1. Newport Beach, 1939

The sky is crazy-white with clouds.  Morning unfolds -- eyes like wet stones.
     You stand at the edge of the shore as dawn cracks at the edge of the world. 
     Your feet turn green with kelp. You walk out until the waves are taller than you.   Your fists are rocks.  They are the first to drown.  You tremble at the thought of losing them to the sea.
     “Timmy?” your mother shouts.  “That’s enough for today.”
     Your father is reading the morning paper.  Bare feet in the sand.
     “Fred?” she says, standing, staring.  “I can’t see him anymore.”
     “Can you believe this shit?  Look at this: HITLER INVADES POLAND.
    “What?”
     “It says here...”
     Turn to HITLER, Page A-3.

2. The 4th of July Parade, Bristol, 1940

Rockets blare.
     She sleeps.
     Marching bands bash.
     She sleeps.
     The clowns hand out balloons.
     She sleeps.
     A parade of soldiers salute.
     She sleeps.
     Your mother is sitting in a lawn chair, tilting toward the sun.  You’re wearing blue shorts and a red and white polo, holding the arm of the chair.  You’re frightened by the clown who is handing you a bag of hard candy.
     “Take the candy, kid,” the clown says.

Cymbals clash.
     She sleeps.
     Batons whirl and girls cartwheel.
     She sleeps.
     Applause for the Mayor.
     She sleeps.
     You eclipse the sun.  Your mother wakes, startled by the shade of you standing in front of her, holding a torn paper bag of candy.
     She lifts a hand to wipe away the tiny tears.
     “Aren’t you enjoying the parade, sweetie?” she says.
 

3. Weekend in Vermont, 1942

Autumn leaves flash by in the windshield.  You watch mama’s head nod in the front seat.  Papa uses his hands when he talks.  You sit in the back with your knees under your chin.
     “Sit up straight,” Papa says.
     “Leave the boy alone,“ Mama says.
     You place your feet back on the floor, but your feet don’t reach.  They swing, bouncing off the car seat.
     “You’re ruining the Goddamn . . .” Papa yells.
     “Leave the boy alone,” Mama yells back.  She turns around and places a hand on your knees.  You wish with all your might that mama would keep her hand there.  If she did you would stop.  You know you would, but she takes her hand away.
     Your legs swing again.  Wack, wack, wack, on the car seat.
     “You just missed the exit, Fred.”

4. Tarzan Summer, 1945

It’s not raining.  There is no rain at all.  Not even the clouds speak of it. 
     It’s hot.  It’s humid. 
     A maple tree sits at the end of the garden.  The tree is tall, wide and a blur of green.  You have your trusty steak knife slung at your hip.  It takes you time to lift through the thick branches.  But you are Tarzan today.  The tree is your friend.  It will not let you fall.
     “Timmy!” your mother calls to you from a tree hut, deep in the jungle of stone and clapboards. 
     It is a cry for help.  You give your best Tarzan yell and swing down from the tree.  You run as fast as you can.  You palm your trusty knife at the door.  You listen for sounds of the beast.  You sniff the air.  Your muscles tight.  You crouch ready to pounce.  Your mother opens the door.
     “Timmy,” she says.  “Put that knife away.”
     “Jesus H. Christ,” your father roars.  “I told him not to play with those Goddamn steak knives.”
     Your mother bends to one knee.  She extends her hand.
     “Please,” she says. 
     You growl like a wind in the maple tree.

5.  Christmas Eve, 1946

Snow falling.  The sky is white with weight.  Snowdrifts pile up in the yard, like sand dunes. You sit on the edge of the bed.  Your mother is downstairs roasting chestnuts.  Your words are softly spoken, like the snowflakes melting on the windowpane. 
     “Dear Santa,” you whisper. 
     “Timmy?” your mother calls.
     “Can I have some army men, and a Monopoly game like my friend Tony.  And checkers, too.”
     “There is no Santa Claus,” your father says.  He is leaning against the door to your room.  His hands are wide and heavy against the wood.  He rubs his chin.  The wind hits the window.  The glass talks like thieves.
     “I know,” you say.
     “You know.  You know.  But you still do it.”
     “Just . . . in case,” you whisper.
     “Timmy!” your mother yells.
     You run past him and rush downstairs.  Santa Claus is real.  Santa Claus is real. 
     “Santa Claus is real.”
     Your mother scoops you up into her arms.
     “Of course he’s real.  But don’t say it too loud, your father might hear you.”

6.  Imagination, 1947

The car speeds at seventy.  You shoot at trees with an imaginary gun.  Your father lights another cigarette.  Your mother wheezes.  Mountains flash like swollen ticks in the distance.
     “Bang.  Bang.”  Trees fall.
     “Would you please slow down, Fred,” your mother says.
     “Bang.  Bang.” Trees fall.
     “Do you want to drive?” your father shouts.
     “Bang.  Bang.” Trees fall.
     Your mother’s fingers tick on the dashboard.
     “Timmy, please, mommy can’t think.”
     “Bang.  Bang.” 
     “Bang.  Bang.”
     Tires screech.
     “JESUS CHRIST!” 
     Horns blare.
     Your father turns and reaches over the back seat.
     “Will you stop that Goddamn racket,” he yells.
     The car speeds at fifty, fifty-five, sixty.  The sun glares the windshield with bright, fat, yellow fingers.  Your father flips the vizor down and lights another cigarette.  Fields flash.  Orange groves run toward the horizon.  Your mother turns and holds out her hand.  You imagine a smile she once used.  A voice once rich with laughter. 
    “Timmy, give mommy the gun,” she grins, like the trees falling.
     Your mother puts the gun away in her make believe pocket.
But you have another gun in your left hand.  You raise the gun, high over your head. 
     “Bang.  Bang,” you whisper.  You close your eyes.  The metal is cold against your cheek. 

7.  13 Main Street

On Main Street, 13 sits in the back.  The house is painted white, with blue shutters and a black wrought-iron rail.  There’s a dirt driveway with clumps of yellow grass.  Pink curtains part the windows.
     In the backyard there’s a garden.  Staked tomatoes, carrots, three rows of corn, and parsley running along the edge of a stone walk.  Further back, a maple tree, and garbage cans.
     In the driveway, there’s a young boy sitting in the dirt holding a jar.  His mother is in the basement washing clothes.  His father is working at a factory on Magnolia Street.  Most of the men in the neighborhood work there.
     The boy lifts the jar and makes faces.  The sun is bright.  It’s summer.  It’s hot.  He shakes the jar.  He stares at it and then shakes it again. 
     Dead fireflies hit the tin cover.
     “Timmy!”
     The startled boy looks up to see his mother standing over him.  She is slightly bent with the weight of wet laundry.
     The boy stares at his mother’s face.  The noon day sun  paints long shadows under her eyes.  He drops the jar.  It rolls in the dirt.
     “Want to help mommy hang out the clothes?”
     Timmy stands and follows his mother to the backyard.
     “Get the clothes pins, okay?” she says, and disappears around the back of the house.
     Timmy runs back to the jar and picks it up.  He unscrews the cap and shakes the contents out.  He screws cap on tight and shoves it into his back pocket.  He sprints to the door smiling under his breath. 

8.  In the middle of the night, 1950

You wake with a feverish grin.  You hear noises coming from the other room: loud grunts, gasps, heaving, and the pulling of tissue paper from a box of tissues.
     Abrasive shadows climb into your head.  Rapid fire thoughts, like wicked witches of the east, conjure a bed of sweating, naked flesh.  You close your eyes and squeeze tight.  You try to imagine the scarecrow stuffing straw into his head: the tin man thumping a metal beat on his chest; and the cowardly lion growling, fierce tears of courage. 
     You click the heels of your bare feet.
     “There’s no place like home.  There’s no place like home.  There’s no place like home.”
     A hush.  Then you hear your father whisper.
     “I thought he was sleeping.”
     “He was.”

9.  Baby Jesus, 1952

It’s dark.  Moonlight slants over your shoulders.  You’re standing in your brother’s room.  He’s sleeping.  You touch his face, his eyelids, his hair . . .
     A light freezes your hand in mid-air.
     “Timmy!” your mother shouts.  “What are you doing in your brother’s room?”
     “Mama, is Billy the baby Jesus?’
     “No.  You march into your room right now, young man.”
     You climb into bed.  She shuts the light off.  Several seconds of silence, then she walks pass your room.
     “Mama, is he?”
     “Do you know what time it is?  Now you go to sleep and stop asking silly questions.”
     “I want to know.”
     “Why?”
     “Because, he never cries.”

10.  The incident, 1958

 “You stay there,” you scream.  “Don’t you move.”  And when he tries to move, you kick him back under the bathroom sink.
     “But Tim, I didn’t do anything,” he whimpers.
     You poke your head under the sink and threaten to kick him dead if he moves.
     “Don’t you move out of there,” you shout until your voice is another weapon.
     “Please, Tim,” he cries. 
     The tears are the ones you want to see.  Those are the tears your father makes you cry. 
     The more your brother cries, the more you want to hurt him.  You kick under the sink.  Wack. Wack. Wack.

“Please let me out.  Let me out.  I won’t do it anymore.  I won’t cry anymore.  I promise.”  The basement door is locked.  Your father is on the other side breathing loud against the door. 
     “Please Daddy,” you cry.

“Shut up.  Shut up.”  You grab your head before it hits the mirror.  You fall to your knees and grab you brother by the shirt.  He holds his belly like he’s been shot. You shake him until his eyes roll up and down. 
     “Shut up.  Shut the fuck up.”
     He’s so small.  He’s like a doll.  You can bang his head off the wall until he dies.  But instead, you let go of his shirt.  He slides under the sink and rolls up into a ball.
     Silence.
     You jump to your feet.  The mirror has teeth, lips, and eyes.  You stumble out of the house.  The sky is black.  The air is cold.  You sit on the front stairs rubbing your face, your arms, and your legs. 

The basement door is open.  It takes you awhile before you can move.  There is no one behind the door.  You run upstairs to your room and scramble into bed with your clothes on.  You wipe your face on the sheets.  Then he comes to you.  A long shadow across the ceiling.   It stops and leans close to your ear.  Fear has hands and it chokes you.  The animal pants the smell of tobacco and bad breath.  It speaks; iron, deliberate strokes.  “If you tell your mother.”  A hand like the weight of mountains. 

A tiny hand on your shoulder.  It’s your brother’s hand.  It’s trembling.  You want to reach up and touch it.  You want to take it in your hand and touch it.  Touch it.  Touch it.  You want to say you're sorry, but you can’t.  Your lips won’t move that way.
     “Leave me alone,” you shout. 
     Real tears fall.  The kind you can’t wipe away. 

11.  Ballroom Dancing, 1960

They were on the dance floor.  She had her shoes off.
     "Step on my feet, sweetie," she said.
     "But it'll hurt, mama," he said.
     She laughed almost as loud as the man playing the trombone.
     "But I don't want to dance, mama."
     "Don't be a party-pooper."
     He pressed his shoes to the floor.
     She wiggled her toes.  "Come on, hop on," she said.
     The man with the white-tailed coat pointed the wand at Timmy and winked.  The man's mouth was open.  "Go ahead son, dance with your mother."
     Timmy's feet stepped up.  His mother grabbed his hand.  He made a tight fist. She grabbed his fist and pressed his face to her stomach.
     He rested the other hand lightly on her hip.
     "Hold on," she said.
     The drums boomed as they moved across the floor.
     Timmy opened his fist.  His mother squeezed his hand.  He felt her stomach tighten, and her body shake to another rythm.
     The music stopped.
     "Let's give a big hand to this lovely couple," the man in the white-tailed coat shouted above the roar in Timmy's ears.
     Timmy stepped down.  His mother kneeled in front of him, wiping her eyes.
     "Why you crying, Mama?"
     "Give me a big hug, sweetie," she said. "Tell me you love me."