half the sign of the Shoe Repair shop, which was over one hundred years old (both the sign and the shop); he was charged with possession, vandalism, and defacement of a historic landmark. Given his previous record (a minor in possession of alcohol as well as an evading arrest when we’d all run from the cops and gotten away but his pants had caught cartoonishly on a fence), it didn’t look good for him.
As for Jackson, he found himself sore and vaguely satisfied the next morning, as if in his dreams he’d swum hard and strong in a clear green river and his muscles had somehow experienced it. He began to feel uneasy as he rose into his usual Saturday morning routine of eggs-in-a-basket (he adored the concise circles like I did) and reading on the front porch. As the coffee began to take effect, he felt his body more clearly; the pleasant buzz in his lumbar region and the satisfied ache of well-used shoulder muscles sat outside the possibility of just a good dream. A smarting between his thumb and forefinger revealed itself as a small, deeply lodged splinter. When he opened the screen door, he found that James’s guitar was leaned against the railing and his precious shoulder bag, which was never without him, was lumped next to it. He retreated inside to find Julia. Not because he particularly wanted to talk to her, but because the sight of her buried deep under the blankets, snoring, one arm extended straight out over the edge of thebed as if in greeting, or sitting up in bed staring at the wall remembering God knows what, was a signal of all things normal and familiar. Only she wasn’t there.
A note on the kitchen table, which he hadn’t noticed, read: YOUR BROTHER ARRESTED WILL CALL (The lack of punctuation and hurried scrawl made Jackson wonder, he told me later with a little laugh, whether his brother had been handcuffed and was waiting in front of a venue’s ticket box, though that made little sense.)
It was at this point that Jackson buckled and broke the silence he’d instated toward me when I’d begun my affair with Dillon. For better or worse, this is usually the way these silences end: something awful happens, and the affected party returns to familiar comforts, temporarily forgetting the wrongs committed. My father let him in and he crawled into my bed and woke me with his crying.
What James did was stupid; what James did was brave. Perhaps he thought there was no way in hell they’d believe him if he said his sleepwalking brother had been the one swinging the bat, but more likely his silence was an act of sacrifice. Julia did not fund a lawyer, and though the public defender was a spunky, articulate man who was quick to point out James’s steady and valued employment at the motel and his good grades at his one (and only) semester of junior college, the court found these red herrings and were more than willing to see him as a drug-addled youth whose potential did not excuse his actions.
Before his hearing, we went to visit him in the Juvenile Detention Center, where he’d walked into the visitingroom looking somehow daunting in the dark blue heavy cloth jumpsuit, and he told us everything—the likes of which Jackson had suspected by the splinter in his hand, the soreness of his body, and the baseball mitt he’d found lodged inexplicably between his bed and the wall. Like blackout drunks, Jackson always had the feeling after one of his sleepwalking episodes that something had happened, only he didn’t have drinking buddies to call up in a contrite state and question.
James took his usual time in storytelling: perfectly executed pauses, expertly placed details, hand gestures that shaped the air to his purposes. He even included that on Jackson’s first swing he had tapped the bat on the ground once, as if heckling the pitcher. Swing, batterbatter. Swing! By the time he’d gotten to Jackson’s remarkable vanish and the arrival of the police, the fifteen minutes were up, and so we couldn’t ask
As for Jackson, he found himself sore and vaguely satisfied the next morning, as if in his dreams he’d swum hard and strong in a clear green river and his muscles had somehow experienced it. He began to feel uneasy as he rose into his usual Saturday morning routine of eggs-in-a-basket (he adored the concise circles like I did) and reading on the front porch. As the coffee began to take effect, he felt his body more clearly; the pleasant buzz in his lumbar region and the satisfied ache of well-used shoulder muscles sat outside the possibility of just a good dream. A smarting between his thumb and forefinger revealed itself as a small, deeply lodged splinter. When he opened the screen door, he found that James’s guitar was leaned against the railing and his precious shoulder bag, which was never without him, was lumped next to it. He retreated inside to find Julia. Not because he particularly wanted to talk to her, but because the sight of her buried deep under the blankets, snoring, one arm extended straight out over the edge of thebed as if in greeting, or sitting up in bed staring at the wall remembering God knows what, was a signal of all things normal and familiar. Only she wasn’t there.
A note on the kitchen table, which he hadn’t noticed, read: YOUR BROTHER ARRESTED WILL CALL (The lack of punctuation and hurried scrawl made Jackson wonder, he told me later with a little laugh, whether his brother had been handcuffed and was waiting in front of a venue’s ticket box, though that made little sense.)
It was at this point that Jackson buckled and broke the silence he’d instated toward me when I’d begun my affair with Dillon. For better or worse, this is usually the way these silences end: something awful happens, and the affected party returns to familiar comforts, temporarily forgetting the wrongs committed. My father let him in and he crawled into my bed and woke me with his crying.
What James did was stupid; what James did was brave. Perhaps he thought there was no way in hell they’d believe him if he said his sleepwalking brother had been the one swinging the bat, but more likely his silence was an act of sacrifice. Julia did not fund a lawyer, and though the public defender was a spunky, articulate man who was quick to point out James’s steady and valued employment at the motel and his good grades at his one (and only) semester of junior college, the court found these red herrings and were more than willing to see him as a drug-addled youth whose potential did not excuse his actions.
Before his hearing, we went to visit him in the Juvenile Detention Center, where he’d walked into the visitingroom looking somehow daunting in the dark blue heavy cloth jumpsuit, and he told us everything—the likes of which Jackson had suspected by the splinter in his hand, the soreness of his body, and the baseball mitt he’d found lodged inexplicably between his bed and the wall. Like blackout drunks, Jackson always had the feeling after one of his sleepwalking episodes that something had happened, only he didn’t have drinking buddies to call up in a contrite state and question.
James took his usual time in storytelling: perfectly executed pauses, expertly placed details, hand gestures that shaped the air to his purposes. He even included that on Jackson’s first swing he had tapped the bat on the ground once, as if heckling the pitcher. Swing, batterbatter. Swing! By the time he’d gotten to Jackson’s remarkable vanish and the arrival of the police, the fifteen minutes were up, and so we couldn’t ask
Similar Books
In the Court of the Yellow King
Tim Curran, Cody Goodfellow, Gary McMahon, C.J. Henderson, William Meikle, T.E. Grau, Laurel Halbany, Christine Morgan, Edward Morris
