Sunday means church. Sunday means my mother sighing at me in my pajamas, from the open doorway to my room, over and over until I'm roused from mild shame at my sloth. Sunday means being packed into mildly undersized corduroy pants and a third-hand gray formal jacket originally belonging to my (second) oldest brother, Jared. Sunday means sitting on a hard wooden pew next to my family at some ungodly hour-- always around nine o'clock-- and passing notes to my siblings consisting of silly drawings or non-sequitors etched into the back of donation envelopes with those little golf pencils next to the hymnals. Sunday means release at 10:30; an entire day to do or play with who or what I like.
This sunday I find myself half-awake in dress shoes; an adult hand tip pressed gently in between my shoulder blades herding me into the blue minivan with red stripes flaking off the sides. Once seated and buckled I rub at my eyes, at my face, forcefully, to will away the last clinging's of sleep. When I'm finished, I notice the shade of aspen and oak leaves whipping past in a carousel of black dots over my little sister Jennifer's pale-placid face and her sky-blue dress-- It's the one with those lacy white ruffles framing the hem. I remember the sound a 1986 Chevy Astro engine makes and realize that sound is being generated. We are moving. I feel for the armrest with my head.
*Sleeeeeeeeep*, I think.
***
"For god will always give what you ask of him," the minister intones. I know it's important to remember the rest of what he said; that means you're paying attention. I wasn't though; I must've been too antsy, too eager, to get home; to eat food; to sleep on the couch with the sun slowly dispelling the shade over my chest. The organ is playing again-- Oh Come all ye faithful--, but all the people are standing up; I am standing up. We waddle toward the exits as one stretching, tentacled mass. My parents -- like all the adults-- stop to exchange pleasantries with neighbors or business associates on the way out. We are at the exit now; the massive wooden slabs of the cathedral doors propped against the stone walls of it's exterior; they welcome the August morning and it's cloudless blue ceiling. "It was a wonderful service Father Howard," My mom is sincere; she is always sincere.
The crowd disperses through final doorway and begins to flow in random directions. The organ is faint now, receding into the clacking of high heel shoes on pavement and the laughter of children. My three siblings and I are ushered back into the now-broiling confines of the venerable Astro. Windows are rolled down and complaints are issued. "I'm hungry!" Jennifer laments from beside me. Jacob, my oldest-oldest brother cranes his neck backwards, "They'll be pancakes when we get home," he comforts.
I'm itchy; I'm really, really itchy. My corduroys are clinging to my damp underside, glued by sweat and an hour of non-movement. And I'm figidity because we're pulling into the driveway ,but I'm used to getting out last as the youngest male-- I expect it even. We go by age then gender. My parents and Jacob climb out first and start to work on breakfast, followed by Jared, Jennifer, and myself. At seven years, Jennifer is not suited for the task of opening and closing a sliding Van door-- She is a child, after all--, but I am ten; I am world-weary and experienced; I know things. It's more than sensible for me to be irritated when I catch her small fingers fumbling with the plastic knobs controlling whatever levels and gizmos dictate the motion of the Astro's metallic opening: she doesn't have a goddamn clue.
“Jennifer!” I object, “No! Lehme open the door! I'm s'posed tah.”
This is important.
“Nohhh!” She ripostes. I look out the windows and see Jared strolling up the garage stairs into our house. We are alone in the van.
“Jennifer!” She actually got the door open “Jennnyifur!” I grab the door sternly and force it in the opposite direction. She's standing though-- I'm sitting-- she has her entire small body to work with. She leaps out overflowing with confidence, entirely misplaced, with me right behind and now attempts to shut the door-- she can never close it right. My feet are firmly planted on the earth and I loom over her. I wrench control of the cobalt blue handle and slam it shut.
She's screaming.
Is this her crude idea of protest? Whatever. I unlatch the handle and the metal panel slides back open.
There is blood; it rushes out to paint the unscathed portions of her hand and the brighter parts of the asphalt. She is screaming even fiercer now; she is a banshee; I cover my ears and the bite of it does not dull. Tears are pooling the soft brown lobes of her eyes. Her speech is mangled and watery. I put my hands on her shoulders to calm her, but she shrieks and throws up her arms. I back away. I hear frantic footsteps from behind; that same clink-clank of high heels; I can recognize my mother's voice-- It's uncommonly shrill.
“OH! OH! Oh sweetheart!” Mom inhales deeply through clenched teeth as she kneels to inspect the wound. I back up further from the driveway and bump lightly against our rose bush, the one lining our front yard beneath our windows. Jennifer resists any and all attempts for a closer view of the gash.
“Honey – Honey,” My mother gently takes Jennifer by the shoulders, “you need you let me look at it,” she coos.
I hadn't noticed Jacob at my mother's side, but there he is. And there he goes at her instruction, inside to retrieve gauze from that first aid closet we keep.
“Sweety...” My mother's eyes attempt a parley with Jennifer's but she still hasn't calmed down. “Sweety-- Sweety, what happened?”
Jennifer takes a rapid breath in between most words:
“I—I—I---I Wuh---wuh---wuh wanted--- I wanted to--- to-- oh—oh--- open the--- the do—do--- door but Jermanyclosedit---andit-andit--hitmy---hand-and-and-andnow,” Jennifer manages before resuming her outright sobbing.
My mother turns to my sulking frame, clearly enraged, “Jeremy-Rupurt-Fackrell! What did you do?”
I find myself rubbing my hands and staring where the dirt of the rose bush mingles with the sidewalk in light swirly patches of brown-grey.
“She wanted to close the door.” I mumble.
“What?” She growls.
Dad is supposed to be the mad one.
“I wanted to close the door.”
***
I'm in the cottonwood hospital waiting room now. We had all piled back into the Astro when it became apparent that Jennifer required professional medical attention. I last saw her wearing a single, lumpy, bandage-mitten and sullenly marching off to some doctor's room with my parents in tow. My brothers and I remain uncharacteristically silent for the forty-fiveish minutes they're away. I take a Highlights from a basket of old magazines underneath a nondescript beige lamp and pretend to read it. Mostly though, I alternate between imagining a life of indentured servitude to my sister after they amputate her hand, and studying the other ER patients.
Eventually, they return. Her hand is neatly bandaged now. Her face puffy and red, especially around the eyes, but it is dry and has returned to her default expression of dignified calm. The doctors informed my sister that she would never have normal used of her right hand again. She would have to learn to write differently, and certain every day tasks would blossom into endless frustration. Of course they are wrong. When do you ever hear the soccer-playing spinal cord injury victim, or the recovered cancer patient, tell you the doctor told them they 'would never walk again' or only had 'six months to live' without a note of pride at their health-care provider being so completely wrong. They are never right in these stories. My sister can write fine and I am not her house slave. I ended up providing enough “I'm sorry”s for her to stomach-punch me. I guess I deserved it. It's the type of thing we could laugh about now-- if she hadn't been killed in that grain thresher accident1.
1. Nah, I'm just fucking with you; she's fine
