The Cave Painter & The Woodcutter (9 page)

There's just so much!

Those times we went for drives in the car and we all sang—

“Tell me the stories of Jesus.”

Laughin' and singin'—

Tapiokee!

“Who let the dogs out!”

We was so happy! We was all so happy!

Times when I useta tell'm stories…

With a story, there's an end to it. Ya do this and this and this, then y're done. Like with those kids. They find that house, they're held prisoner, Gretel shoves the witch in the oven, they get back home with the witch's treasure. All happy ever after and done. And the mean stepmother's dead now ta boot—so Bob's yer uncle, like old Gram useta say.

Life, though, not always like a story so much. Only true end it's got is when ya die.

Like poor Mike…

Gettin' all mixed up with all that racket. Bikers and drugs and that.

How could someone so smart be so stupid?

That feelin' I felt when he took off? Almost as bad as now. I'm not kiddin'. It was that bad back then.

This last time I come down here ta visit…

I don't tell'r I'm comin', just show up. Go ta the Dollarama before I leave, buy'm them glow sticks that ya snap and glow in the dark, big bags a chips.

I don't go there right away, park the car and watch till the bus drops'm off.

Kids're more grown-up, so much happens while I'm gone.

“I don't have enough fer supper with you, too,” Angie says. I don't want ta take food outta their mouths, so I say okay and go off in the car. But I don't go nowhere ta eat—just this Oh Henry! while I'm parked down the road a ways.

We watch American Idol like a family. I hate that Simon fella, tell Brittie ta steer clear a guys like that, good-lookin' smartass pricks who never done a real day's work in their lives.

“What real-day's work you done lately?” says Angie.

So I tell'r she could be on that show with him, she's that smug and nasty. “Turnin' inta yer mother, are ya?”

Brittie asks Bobby a question 'bout homework and her big brother tells'r ta figure it out fer herself.

“Help yer sister,” I tell'm and Angie says ta butt out.

I'm sleepin' on the couch.

Kevin's long gone, back ta Toronto or wherever. Darla put the boots to him. I knew that'd happen. She's not stupid.

I'm sleepin' on the couch.

Bobby always useta stick up fer Brittie at school, but that don't mean he don't pick on'r at home. She's fightin' off tears at bedtime and he's got'r cryin' again first thing before she's dressed.

“You mind your own business,” Angie tells me.

I say, “I'll take'm ta school.”

“School bus picks'm up,” she says.

“Let Daddy bring me,” Brittie says, except she stutters just a bit.

“You've gotta get useta the kids on that bus. Yer father's not gonna be here ta drive ya ta school.”

“What's with the kids on the bus? Someone bein' mean? I know kids, I useta ride on a bus.”

“You stay outta this, mind yer own business.”

“My kids is my business.”

I take Brittie ta school, Bobby wants ta go on the bus with the others, that's okay. Don't wanna look like a fruit havin' his daddy drive'm ta school. I get that.

In the car, Brittie and me have us a talk. Then all of a sudden she's cryin' so I pull over ta the side of the road and she lets it all out—about how they make fun a the way she talks and how she gets her letters mixed up and how there's this one named Sheila, the ringleader, she is. And how this Sheila gets them all to say mean things and so on. Makes her say words that'll make her stutter so they can laugh at her. Make her say her own name, 'cause she can't always, 'cause it starts with a “B” and she's goin' “B-B-B,” and they're all laughin', teasin'r. She's like me, I think, little Brittie's like me back in the days a Tubby Thompson and that. Nobody ever picks on someone bigger'n them, always pick on someone who can't fight back.

And where's Bobby? Why isn't he lookin' out for her like Mike done for me? “Where's yer brother in all this?”

Boys at school pick on him, too, Brittie says. Bobby's been sent home for fightin' already.

We're parked in the car later and watchin' the playground. “Which one's that Sheila?” And she points her out. She's a rich kid, ya can tell by the way she walks, and she's got the little white headphones in her ears. So I just go over to her and tell her that she's not bein' very nice and she shouldn't pick on someone like Brittie. She's all, “Who you think you are, talkin' ta me like that.” So I tell her—I grab hold a her and tell'r.

“You just listen ta me,” I say.

Then there's all this commotion and teacher comes runnin' and I'm in the principal's office and…

“I'm just standin' up for someone who's bein' picked on,” I say. “I don't mean ta scare that Sheila or threaten her, no, no way. I just don't want her makin' fun a the way my little girl talks. Don't want her ta be at my Brittie, always be at her. It's no fair. How'd you like it someone picks on your kid like that? Shoe'd be on the other foot then.”

But they gotta call in Sheila's mother, get her in there and she's all about callin' the cops and everythin' and…

“Lot a goddamn nonsense. Get yer hands off me,” I say, “just quit it.” And I walk outta there. I'm no kid in that school, they can't keep me in that office no more. Those days are over.

Jump in the car and up to the Conrads where Mike took off from. Look at our old bedroom window like it could tell me somethin'—but what? Then over to the place above the store where Mom lived before she took off. Is she still livin' somewhere? Who knows. Then Gram and Fa's house, where my dad was a boy. Who's there these days? Don't have a clue.

I roll down the window by Mrs. Allen's, just in case that one's still around, I slow down right there and holler, “Hey, old bitch! Ya better be scrubbin' that goddamn chooky!”

Then I park by the little bridge, and I'm thinkin' about poor Brittie. What's gonna happen ta her? What's gonna happen when she gets ta high school with the girls pokin' fun at her and the boys talkin' bout how she stutters—I know how boys talk, I heard'm, I was a boy. And then I think 'bout her gettin' old enough to have a baby and gettin' pregnant, and who the father'd be. And that'd be my grandson, that baby, or granddaughter maybe, and would the father stick with them or would he take off and—

And if he did take off, she'll feel that, won't she? That feelin' that got so bad in me when Mike took off. Maybe she even feels it already. Maybe that's why she was cryin' in the car before. Maybe she started ta feel real bad that night back with Kevin when she was so upset and crawled into our bed.

It don't seem possible for poor Brittie ta grow up and have anythin' good that'll last. Will either a my kids be happy? What're the chances they'll feel any different than I do right now? That's why ya spoil kids, I'm thinkin', so they won't feel as miserable as you. But looks like nothin' ya can do will stop it all from goin' ta hell. Like what's the point in that? What's the point of havin' kids and them growin' up and havin' kids and—

I don't mean what I heard once on TV, that woman who said she couldn't bring kids into a world with pollution and population and that. What I mean is like no matter what I do those two kids aren't gonna be gettin' a better life. 'Cause my kids'll get the same as me, same's I got the same's Mom and she got the same's hers. They let ya think it's possible, let ya hope it's so, but it never was and never will be. Ya can take off, ya can learn French, ya can do all kinds a things, but it ain't gonna happen. Just look at Mike—left here, got a new life, spoke French and what'd he get? Dead by the side of the road somewhere. He and some buddy a his, shot right in the head. Hells Angels Bandidos Rock Machine pricks!

“But ya gotta try!” I'm thinkin'. “Ya can't just give up on'm. It'll be worse if ya give up and y're not a family!”

I go back ta talk ta Angie, but she's not doin' nothin' now that Darla don't want'r ta do. I'm out the door far as they're concerned, those two. No room fer me ta even try and help those kids.

“Just listen,” I'm sayin', “just listen.”

But she's all, “I'm sick a listenin' ta you.” Tells me she's all fed up. She's mad, she says 'cause now she's gotta go ta the school and talk ta the principal and all.

“You tell'm ta stop pickin' on our kids,” I say. “You tell'm that. Don't let'm push ya round.”

Then she says “I don't want advice from you no more on nothin'!”

“Look, “ I says, “look. You need me. Little rich Sheila there, she can do whatever the hell she wants ta my kid and she'll get away with it every time. And her mother, that bitch, and the principal there and the cops, they're always goin' on ta the rest of us 'bout right and wrong. But it's not the same fer them, s'all different.”

“Shut up.”

“No, you listen, 'cause with us they're all sayin' like if ya do this and that then them kids'll have a better life. If ya do such and such and the other, them kids'll have a better life. But that's just their talk. No matter how hard ya work er try ya'll never get anywhere by listenin' ta them.”

“I'm not listenin' ta you,” she says, “you're full a shit.”

“I am not. Look, on the TV, when ya watch anythin', the news, anythin', it's the same all over. There's always two sides, and I don't mean good and bad. I mean the ones with a better life and the rest of us.”

She don't wanna listen, but I keep tryin'. I go, “First ya think it's one thing. Like, finish yer school and ya'll get ahead. Then it's oh, ya gotta do this now, too, after school's done. Then ya do that, an' then it's somethin' else, and more and more. And ya can do yer time, ya can quit drinkin', ya can steer clear a that oxycodone, but each time there's somethin' else that's comin' at ya next.”

“You're crazy,” she says.

“No, I'm not. I'm speakin' up! Why the hell you wanna come back ta this shithole? Those kids won't have a chance here! Let's pack'm up, get in the car and go back home!”

“This here's my home,” she says, “and y're not welcome in it. Y're leavin' here first thing tomorrow, soon as the kids are on that bus. I'm not askin' ya, I'm tellin' ya.”

Then—

“I wish I'd never met ya!” And she walks out the door, slams it like she don't care if those kids wake up or not. It might a all been diff'rent if she'd stayed and tried ta listen.

Could all a been diff'rent.

Moment.

In the story, that father took those kids out in the deep woods. Place like this.

And then the father told them he loved them and said to be good and he left them there. Hoped they'd have a chance at a better life.

He didn't lay a hand on'm.

He didn't kill'm with a knife. No sir. He didn't.

I did that. I killed'm with a knife.

Shakes his head, it all seems unbelievable.

And I wish it could a been easier on'm. But I didn't have a plan. Just happened. Angie's off ta Darla's, tryin' ta figure out how ta get me gone ferever. I know what's up. I opened the back door and let that Blackie just run off. He'll come back, stupid dogs always do. And there's the knife, just sittin' there on the dish board.

It should a been Bobby the first maybe, then he wouldn't a tried ta save his sister. He wouldn't a woke up. I wish I'd done it right, simple, like they died in their sleep, like they said Gram did. But I didn't. There's so much blood, like everywhere, and ya think ya know how ta go about somethin', but once ya start it's all different, and they won't lie still. “It's for yer own good,” I'm sayin, “I know, 'cause there's no better life.” And poor Brittie's so scared and screamin' and…

Bobby comes at me, he comes in at me.

“Don't,” I says. “Don't.”

I clean'm up as best I can, and—

Put'm both on the one bed beside each other. Bobby with his arms around her.

Like they're still sleepin'.

And put a note on the door for Angie, “Don't come in. Call the cops.”

Then I started drivin'. Ditched the car, walked till I come here, wherever here is. I could give a fuck.

They better not find me. There's been enough trouble already, enough talk about my family.

Just wanna stay here till it's done.

And Angie. I didn't do it ta get at her—she had nothin' ta do with it, really, I don't think. I feel terrible 'bout her, no doubt about it. Hope she didn't go in. Wouldn't serve her right after all, no sir. Cops is useta lookin' at things like that. S'their job.

Bobby?

Brittie?

He takes off his coat; his shirt is covered with dried blood. He folds the coat up and puts in on the cleared ground. A pillow. He starts to shiver.

Their pictures'll all be on the TV. And everybody's probably all parading by the house, the whole fuckin' countryside, day and night. Bringin' flowers and candles, I bet. Pilin' them up out front. Leavin' little notes my kids won't ever read. And they'll be stickin' teddy bears and dolls on ta the fence there. I don't get that. Gets all soggy outdoors, turns right ta mush.

A week ago, none a those people'd give my kids the time a day. Pick on'm all a time. Sheila from the school there and her mother are probably on the TV talkin' about how Brittie was her best friend. Boo hoo hoo. God, I hate that. I just hate that.

I feel so bad.

No kid a mine is ever gonna feel as miserable as this. Not ever again.

I couldn't bear it if they grew up and felt this bad.