I know that when my daddy died, we got some kind of life insurance. But that was seven years ago, and my mom doesn’t make that much at the restaurant and these numbers they’re whispering that they don’t think I can hear don’t add up. I see them dancing above our heads, laughing at us, gloating at our misfortune. I want to get a broom and chase them out like Granny Dee chased that reporter, but I know they aren’t going anywhere.
Two years ago, one of the other guys on the football team got some kind of rare blood disease. The kind insurance didn’t cover. The team did car washes and the cheerleaders had a bake sale and people in the neighborhood donated.
When I suggest to my mom that we hold a bake sale for Marcus, she puts down the yellow legal pad and asks me to come sit next to her on the couch.
“Wing,” she says, her voice soft and slow, watching me carefully. “Sweetie, you know … you know that people blame Marcus for this, right?”
“Well, it was his fault,” I admit, because he was driving, after all. “But that doesn’t mean they won’t want to help him.”
“Honey, it’s such a nice idea. But I don’t think it would be very well received. This is different from when that boy got sick.”
I must still look confused, because she sighs, not like she’s frustrated with me, but like she’s sad that she has to have this conversation.
“I didn’t want to show you this, but I think you need to know how people are feeling.”
She goes to the bookshelf and pulls out a manila folder that’s sitting on top of some books. Inside are newspaper clippings. Newspaper clippings about Marcus.
LOCAL FOOTBALL STAR KILLS YOUNG MOTHER
SCHOOL SHATTERED BY QUARTERBACK’S DECISION TO DRINK AND DRIVE
COP’S SON HEADED FOR PRISON
STAR ATHLETE THOUGHT RULES DIDN’T APPLY
DRUNK DRIVER SHAMES HERO FATHER’S MEMORY
Dotted throughout the articles are quotes from kids at our school. Kids in Marcus’s class, other guys on the team, all eager to give the “inside story” on Marcus.
“Don’t you see, sweetie?”
And now I do: no one will want to help him after what he did.
I remember how different it was when my daddy died, how the very day after we got the news, and for days and days after that, we were inundated with casseroles and fresh-baked bread and cookies and whole weeks’ worth of meals we could put in the freezer and reheat. Like we could eat our way out of grief. I didn’t understand how a casserole was going to help us feel any better, but I realize now that it’s what we lived on. We survived on food made with love, made to comfort by other people who cared about us and weren’t so racked with grief that they couldn’t find their way around a kitchen. And my mom got time off from the restaurant. Paid time. Bereavement.
She hasn’t gotten any time off work now. Even though she’s grieving. And no one has come by with anything. Nothing at all. It hurts just the same. Maybe worse. Because when my daddy died, that was it, he was dead. And it was the worst thing that had ever happened, ever. It was like our house was swallowed up by a sinkhole of pain and we were never going to get out of it. But we did, somehow. I don’t even remember doing it, but we did. And now the not knowing if Marcus will wake up is a different kind of hurt. Everyone said my daddy was a hero who died honorably. There is nothing honorable about what Marcus did. If he does die, it won’t be honorable. It’ll be shameful. And if he lives, that’ll be shameful too.
But I’d rather he live a shameful life than die a shameful death.
I don’t go to school on Monday. I wonder if Monica and Aaron are there.
I don’t go to school the next day either. My mom says I can stay home this whole week. Tuesday night we’re sitting at the table when there’s the horrible sound of something hitting our windows. I think we must be getting robbed, not that we have anything worth stealing, and we cower in our chairs, not one of us moving, sitting silent, fear loud on our faces, and the sound goes on and on, and then I hear something else. Shouting. Jeers. Laughter.
By Wednesday morning the egg yolk has run and dried down the windows and the door and all over my mom’s car. Across our porch someone has sprayed
M IS FOR MURDER
On Thursday my mom meets with the doctors. We have to make a decision. The only thing keeping Marcus alive right now is the machines. The doctors can further induce his coma, keep the machines going, but our insurance doesn’t cover it. They don’t know how much it’ll cost.
My mom doesn’t pause, doesn’t flinch. “Do whatever you need to do. He’ll wake up.”
My brother, once the hero, the Prince Charming, has somehow turned into Sleeping Beauty. If only a kiss could wake him.
Some people think he’s worse than that. Some people think he’s the villain in the story.
M is for murder.