“Hey, remember when you tried to sniff sand up your nose with a straw when you were like two?” Marie’s brother Will always brought up memories of being reared by addicts. “Uncle Jesse found you at the park across the street from mom’s old place. He said you even put the sand into lines. Damn, they started fucking us up early, huh?” Two decades later, Marie thought this memory mildly amusing as she listened to her brother snicker between words. Sometimes, though, she thought her brother spent too much time blaming the past for his own mistakes.
“Jacob! Put that stick outside where you got it and come say hi to your Aunt Marie. Now, Jacob!” Marie squinted her eyes, holding the phone back from her ear as it was violently passed from adult to child. Asthmatic, nasal breathing transmitted through the phone into Marie’s ear. “Hey-a, Jacob. What are you doin?” A loud thud responded, followed by faint maniacal laughter and scurried footsteps. “Jacob, did you say hello to Aunt Marie?” Marie wondered why her brother even attempted to be firm. His son Jacob was a spoiled brat. She couldn’t ever really blame Will. Marie and her brother had both been raised the same way.
“Yeah, Will. He said hi.” Hearing her brother shout for the last few minutes of their conversation was more then she could stand. “The doctor said he might have A.D.D.” Sounding a bit overwhelmed by this evaluation of his son, he continued on with rebuttal: A disguised attempt to soothe his worries. “But I think their full of shit. He’s just being a four-year-old.”
Marie glanced at the blinking indigo blue numbers on her alarm clock. “Hey Will, I gotta go. I need to leave here for work in like five minutes.” Will sighed heavily in response. “Alright then.” It was one of those dormant “there’s no hope left for me” sighs that Marie was all too familiar with. Irritated by his reaction she jolted into a refreshed state of energy , attempting to give a speedy goodbye. “Okay, well call me next week or something and I’ll let you know what’s up with mom.” Marie forgot this was the reason she had called in the first place. Will had left a frantic message on her answering machine talking about how mom was selling again. “Shit, I forgot. Is it okay if I call you back tomorrow night? I have to leave for work now.” Another melodramatic sigh from Will signified his annoyance. “Yeah, whatever.” Anxious to get off the phone and out of this temporary feeling of stagnancy she hastily expelled another farewell and slammed the phone into the receiver .
Stretching out the kinked muscles in her neck, Marie reflected on their conversation. She rolled her eyes inhaling deeply, then let the exhaled breath blow her bangs up away from her forehead. Massaging her temples, Marie gripped the coffee table with her toes pressing her back into the bosom-like coziness of the couch. Why did Will always have to sound so helpless, and what the hell was up with that sigh? Marie thought he did it to make his torment seem more authentic. St. Jo, Missouri was infamous for the sighing disease. Once one caught the disease, surrendering to its mechanisms was inevitable. The process reminded Marie of fish gasping for a final breath as their eyes glazed slowly over and their bodies finally subdued to a middle-American mindset.
Talkback: Post Reply | View replies (8)
