Cote Smith - Hurt People

“Oh yeah?” Rick said. He pushed me off him and stood up. “Well, do you see his parents around anywhere?” Sandy slowly blinked her eyes. “Me either,” Rick said. “But I’m here, aren’t I? I’m the one who’s always around, OK. I see these brats more than their goddamn dad.”

Sandy sighed, and for a moment it seemed she could see Rick’s point. “It’s not the same, Rick. You don’t know what it’s like.”

Rick laughed to himself. For some reason, what Sandy said was funny to him. He unwrapped his hand and threw his belt over his shoulder. “Oh, so now you’re an expert. On parenting.” He sauntered over to Sandy, until the two were close enough to kiss. “You. Of all people. Is that right?”

Sandy met his eyes, her jaw clenched. “Don’t.”

“What?” Rick said, his voice dropping to a whisper. “You don’t want to trade parenting tips?”

Sandy squeezed the frying pan’s handle, and her arm veins popped up like little rivers.

“OK, how about a freebie?” Rick said, turning his back to Sandy and looking straight at me. “A free lesson from me to you, Sandy. Here it goes: If you ever have a baby that won’t quit crying, don’t shake it to make it stop.” He turned around, smiled at me. “For God’s sake, I mean, you don’t treat a baby like a jug of juice.”

Sandy’s eyes dropped. She looked at me, biting her lip, as if she wanted to apologize with all her heart for burning my breakfast every day I ever knew her.

Rick licked his lips, proud of himself. “Nope, last time I checked they don’t give out mother-of-the-year awards to a lady with a dead baby on her hands. I’m pretty sure they put people like that in jail.”

Sandy lowered her head. Hit him, I thought. He isn’t looking. Do it.

But Sandy didn’t. She relaxed her grip on the pan, twirled it by its handle, and composed herself. “Are you sure you want to be airing each other’s dirty laundry?” Rick stopped his cocky pacing. “’Cause there are some things I heard about you, you know, things that you probably don’t want getting out.” My mind went to the gas cans Rick filled in secret, when he thought no one was looking.

Rick scratched his sling. “Bullshit. You don’t know nothing.”

“You’re right,” Sandy said. “I don’t. But Cornbread does. He only told me a little, says there’s some code among guys who’ve done time together. But I bet if I really wanted, I could get it out of him.” She rolled her tongue in her mouth, combing her teeth, and her whole body loosened in a way I’d never seen before.

“Go ahead,” Rick said to Sandy, “fetch your magic Negro. Just because we jailed together doesn’t mean he knows shit.”

“O-K,” Sandy said, stretching out each letter. “Hey, maybe I’ll fetch the boys’ mother while I’m at it.” Rick quickly turned around. I couldn’t see his face, but I bet it was filled with fear. “How much does Aggie really know?” Sandy asked, her voice cold. “I’m sure she knows about the stupid things that landed you in jail. But does she know about what you did in prison? The stuff you did to survive?”

Rick walked away from Sandy and me and stood by a tall cafeteria window, his reflection milky in the glass pane. “She knows enough.”

My brother came into the cafeteria, still holding his stomach. The mark on his face where Rick had hit him was easily visible.

“What’s going on?”

Sandy and Rick exchanged a quick look.

“Nothing, sweetheart,” Sandy said, and just like that she reverted to her former self, the ex-con cook who always treated me like I was the world’s most precious metal. “Just having some words with Mr. Rick. But I think we’re done.”

Rick stayed by the window, gloomy. “I was just trying to help,” he said, staring at his reflection, the only other person on his side. I liked to do the same thing when I was alone in our bathroom. I liked to whisper and watch my lips form the words. This is what I look like. This is what other people see.

* * *

Our mother was waiting in the van. Her big blond hair hung out the driver’s window, soaking up the sun like Baron used to do on car rides. She had an hour to drive us home and feed us, she said, before she had to be back at work for the late shift. She didn’t ask why we were late, where we had been, not until the van was parked and we were walking up to our building’s pea-green door. “Why was I waiting?” she said. There were no sounds at the pool. The fireflies were out, lighting up what was left of the summer. “At the golf course, I mean.”

“We were detained,” my brother said.

My mother laughed a tired laugh.

“Detained?” she said. “That’s a funny word for you. Hey, what happened to your face?”

“A golf ball hit me,” my brother said. “I guess it was only a matter of time.” He tried to pull open the building door, but my mother stuck out her long arm and held it shut.

“Hold it. You’re not lying again, are you? Turn around.” My brother slowly spun around, and my mother brushed the hair covering his face. “I’m not ignorant,” she said. “I know there was no siren that day. I canvassed the neighborhood. No one heard a thing.” She cupped her hand on my brother’s cheek and examined him, her thumb tracing his red mark, now a dark bump. I watched her and put my hand to my face, where my head had hit the patio door.

“The Bump Brothers,” my mother said. She leaned in and gently kissed my brother’s bump. “Listen, you don’t have to tell me where you were that day, though you can if you want. Just tell me what happened to your face. And I don’t want another lie. I’ve had enough lies to last a life.”

My brother looked away.

“Rick did it,” I said. “He hit him for no reason. That’s why he has that mark.”

“Rick did?”

“And he was going to hit me, but Sandy stopped him. He was going to beat me with his belt.”

“He hit you,” my mother repeated, sounding more confused than disapproving.

“What do you expect?” my brother said. “Working with prisoners.”

“Ex-prisoners,” my mother said, though that didn’t sound any better. “OK, I’ll talk to him.”

“Yeah,” my brother said, “talk.”

Our mother waited until we were inside the apartment before she said any more. She wrapped a handful of ice cubes in a washrag and sat my brother down at the kitchen table, the ice pack pressed to his face. Across the living room the sliding glass door was open and I could hear a police car’s siren wailing down a nearby street. I pictured my dad racing across town, chasing down some bad guy. The Stranger.

“Listen,” my mother said. “I’m sorry about your face.”

“It’s fine,” my brother said. “Whatever.”

“It’s not fine. Rick is … complicated.”

“We don’t like him,” I said.

“It’s not that simple.”

“He hurt him,” I said. It was a simple statement, but true, and it stumped my mother for a long time. She sat there thinking. She repeated what I said, tried my words out on her lips. He hurt him. He hurt him.

Finally she said, “I’m sorry if Rick ever hurt either of you. But that’s only because Rick has his own hurt.” She took the ice pack off my brother’s bump. The bump looked brighter, bigger. The swelling had gotten worse, not better. “It’s like I always say, hurt people hurt people.”

My brother slapped my mother’s hand off his face, and the ice pack fell to the floor, scattering cubes across the kitchen. “I’m sick of your stupid sayings. You say all these things, but they never mean anything.” He turned his bruised half away from us, showing only the good side, like he was giving us his best mug shot. My mother apologized again. “I don’t care,” my brother said. “Stop saying that. Stop saying you’re sorry. You’re sorry. Dad’s sorry. It doesn’t matter. Things keep happening.”