablecloth, place mats, serviettes. There were no hot dogs, no barbecue. Our father was nowhere to be seen.
Sylvia stood at the stove, a cigarette dangling from her lips. She wore lipstick spread in thick uneven streaks. It was a ghastly colour, like brown bruised plums.
“I thought you said we were having hot dogs,” I said.
Sylvia didn’t answer. She clutched a variety of kitchen tools: a spatula, a straining spoon, a ladle, some wooden spoons and a bread knife. She banged them on the stove, against the frying pan that held three more blackened chops amid globs of white grease, on the stove overhang, on her own wrists.
Her eyes were like pennies — lighter, coppery, but flat and turned inside, not out.
“Sit down, Mercy,” Nicky hissed. His hands clutched the edge of his seat, his eyes never leaving Sylvia.
“Yes, dear. Sit down. Let’s have a nice family dinner.”
Sylvia let the utensils fall as though she’d forgotten them and lifted a chop from the frying pan using the fingertips of both hands. She dropped the meat on the table in front of my seat. She waited there, posed, foot, ankle, knee, thigh, hip all turned out perfectly, like a housewife in a magazine ad for Crisco or Betty Crocker. Her hair was still oily but she had teased it back into place. It resembled the empty carapace of a beetle, wings slightly outstretched, poised for potential motion. Her eyes clouded over, giving her away. Around them hung shadowy sacs of skin, making her face look both bloated and drained.
“I won’t sit. Nicky was right. No. Maybe he wasn’t right. He said you were a bitch. I say—”
I couldn’t finish the sentence. I’d said bitchl And not by accident. I was as bad as Nicky. Worse! I knew better. Those words made my mom act funny and here I was saying them. But I couldn’t take them back. What little was left of my mom, the part that wanted a nice family dinner, was receding from those sunken eyes. What could I do to bring her back? Getting angry wouldn’t help. I ducked my head and slid into my seat, trying not to gag as I picked up my fork and knife and sawed at the chop.
“I’m not finished with you, young lady,” Sylvia said, her words congealed with tears. Still, I detected the steel underneath.
“I’m sorry.”
“This is not good enough. I wish your father were here to see this. Darn it.” Sylvia ground the heels of her hands into her cheekbones.
Nicky and I cut into the meat, pushing the blunted edges of our knives against the bone to sever the charred flesh. Maybe if we ate the way she wanted she would be happy. I glanced at Nicky but he just glared into his meat.
Eating didn’t work. Sylvia sniffed in hard. She whirled around to the stove, seized a wooden spoon and brandished it like a sword, eventually turning it on herself, beating it against her bony forearms. Nicky slid off his seat and crouched under the table. I raised a piece of burnt pork to my lips. Sylvia ran from the room. She slammed two doors, one after the other, and wailed.
The portion of meat perched on the end of my fork was black on the outside, inside a pinkish grey. I hated meat, always had. I would sit at the table through Sam and Sylvia’s dinner conversations, chewing on a single piece until my jaw felt like thick rubber bands and ached when I tried to separate my teeth. Given the chance, I would slip away to the washroom and let the chewed flesh fall from my lips into the toilet bowl while I ran water and pretended to wash my hands. I wasn’t sure whether Sylvia ever found out, but lately, except for tonight, it hadn’t mattered when I didn’t put meat on my plate, those nights it was even served.
I popped the triangle of pork into my mouth and held it there, letting the grease seep into my palate. I wondered how long it would take me to melt the meat with my juices, how long I could sit there, squeezing the meat against the roof of my mouth with my tongue before it would dissolve and the pork flesh would become part
