Susan Steinberg - Spectacle - Stories

My brother said, He hit you with a fucking book. I said, Yes. I said, No. He said, Which. He said, Yes or no. It was an accident, I said. An accident, he said. Bullshit, he said. There are no accidents, he said. Bullshit, I said. There are only accidents, I said.

The bird was crashing into the walls. I got out of bed. I took a book from a shelf. I waved the book around. I swatted the bird through the window. I walked out of the bedroom. I was still holding the book in the hallway. I was still holding the book, in the room in which my boyfriend was sleeping on the couch. And I was still holding the book standing over my boyfriend as he slept. And I stood there, still, still holding the book, as he opened his eyes, looking terrified.

I don’t know what I was thinking. Perhaps I wasn’t thinking. Perhaps I was only feeling. Perhaps I was feeling like a guy. And what does that mean. I don’t know what that means.

My brother let go of my arm and slammed his fist again into the table. And when the crumbs on the table jumped this time, it wasn’t funny. I stood and said, Fuck this. I said, I’m going. And my brother said, Where are you going. I said, I’m going somewhere. And my brother laughed. He said, You’re going nowhere.

Once, I was bigger than my brother. And I knew he would one day be bigger than I was. And I knew that once he was bigger than I was, he always would be bigger. Because I would not get bigger than I was. But I would always be the bigger prick. Because I was the biggest prick I knew.

I watched from my bedroom window as my father found his underthings all over the yard. I could tell he was angry by the way he stomped toward the house. And by the sound the door made. And by the weight of his steps in the hallway. Then I heard him open my brother’s door. Then I heard my brother’s voice. I heard my brother’s body hit the wall.

And did I try to stop my father. I suppose I did not. I suppose I had my reasons for letting him throw my brother around.

At some point, my father moved away. We were older then, and he moved to another city. He moved to the city for a woman. And then he left that woman. And then there was a second woman. And then he left that woman too. And then there was a third. And then he left that woman. And then there was a fourth. After he died, we met the fourth. She called herself your father’s friend. She told us things we had to do. There were people to meet and people to pay. There were papers to sign and objects to put into boxes. And when every last paper had been signed and every last object had been boxed, she drove us to the airport in her very big car and sad music played and she told us she prayed for our father. And on any other day, we would have laughed. We would have told her what he told us. That no one will save you. That there’s no great man in the clouds.

And on the plane going home, we were very happy. Our father had died, and we had been terribly sad. But on the plane going home, I don’t think we had ever been that happy. We were so happy we were going home, we would not have cared if the plane had crashed. We drank whiskey out of tiny bottles. We spent all our money on the whiskey. We were drunk and we were fucking happy. And when the plane landed, we were still laughing. It was probably something not even funny. It was probably something pretty dark. We probably shouldn’t have been laughing at all. But we were still laughing waiting for our bags. Some of the bags were our father’s bags. These bags were filled with our father’s things. They were coming around with the other bags. One of them had a dent in it. One of them had a stain. And then we were no longer laughing. We were no longer happy but just absurdly sad.

My brother smoked his first cigarette at the kitchen table. He was ten and the cigarette was unfiltered, and he took a long drag, and my father said, Boy, and my father was proud. And when my brother started choking, my father laughed his ass off, and I laughed my ass off too. My brother just looked so dumb, not able to stop that choking. He looked so dumb, the smoke just pouring out of his dumb head, my brother, who was not my father’s son.

I was standing over my boyfriend. It had started to rain. And I liked, in that moment, the rain. I mean I liked, in that moment, the sound of the rain. And I liked the weight of the book in my hand. But it must have seemed like a night terror to him. It must have seemed like a dream of being killed. Because in seconds my boyfriend was off the couch. Then he was the one holding the book.

We were standing at the kitchen table. We were playing the dumb parts we played. It was like I was trying to play a woman, and he was trying to play a man. It was like I was trying to play the victim, and he was trying to play the savior. He said, I’m going to kill him. I said, Then kill him. But my brother would not kill my boyfriend. Because he was my brother, not my father. And so my brother would stand at the kitchen table. And I would stand at the kitchen table. And eventually, my brother would go to his job. He would pick up weights. He would haul out trash. But for now, he was going nowhere. And I was going nowhere. For now, we were putting on a show. It was a show we put on for each other. It was a show we put on for our father. It was a show we put on for our mother. It was utterly absurd, our show. Just a little girl playing little girl. Just a big guy playing big guy. And who was the girl. And who was the guy. It was so confusing, our show. We didn’t always stick to our lines. We didn’t always know our lines.

I should have started with this: A bird flew into the bedroom. And followed with: It was flying crazy into the walls. Feathers floated from the ceiling. I swatted at the bird with a book. I swatted it back through the window.

I should have started with this: I was standing in the hallway. And followed with: I was standing over my boyfriend’s sleeping body. I wasn’t thinking as I stood over his body. I was just holding a book up high while he slept.

One morning my father threw my brother’s dolls into the trash. And this time he locked the trash in the trunk of his car. And this time my brother cried all morning, and my father didn’t know what to do. At some point they had a private talk. My father was sitting on my brother’s bed. My brother was crying on the floor. I was standing in the doorway. Boys only, my father said, and slammed the door in my face. I suddenly felt like the only person in the world. I felt like I was standing on the moon. I screamed, Fuck you, at the door. I screamed, Fuck you, and kicked the door. I screamed, Fuck you pricks, and kicked a hole right through the fucking door.

Later that day, my father took us for pizza. And after we ate our pizza, he took us to a toy store. It was the biggest toy store in the city. My father bought me a book on puzzles. He bought my brother a rocket to build. My brother, for whom there was still hope. He could still become an astronaut.

My brother smoked his second cigarette at the kitchen table. He smoked his third cigarette at the kitchen table. He smoked his fourth, and it was terrible to watch him smoke. It was absolutely brutal. But did I try to stop him. He was so determined. I couldn’t stop him.

And did I try to stop my boyfriend as the book was rushing toward my face. Let’s just say I was working through something. I was making up for something.

This had nothing to do with my mother. When I stood at the mirror, I did not see my mother’s face. It was not that at all. My mother was not a banged-up woman. She was a brilliant woman. She left the house. And I could not have stopped her.

Just before he died, my father came back to the city for business. We met him at a trashy bar. He looked old. He could barely talk. He coughed the whole night. Everyone knew he was going to die. The bartender gave him water. She gave him a look. She gave us all that look. And my father grabbed the bartender’s arm and pulled her in toward him. And through all his coughing, he was able to say something to her. I don’t know why I thought he would say something nice, like thank you or something like that. It wasn’t like he was that type. He did not say something nice. He said something about her body. Something about her ass. Her amazing ass. My father said to me, Look at that ass. I looked at the bartender’s face. It was alarming how much she hated us. And my boyfriend snapped at my father for this. And my brother snapped at my boyfriend. And I snapped at my brother. And as the bartender walked away, my brother looked at her ass. And my boyfriend looked at her ass. And I, as well, looked at her ass. And it was amazing.