The Night They Brought Him Home by Jake Bristow

When they brought him home that night, the lid was strewn canted off the wooden lip and jacks and queens ornamented astray around the box like a ring of fire. Someone- I do not remember who- had loaded coal into the fireplace and after some poking it begun to lick its flame at the iron grate. Ma was cold and Paul and Jane huddled around the hearth for they were cold but I suppose not as cold as him. Still, it only felt right to keep him warm.

That night, the startings of snow settled on the sill outside and the silences were punctuated by the ticking of the wall clock and the shrill whisper of a crisp breeze. It made its way in through the vent near the porch door. The moonlight slipped through Ma’s blinds and smothered that scuffed mahogany table in shimmering film, the kind I first knew as a child ledged on his knee when I pried the skin from a rice pudding to see if it held in my hand. I remember it split, zipping in two and falling back on its creamy bed like a butterfly on a half-drowned lily pad. Moonlight has a habit of that. It cocoons all into a shape without detail. That is how I remember. The moonlight fought the flicker of the dull flame and landed on the jumble of pennies in the ashtray and fractured its light into a burst of shards whenever somebody upped the ante.

I’ll raise three, Paul said.

His hand slid into his front pocket and pulled out an array of coppers and some scrunched up receipts. The latter detail I remember because Jane leant over and pinched one of the scraps and it flew like a dart at Benji’s head and tumbled down his back onto that tattered carpet. He did not flinch. He was standing on his tiptoes at the lip of the box trying to catch a glimpse but he remained his arms at his side, stiff as a soldier, waiting to see who would break first. Paul clipped Jane on the side of the ear with a light tap and through the fluttering of overhanging moustache hairs he said, Behave yourself, you little rascal. Now is not the time. Jane tilted her eyes up at him and he knew she was warm for her cheeks were filled red and he ruffled her hair and uttered a brief exhale of laughter.

I turned to Ma. She sat with one leg rested upon the other and her eyes remained fixed at the centre of the room, past the ashtray and through Benji’s golden ringlets.

It’s your turn, Ma.

Her face looked like his had when we gathered around his bed and we all knew and she had turned to Paul and said, What are we going to do now?

On her lap, her dog-eared cards lay face up in her palm as if offering all that she could.

Hide your cards, Ma. You don’t want us seeing, do you?

I remember that her mouth parted but only to steal another breath. Her neck slumped under the weight of her bronze cross and its ribbon frayed like worn socks. I held her hand to her chest like an artist does with wooden figurines and I kissed her cheek and her blink disturbed the watery glaze but her eyes remained on him in the box as she said, Is it my turn yet, love?

Benji broke first. He was stood shuffling his hands. He wandered, mute in expression, and scrambled to the col of my knee, facing the box as he settled.

Where will he go next? he said.

He was fiddling with a yo-yo in the basin of his palm but he did not swing it. He must have only wanted to feel it. I looked at Ma to guide me but she had placed three coins in the ashtray and fixed her gaze back upon the box. Paul did not turn but he nodded and in that nod were the reigns to our carriage, even if only for a few seconds.

Well. We’ll take him to the church.

I wrapped my hands around Benji’s waist to keep him from falling, just like a harness holds a climber when something comes unstuck. I remember thinking, though, that he could still fall. Harnesses do not stop you from falling. They just stop you from hitting the ground. I swallowed and Benji was fixed on the pattern engraved in his yo-yo.

We’ll take him to the church and then we’ll…

He wriggled as if to become more comfortable and said, I know that. I mean where will he go after that?

The fire had begun to spit its embers and Paul was hunched over the grate, streaming more coals from the burlap sack. They nestled into gaps as they grazed the scattering of ash. My eyes burned at the pale iron, pleading to catch his gaze in the reflection. The ashen warmth filled my lungs and I could not breathe. I tracked Paul as he went from the fireplace and pulled from his breast pocket a small envelope, placing it by Ma’s side. I could not hear what he said but he swallowed hard as he paced past Benji and I, his stained denim shirt leaving a whiff of sweat and oil in his path. He grazed the blinds and a beam of moonlight now held Benji’s yo-yo in its grasp. Benji squinted past my shoulder through the pane of silver light.

Will he go up there?

He pointed through the window and I sighed and laughed for then I knew his guess was as good as mine.

I remember seeing Jane on her front, recumbent, tired of the card game and paddling her feet in the air as she flicked through the flimsy pages of a comic book. She lay on the carpet in front of the box, she facing the floor, he facing the ceiling. Her red strands were tucked behind her ears and she grinned whenever a punchline landed or an idea for school desk graffiti impressed her. When she was nearing the end, she placed the comic on the carpet with care and turned to Paul, raising her voice to address the room.

Does anyone remember that time when he came home and threw all his clothes onto the bed? He was mad that day. What was he doing?

Paul glanced over at Ma but she remained fixed. He took a sip from the murky brown mixture in his tumbler and said, He was looking for his war records. Jane swivelled and sat bracing her knees, her chin leant with full attention on Paul. He passed her gaze and peered for a second at the box, furrowing his brow.

Someone had said there was no way that he could have been in Burma. He’d come home to find his records so he could go back and prove them wrong.

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Ma’s fingers had gripped the rim of the arm, her nails sinking into the upholstery. Benji was still rubbing the sanded wood of his yo-yo and Jane leant in further.

Go back where?

I could see Paul’s tongue pushing against the side of his cheek and he placed the tumbler on the coffee table. He took a breath.

Back to the pub.

Jane giggled and Paul’s lower lip trembled. For a second, I could hear the hand of time beating against the wind outside.

So when he came home and turned the place upside down, was he drunk?

Ma surfaced from the depths of her trance and her voice filled the void where the crackling of the fire had been. Benji shivered in my arms.

How dare you ask a question like that tonight, young lady? And to your own brother. It’s only down to him that you’ll be eating tomorrow.  

She tried to push away from her chair as if she had set to march across the room but she had not the strength and crumpled, covering her face with the suede arm. She let out a single sob the way a child does when they are too tired to cry. I thought of the sow despondent when he had taken the boar to slaughter and I tugged the fabric on his knee as he did it. Paul began his way over and I lifted Benji from my lap but Jane rose to her feet and we watched. She closed her comic and gingered over to kneel at the arm of Ma’s chair. She raised both hands as if in prayer and searched for Ma’s in the mess of her contorted body, Ma’s fingers covering her face like the grille of a confessional. Jane clasped both palms around Ma’s and kissed her on the forehead.

I’m sorry, Ma. I didn’t mean to make you cry.

There was a silence and Ma did not move and Jane’s voice held strong for a second and then she bawled and nuzzled in to find Ma’s nose so that she could scrape her own against it.

Please Ma. I’m sorry. Please don’t hate me. I’ll even give up comics. Please. Please don’t hate me.

Paul downed a large swig from his tumbler and I did not look but I heard him sniffle as he stared into the flames. Ma emerged from the cradle of the suede arm and she stroked Jane’s hair behind her ears from the clumps sodden on her freckled cheeks. She wiped Jane’s eyes and then her own and kissed her on the tip of the nose.

Don’t be silly, love. I know you didn’t mean to.

Jane knelt and Ma turned to Benji and I. For a brief moment, I had forgotten the box in the middle of the room and I no longer needed the cards.

How’s Joanne, love? Did you tell her the news?

I sighed and held Benji tighter.

Yes, Ma. I called her earlier from the hospital. She said she’s really sorry.

Ma wiped the tears that remained and managed a long, deep inhale.

She’s a good lass, she is. You better treat her right. Have your wages come in yet?

I patted around my pocket, fumbling to find the creased envelope.

They have, Ma. How much should I chip in?

She tutted and smiled.

No, you daft beggar. We’ll manage this week. We’ll dip into the didlum if we have to.

She watched Benji fiddling with his yo-yo.

But we’ll try not to. Take her somewhere nice tomorrow. That’s what he would have wanted, isn’t it?

We all aimed our gaze towards him in the box. He lay stoic like a knight on stained glass at mass. His black hair was swept back to reveal the ravines of his wrinkled forehead but moonlight cast his cheeks in youthful wonder. It made him shimmer and float and the cufflinks he had worn on their wedding day glinted from his wrists, laid one over the other as if he were waiting. I suppose he was. This was the long wait.

Time passed. A heavy tiredness fell upon me and, when I awoke, the wind had calmed outside. The fire had died down but all were full of colour, him especially. Benji had stopped passing the yo-yo between his hands but held it in the tight of his fist. Paul had pushed the tumbler across the coffee table and Ma held Jane close like she used to do.

I began to hear the clock again and Benji slipped away from me. Paul was adding more coal to the fire and as Benji waddled over to sit by the grate, the twilight of his shadow stretched and time passed once more. I stood up.

Where are you going, love?

Ma looked up from her chair. Worry passed over her face like a child not yet ready to say goodnight.

I better head to bed. I’ll do his rounds in the morning.

Fixed on the flames, Paul said, Don’t worry, kid. I’ve already asked George to do it. 

I tweaked a smile and drew in all the air I could. I turned. I wanted to capture the whole tableau. The hand would never stop so I stopped the hand. Then I let the air seep out.

It sounds silly. I don’t know how to say this.

Ma grasped the arm of the chair again. She choked the fabric and managed the words, It’s alright, love. Take your time. I clocked her hand and turned my eyes inwards.

Well. I wish I wasn’t here right now.

Ma hoisted herself up and scampered to me, the best she could, taking my hand.

What are you on about, love?

I dug further and deeper, grasping onto all that I could.

No. Don’t worry. I mean, look at us.

She mirrored me as I panned my eyes again. I gripped tighter.

I’ll try to remember how you all look right now. I’ll really try. And I’ll remember the moon and the way that fire makes our shadows flicker on and off against the wall. It’s like he used to do with his hands when me and Paul were little. With the rabbits. I’ll cradle the memory and carry it.

I smiled down at Benji, who was unaware. With his finger, he was tracing the grin of a joker.

Carefully. Just like I would with little Benji. Just like he used to. But most of all I wish I wasn’t here because memories are always best from a distance, aren’t they?

She smiled and said yes with her eyes and I swallowed hard.

That’s what I thought. So twenty years or so will go like that. But in twenty years, or maybe when I am even older than he is. Or was. Maybe then the light from the moon might catch in a certain way and it all might come flooding back to me. And I think then I’ll enjoy it all much more.

I saw a reflection in her eye.

Now it’s mine and yours. And all of ours, really. It belongs to us, I suppose. It’s like we have it stored on one of those reels that spin around at the pictures and we can play it whenever we want and like that whiskey he kept in the cabinet for special occasions I suppose I’ll appreciate it the more it trickles away.

Ma buried herself in my chest and wrapped her arms around the small of my back. Jane would find a new comic and Benji would soon be tall enough to unwind the long string of his yo-yo. He turned to me and said, Do you think he’ll play football with me when he’s finished resting? Paul was placing some newspaper on the vent near the porch and I looked at the box. The moonlight captured his face and he cast no shadow.

Jake Bristow

Image: Coffin on a beir with part of the lid open