Emma Richler - Feed My Dear Dogs

I am reading a story in Jude’s World of Wonder about stars, etc. It has pictures of olden times scientists, Sir Isaac Newton and René Descartes, a man with a lot of curly hair like a girl, plus Einstein, and I’ve definitely heard of him, and also Galileo, a man from the seventeenth century in a big beard and a wee hat resembling a yarmulke, a hat worn by my dad and the boys on Passover, but not by me, due to sex and me being the wrong sex for nice hats. I don’t think Galileo was Jewish at all, it is just an Italian-type hat, and quite fashionable in olden times, as I suppose.

‘Jude?’ I say. ‘Light year. What is that?’

Jude is reading the latest World of Wonder and he is lying on his back holding his magazine in the air not far from his face, sometimes switching hands to avoid pins and needles, turning pages and breathing in and out without any palaver, no shuffling and rustling or unnecessary movements. Jude never flaps about the way I do, it’s nice to watch, how he is, how he moves. Answering my question might disturb his whole set-up, but I ask anyway, he always hears me, he’ll remember, and three days later, here we are walking home from the fishmonger.

Mum has rung up Mr Jarvis and Mr Jarvis has all the fish ready for Jude and me. I refuse to carry it, not having a big thing for fish, especially slimy fishies with heads still on and staring-right-at-you eyes, no thanks. We made a pit stop at the newsagent and Jude has stolen a packet of fruit gums, my favourite. Wait outside, he said.

‘Light year,’ he says, stepping out of the shop. ‘The space light can travel in a year. It’s distance, not time.’

This is hard. ‘Oh. Do I need to know this, is it important?’

Jude frowns as we stroll along and he takes another fruit gum from the roll. He is thinking. The fruit gum is red, my topmost favourite, so he passes it on and eats the next one, which is yellow and also pretty good if you are not in the mood for red. ‘Yeh. Important.’

This means I have work to do and will need to go to Ben for more information, Ben who is patient and can do a lot of talking all at once without getting fed up. Suddenly Jude chucks our sweets right over the fence by the pavement we are walking home along.

‘Hey, Jude.’ Jude does strange things and if you get upset, his forehead bunches up and blue veins show at the temples, like railroad tracks. So I say it quiet. Hey, Jude.

‘Too many sweets. Bad for you.’

OK, Jude.

So that is one example of how long it can take to get an answer from my brother, three days in this case and something I do not mind because Jude is great and nearly my twin and it is why I don’t really expect him to tell me straight off when I will feel better, what does he mean by soon, and what is a light year, on the day we had the milk race and lay about reading comics, feeling mighty throw-uppy and pathetic.

I am in Ben and Jude’s room, I am lying on Ben’s bed, which is the top bunk of the bunk beds and Jude is down below on his bunk. He never wanted the top one because of all the movement involved, going up and down the ladder. I am crazy for going up and down the ladder, it’s like being an officer in a submarine in World War II. Cool. Jude and I have used the bunk beds for a lot of military situations, as a submarine, a Roman galley in wars against Egyptians, a tent in the desert war against the Afrika Korps and a hut in a Nazi prison camp before we dig our way out. We are happy that Mum and Dad bought the bunk beds and sometimes I even get to sleep in here with Jude if Ben is staying over at a friend’s house, though this is upsetting for Harriet, who will ignore me completely the next morning, building a wall of cereal boxes around her place so she won’t have to look at me, but spending the whole breakfast time peeking through the cracks and then quickly shutting her eyes and turning her head away if I happen to catch her, signifying her great disgust regarding me, and how I am the most boring and stupid person she has ever known. But I like sleeping with Jude because there is no end to our game and we can do night scenes if we are not too sleepy. It’s very realistic.

‘Jude, are we taking the bunk beds with us, do you think?’

‘Doubt it. Bet not.’

‘Too bad,’ I say.

‘Yeh.’

Things are kind of messed up in our house at the moment, what with items not in the right places and this feeling all the time of nearly being late for school even when it is not a school day, and my dad stomping around the joint with his hair all mussed and breathing hard, sometimes stopping short and scratching his head with both hands and a lost expression. This is because we are leaving this house soon, not only for a new house but a whole new country, my dad’s country, and it is his idea so I do not see why he is acting so huffy and puffy. I am not sure I want to go, I don’t know what they’ve got over there, do they have good things, maybe it will be fun, maybe not. When my dad gave us the big news one night before supper, like an annunciation meeting I guess, he said we could come right back home if it doesn’t work out over there, but he just has to go now, it’s something he has to do due to his roots. Roots. Like my dad is a plant or something. During the tidings, I kept looking at Mum to see what might show up on her face and she said nothing and just smiled and played with Gus, who was trying to pull the mats out from under the cutlery and plates in a spirit of scientific endeavour, I believe. He seems quite interested in the motion of things through the air ever since he can walk about by himself for great lengths of time without falling down drunk like most little kids, falling down and staring at the ground that hit them before going in for some howling and screaming. I kept looking at Mum because I thought I could tell if this were a good or bad thing we were about to do, go to my dad’s country, and in a ship, but it was hard to tell, as if Mum were not in the meeting at all, here and not here, and I got a racy scared feeling for a second, like when bike riding and my feet come off the pedals and the pedals spin wild so all I can do is steer away from large impediments such as trees and lamp-posts and other people and hope for the best.

One of the messed-up things around here at the moment is too much milk delivered by the milkman. Maybe he got it wrong or maybe Mum was too busy to put a note out saying how much milk, etc., I don’t know, but Jude decided we should have a milk race so as not to waste the milk and that is why we are lying around on bunk beds like sea lions at the zoo on a hot day, not budging much, even when zoo men are pitching slimy fish snacks at them. We lie on our backs like sea lions and keep our arms to the side because any pressure on our stomachs leads to a throw-uppy feeling. We stare at the ceiling and try to forget about milk, which is not easy.

‘I wish we could take the bunk beds, do you think they have bunk beds over there, Jude?’ No answer. ‘Jude? I was talking to Sister Martha – I told you about her – and I must have said something about you, some football thing, and she went, Jude. Patron saint of lost causes! and kind of laughed. In a nice way, not a bad way. But still, what does it mean, how does that work, patron saint, is it the top saint, and what is that, lost causes? And are you named after him? I wish she hadn’t said that, it’s weird.’

‘We’re Jewish, we don’t have saints.’

‘What do we have then?’

‘I don’t know. Rabbis. No saints. Anyway, I’m named for a book,’ says Jude, and I can feel the bunks sway, meaning Jude is rolling over. Meaning Jude is getting better and can take the pressure. Possibly my time for feeling better is coming up too. Coming soon. I hope so.

‘What book?’