That’s when Bruce got up from the table and went back to the room.
You know I ate cake. You know Mom thanked Dad ten times for the vacation. She looked scared, that’s what she looked like. Scared. I’d seen that look before and I’d heard Dad be rude to Bruce before and I felt bad right then for telling Bruce to shut up. I guess I was just used to everybody ragging on Bruce. It was a tradition in our family. But when I ate the three cream cake and cried, I wasn’t crying because the cake was so good. I was crying because I’d goaded Bruce the way he’d been goaded his whole life. Maybe I was why he was moving so far away. Maybe I was one-third of it, anyway.
I was ten. I knew better than that. We had no-bully rules in our school. We had be-kind rules in our school. I vowed to be kind to Bruce from that moment forward. In my head I vowed this. I couldn’t tell Mom and Dad because they were too busy being mad at Bruce.
But I vowed it.
? ? ?
What happened next went as fast as I’m going to tell it.
I didn’t tell Mom and Dad about the rings.
Bruce did.
I was on the balcony again. Mom closed the door all the way again. It was a clear night and I could see the stars. It was a quiet night at the resort—no pool parties or beachside romantic dinners—and I could hear them all fighting through the sliding door to the balcony. The people in the room next door even called the manager about how loud they were. The phone ringing made Dad madder.
I didn’t hear whole sentences. I heard words and phrases. I heard divorce, Sarah, liar, you’re the liar, divorce, rings. In the ocean now. Because you’re living a lie. It’s not helping her. Oregon. Never giving you another penny. Stay away from this family. Never coming back. Bruce was right near the sliding door when he said this last thing. He said, “You think because you stopped beating on us that this isn’t the same? It’s the same, Dad. You’re the same psycho you’ve always been.”
I heard that.
Then I heard the unmistakable sound of a punch. Just like in movies or cartoons—I heard it land and I heard Bruce fall and scream out and I heard the reading lamp go down with him. And I heard Mom yell, “Stop!” and the phone rang again and Dad let it ring and Mom tried to answer it and he said, “Don’t you dare, Helen, or you’re next.” And Bruce said, “See? See?” from on the floor. You must know that a part of me had to make up another story right there and right then when I was sitting on that balcony by myself with my sunburn and looking out into the sea where the sea god had no idea how to help me. You have to know. You have to know that this crisis didn’t start with the headpiece in tenth grade. You have to know that from that moment when I turned around and saw my brother on the floor, spitting blood and my mother held tight by Dad’s hand as the phone rang and rang and rang that I was alone and life meant a little less than it ever would mean again.
? ? ?
Bruce lost a molar. He showed it to me before bed. Mom had given Dad something to sleep. She packed our bags herself and didn’t fold anything. She just threw in the clothing—wet and dry together. She threw in our souvenirs. She used the foot of my double bed for each suitcase—packed all of Dad’s things and her things and then zipped everything up, looked under the beds one more time, and then zipped our bags up, too.
Bruce had a huge plastic bag of ice on his jaw. Mom said it wasn’t broken. Mom said she was sorry. Mom said Bruce was wrong for taking the rings. Mom said anything she could to get Bruce to talk but Bruce wouldn’t talk.
I went over to the side of his bed and I knew he was awake but he had his eyes closed. He was crying. I said, “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault,” he said, but he sounded like his mouth was full.
“I love you. Please don’t go.”
He said, “You can always come stay with me, no matter where I am.”
I stayed until he fell asleep. Mom had given him something for pain and it didn’t take long. She checked on him one last time and I was back in my bed pretending to sleep. I opened one of my eyes and watched her pull out a string of cotton from Bruce’s mouth. It was soaked with blood. Instead of putting it in the trash, she flushed it down the toilet.
When Mom went to bed and closed the door between our rooms, I went to my suitcase and found some shells I’d collected. There was some loose American change on our table so I grabbed that, too. And the notepad and pen with the resort’s logo. I went to the bathroom and I wrote two notes to Bruce. One said “I’m sorry.” The other said “I love you.” Then I sneaked back into the room and slid the items under his pillow as he slept. His pillow was soaked from either the melting ice or tears—I couldn’t tell.
My sunburn didn’t hurt at all that night. I didn’t feel a thing.
Day Six: over. Day Six: sunburn, a molar, you can always come stay with me, no matter where I am.
HELEN’S IN MOURNING