Rion Scott - Insurrections

Let’s pray, Robert.

After that, I heard grumbling and then silence. I rested my head back on my pillow. I wanted to rush out and ask all that was swirling my head: Is it true? Was it just half a beer? Did you tell my mother and Jesus everything? Am I really to blame? Are you praying to White Jesus or Black Jesus and do you really think he’s up there making it all better?

That Sunday morning — the day of my confirmation — my mother and I went off to church and my sister met us there. My father stayed home, saying he wanted to spend the morning finishing the table and getting the house ready for the party that would follow the evening’s service.

God’ll understand, he said as my mother hurried me out the door.

It was the usual service. The rector told corny jokes during a generic sermon. I refused to raise my croaky voice in song, even as my mother glared. Having stayed up most of the night before, I dozed during the prayers and all the various still moments. When I dipped off, my sister kicked my ankle and my mother popped my cheek.

During the announcements, the rector asked all the confirmation candidates to assemble in the narthex at 6 p.m., no later. I was awake and alert. I even looked over at Alana and imagined we shared a moment. I’ll never forget the word narthex or sitting there paying close attention to the announcements, thinking I was having a mundane, forgettable time. One that wouldn’t define me and one I’d never think back to as I went on to live my life. The word narthex was just a strange word I somehow dimly knew the meaning of. How could I ever imagine that my future would turn on the precision in defining such an odd and beautiful and gothic little word?

My mother slammed the door of the gray Oldsmobile. I sat in the back and stared out the window for the short drive home, and my sister sat up front.

First my mother started in, Couldn’t you act like you care one Sunday in your life? It’s your confirmation Sunday.

I know, I replied.

And got the nerve to talk back, my mother said.

Bobby, why don’t you shut up and listen for once? my sister said. I was shocked by her rebuke.

You slept for the whole service, didn’t pay one bit of attention, my mother said. You are the one who has to account for your soul, not me.

My mother and sister took turns going back and forth. We stopped at a red light and I thought the car would never move. The sound of my mother and sister chattering against me became an impenetrable wall. They no longer used words; it sounded to me like the muffled noises I heard between the walls when my parents prayed. I said not another word, because I could barely understand what was happening.

He’s not paying you any attention, Mom, my sister said. I don’t even see the point of talking to him. He’s going to learn the hard way.

I don’t want your brother to learn like that, so I’m going to make him damn well straighten up. Bobby, listen. You awake?

My mother pulled into the carport at the side of our house. We all exited the Oldsmobile and approached the door. I felt worn and beaten.

I bet you don’t even know where you’re supposed to meet tonight, my sister said.

Of course I do.

I waited for my mother to put the key into the lock, but the three of us just stood at the door.

Where? my sister asked.

I paused. I felt no need to explain anything to anyone. After all, in a few hours I would officially be declared a man.

Where, Bobby? my sister asked again. Where are you and your girlfriend and everyone supposed to meet, Bobby?

I looked at the keys jangling in my mother’s hand. She stood, refusing to put them into the lock. I grasped for the word, but it perched itself far outside of my mouth, not even anywhere near the tip of my tongue. Since my mother and my sister waited, I hoped to satisfy them with an approximate answer.

In the place where we meet, I said.

My mother reared her free hand back and slapped it against my cheek. I stumbled and looked over at my sister, her eyes and lipstick-red mouth open in shock.

A man wouldn’t cry, but I was still a boy and the smack shook loose teardrops big as blowflies.

Don’t even have any clue where you’re supposed to assemble, she said. It’s the narthex, Bobby. The narthex. Not the place where we meet . The narthex. Now, shut up with all that damn crying.

I couldn’t shut up, though. My sister watched me with a sort of prideful smirk I had never seen on her. She also told me to shut up as my mother pushed the key in the lock and shoved open the door.

My father, standing in the living room holding a rag to his beloved table, saw the tears streaming from my eyes. He watched them, and his face fell and creased, turning into the thick twisted visage of a bull.

What did he do? he said softly, and before anyone could answer, he snatched me by the collar of my shirt. What the hell did he do? my father shouted.

I—

He flung me across the living room as if I were made of cloth and stuffing. I stumbled and slammed into his table, cracking the wood and knocking loose the leg my father had spent the last couple weeks fixing.

Dazed, I struggled up. My father shoved me back down and I heard the wood again crack beneath me. He balled his fists and punched me in the chest. I doubled over and he slammed a fist down on my back.

What the hell did you do? my father screamed. He opened his hand and slapped at my face. I tried explaining through the tears. I gave each blow an amplified howl in an attempt to appeal to my father’s humanity or my sister’s love or my mother’s pity. My mother shut the door, as if to keep the whole neighborhood from hearing our drama.

Sick of you, man, my father muttered.

I could see my mother and sister hanging back, expressionless, as my father punched me and slapped me and swung me around, flinging me back and forth across the living room.

When the beating was done, he stormed off to his room and slammed the door. My mother followed without even looking back at me quivering and crying and curled into a question mark on the floor.

I looked to my sister and saw a wisp of her heading for the basement.

I lay there by myself sobbing and dazed for what seemed like an hour, but time no longer had any meaning to me; it could have been a minute, it could have been a day. The house had a stillness that I equated with late at night after I finished my movies and dragged myself to bed. Through the quiet I heard my father’s voice speaking softly to my mother: What did he do?

I said nothing at all to my sister for the rest of the day. When my father and I passed each other, we looked off into the distance or at some spot on the floor. My mother, toward late afternoon, pretended as if we had just experienced an ordinary morning. She told me jokes and chatted about the comics page. I responded with low grunts and nods and eventually walked away from her.

I put on my new suit. I admired myself in the mirror. I rolled my tongue over the swelling at my lip, the blemish that ruined it all, the stark reminder of my status as a member of the childhood underclass. My mother pushed open the door to my bedroom.

Bobby, you look so handsome, she said.

Thank you.

I’m going to call your sister in here so she can see how handsome you look.

Why don’t you call Dad too so you can all take turns beating me?

You stop it, Bobby. Tonight’s a special service. Don’t turn it into something else.

I got beat for no reason and you know it.

Sometimes these things build up, Bobby. Now straighten your tie and stop frowning; it makes you less handsome.

I carried the icy silence of the car ride into the narthex, thinking mostly of the slap that preceded the beating. I wondered if the swelling at my lip came from that blow or from the later assault. When I saw Alana, I realized I hadn’t thought about her for hours, and I couldn’t bring myself to talk to her or even to make eye contact. I hung back while the confirmation group chatted with a newfound collegiality. When they spoke to me, I responded with just a word or a shrug. Mostly I looked off, dazed. Who was I to try to talk to Alana? I couldn’t even defend myself from the beatings children get. In less than a half hour she’d be a woman and I’d be what?