And Janelle said mockingly, “Poor you.” But when she said it, though her face smiled, she let her hand fall along the side of my body and rest there.
– -
It was on a Sunday when I was seven and Artie was eight that we were made to dress up in what was called our adoption uniforms. Light blue jackets, white starched shirt, dark blue tie and white flannel trousers with white shoes. We were brushed and combed and brought to the head matron’s reception room, where a young married couple waited to inspect us. The procedure was that we were introduced and shook hands and showed our best manners and sat around talking and became acquainted. Then we would all take a walk through the grounds of the asylum, past the huge garden, past the football field and the school buildings. The thing I remember most clearly is that the woman was very beautiful. That even as a seven-year-old boy I fell in love with her. It was obvious that her husband was also in love with her but wasn’t too crazy about the whole idea. It also became obvious during that day that the woman was crazy about Artie, but not about me. And I really couldn’t blame her. Even at eight, Artie looked handsome in almost a grown-up way. Also, the features in all of the planes of his face were perfectly cut, and though people said to me we looked alike and always knew we were brothers, I knew that I was a smudged version of him as if he were the first out of the mold. The impression was clear. As a second impression I had picked up little pieces of wax on the mold, lips thicker, nose bigger. Artie had the delicacy of a girl, the bones in my face and my body were thicker and heavier. But I had never been jealous of my brother until that day.
That night we were told that the couple would return the next Sunday to make their decision on whether to adopt both of us or one of us. We were also told that they were very rich and how important it was for at least one of us to be taken.
I remember the matron gave us a heart-to-heart talk. It was one of those heart-to-heart talks adults give to children warning them against the evil emotions such as jealousy, envy, spitefulness and urging us on to a generosity of spirit that only saints could achieve, much less children. As children we listened without saying a word. Nodding our heads and saying, “Yes, Ma’am.” But not really knowing what she was talking about. But even at the age of seven I knew what was going to happen. My brother next Sunday would go away with the rich, beautiful lady and leave me alone in the asylum.
Even as a child Artie was not vain. But the week that followed was the only week in our lives that we were estranged. I hated him that week. On Monday after classes, when we had our touch football game, I didn’t pick him to be on my team. In sports I had all the power. For the sixteen years we were in the asylum I was the best athlete of my age and a natural leader. So I was always one of the captains who picked their teams, and I always picked Artie to be on my team as my first choice. That Monday was the only time in sixteen years that I didn’t pick him. When we played the game, though he was a year older than I was, I tried to hit him as hard as I could when he had the ball. I can still remember thirty years later the look of astonishment and hurt on his face that day. At evening meals I didn’t sit next to him at the dinner table. At night I didn’t talk to him in the dormitory. On one of those days during the week I remember clearly that after the football game was over and he was walking away across the field I had the football in my hand and I very coolly threw a beautiful twenty-yard spiral pass and hit him in the back of the head and knocked him to the ground. I had just thrown it. I really didn’t think I could hit him. For a seven-year-old boy it was a remarkable feat. And even now I wonder at the strength of the malice that made my seven-year-old arm so true. I remember Artie’s getting off the ground and my yelling out, “Hey, I didn’t mean it.” But he just turned and walked away.
He never retaliated. It made me more furious. No matter how much I snubbed him or humiliated him he just looked at me questioningly. Neither of us understood what was happening. But I knew one thing that would really bother him. Artie was always a careful saver of money. We picked up pennies and nickels by doing odd jobs around the asylum, and Artie had a glass jar filled with these pennies and nickels that he kept hidden in his clothes locker. On Friday afternoon I stole the glass jar, giving up my daily football game, and ran out into a wooded area of the grounds and buried it. I didn’t even count the money. I could see the copper and silver coins filled the jar almost to the brim. Artie didn’t miss the jar until the next morning and he looked at me unbelievingly, but he didn’t say anything. Now he avoided me.
The following day was Sunday and we were to report to the matron to be dressed in our adoption suits. I got up early Sunday morning before breakfast and ran away to hide in the wooded area behind the asylum. I knew what would happen that day. That Artie would be dressed in his suit, that the beautiful woman I loved would take him away with her and that I would never see him again. But at least I would have his money. In the thickest part of the woods I lay down and went to sleep and I slept the whole day through. It was almost dark before I awoke and then I went back. I was brought to the matron’s office and she gave me twenty licks with a wooden ruler across the legs. It didn’t bother me a bit.
I went back to the dormitory, and I was astonished to find Artie sitting in his bed waiting for me. I couldn’t believe that he was still there. In fact, if I remember, I had tears in my eyes when Artie punched me in the face and said, “Where’s my money?” And then he was all over me, punching me and kicking me and screaming for his money. I tried to defend myself without hurting him, but finally I picked him up and threw him off me. We sat there staring at each other.
“I haven’t got your money,” I said.
“You stole it,” Artie said. “I know you stole it.”
“I didn’t,” I said. “I haven’t got it.”
We stared at each other. We didn’t speak again that evening. But when we woke up the next morning, we were friends again. Everything was as it was before. Artie never asked me again about the money. And I never told him where I had buried it.
I never knew what happened that Sunday until years later when Artie told me that when he had found out I had run away, he had refused to put on his adoption suit, that he had screamed and cussed and tried to hit the matron, that he had been beaten. When the young couple that wanted to adopt him insisted on seeing him, he had spit on the woman and called her all the dirty names an eight-year-old boy could think of. It had been a terrible scene and he took another beating from the matron.
When I finished the story, Janelle got up from the bed and went to get herself another glass of wine. She came back into the bed, leaning up against me, and said, “I want to meet your brother, Artie.”
“You never will,” I said. “Girls I brought around fell in love with him. In fact, the only reason I married my wife was that she was the only girl who didn’t.”
Janelle said, “Did you ever find the glass jar with the money?”
“No,” I said. “I never wanted to. I wanted it to be there for some kid who came after me, some kid might dig in that wood and it would be a piece of magic for him. I didn’t need it anymore.”
Janelle drank her wine and then said jealously, as she was jealous of all my emotions, “You love him, don’t you?”
And I really couldn’t answer that. I couldn’t think of that word of “love” as a word that I would use for my brother or any man. And besides, Janelle used the word “love” too much. So I didn’t answer.
On another night Janelle argued with me about women having the right to fuck as freely as men. I pretended to agree with her. I was feeling coolly malicious from suppressed jealousy.