Looking On

Sister, I write that word with shaking hand and heart. You will not call me brother after you read what I have done. You may not visit my grave after you know what I have done. No one will blame you, I can only reach into the past to remind you that we were once loving children together. Brother and Sister.

I must go back before I can admit sin, back to when we padded bare feet on fresh cut grass, our father laughing whilst the sprinkler wet out golden skin, our mother busying herself but stealing sideways glances at the three of us having fun. Look upon that time now, feel it, smell the grass, rain on hot bitumen, the freshness of youth, and our mother looking on, always looking on.

Do you remember the day we went to the beach, and we were swept out to sea. We were too little to fight the undertow and abruptly we were in over our heads, you clinging to me, me panicking with salt water filling my sinuses, unable to get a breath. Suddenly there were strong arms around us and we were rescued by a life guard. A crowd had gathered to watch. Dad was oblivious, reading a book. Our mother was part of the crowd, I only glimpsed her, at the back, looking on. Her face expressionless, no, there was an expression, it was excitement. Sister, believe that. Later she claimed not to have been there, and made a fuss and was angry at Dad for not watching us carefully, I doubted her presence myself, and for the sake of the comfort of a mother's love, I told myself I was mistaken. But I saw that expression again over the years, and others - anger, sadness, loss and hurt cunning - all when she thought she was looking at us unobserved.

The years passed, our father would joke with us and our mother would look on, cooking the dinner, being the butt of a joke, never showing anger at it, just quietly accepting the teasing. You remember how we would imitate her, the way she used her hands to describe something, some archaic memory of when hand expression meant more than words. We would copy her, our hands fluttering too, but we were innocent, we didn't mean to hurt. She would look on at us, at most saying, "You are very rude."

One day, when I was ten and you were too young to question, something horrible happened. It was on this day that I knew our mother was not a nice person, in fact, I realised she was an evil person. You remember Belle, our dog, my dog? She died when she was hit by a car. You knew how I loved Belle, it was an accepted truth, Belle loved me too, above anyone. Dad said her mongrel colourings made her seem like a miniature African Hunting Dog, and the three of us sat in awe when a wild life came on about them.

"There's Belle!" You pointing at the TV.

"No there's she is, the puppy!" Belle wagged her tail when she heard her name. In the corner, our mother watched, looking at me, looking at Belle. She was a unique dog, beautiful. It was me she came to, me she followed. Belle the beautiful, the first word I learned in another language. Hit by a car in the dead of night. Me calling for her in the morning,
"Belle! Belle!" No sign of her. It was then my mother looked at me and shook her head: "Your father has something to tell you." I turned to him, and felt my mother turn too, but whilst my stricken face was full of fear, the glimpse I caught of my mother's was of anticipation, excitement.

"Belle was hit by a car last night, she's dead son, I'm sorry." He put a slice of toast in his mouth and I hated him. I turned to my mother and ran to her with open arms, her smile, her giggle did not register with me. She was warm and she hugged hard, I loved her, I had lost Belle, and my father ate toast.

"Can I see her, where is she?" My mother paused and glanced at my father, he chomped more toast, and I felt her frown.

"We've buried her, she was a mess we couldn't let you see her." She hugged me so tight I could ask no more questions, but that night when I was tucked in the tears flowed, wetting my pillow so thoroughly I had to turn it over. Sobbing, I relived the event, the conversations, and doubt found me.

Sister, I could not sleep. I crept from my bed, my body full of instinct. In the garage I found Belle, under hessian sacks. A spade rested beside her. She was not a mess, but her skull was crushed with a vicious blow. I looked at the spade and knew. Our mother killed Belle, because she was jealous. Before I could return, I heard footsteps approaching, my fathers. I dived behind some boxes and watched him approach Belle. He was sobbing and shaking his head, "What a mess, what wickedness. The poor boy, poor Belle." He put Belle in one of the sacks and took the spade. It was then I noticed the patch of blood, a perfect circle, on the spade. My grief burned like a meteor entering the atmosphere, and became hard iron rage, it impacted my heart, and left a crater that would never heal, not until I had revenge.

A child gets on with things much better than an adult. I cried for Belle, nightly, soaking the pillow and wishing for her to come back, just please, come back. I was cool with my mother, not acknowledging her crime, and not acknowledging her. I felt her disappointment, and realized that with Belle dead, she thought she would take the love I had for Belle as her own.

I became busy in the garden, using the very spade that had murdered Belle, I dug garden beds, I turned soil, I grew vegetables and became interested in fungus, wetting logs in damp places and watching the fungi grow and gnaw away at wood. My shouldered began to knit with muscle, my arms grew in disproportion to my body. The Budding Gardner people called me. So young to work so hard.

As I tended the garden, our mother tended you, doting, but always looking at me as she did. I pulled away further, thinking. I turned eleven, twelve, thirteen, and still I thought and turned soil, grew vegetables, and in dark holes I watched how fungi worked at wood. Our father seemed to retreat into his own world too, and our mother became dominant and obsessed. No longer did we tease, and no longer did we play in the garden without her. When she looked on, we looked back as if hypnotized.

It wasn't until I was fifteen, and you twelve, that I knew the time for thinking was over. Dad raked at leaves and I kicked at them, mucking about. I happened to look up at the house and saw the curtains part. I was agog, there was our mother looking on at us, and beside her stood you, with the makings of the same expression. My little sister, who had no idea what out mother was, you, who our mother had made her own, who did not understand the lessons you were being taught. The crater in my heart burned and I reached for it, blood pulsed hot and wild, my father said something to me I didn't hear but as I turned to leave his words haunted me, "Best to let them have their ways, best not to interfere with their feelings."

The terrible, feeble, toast munching man. I was back in the kitchen the day Belle was killed by my mother. He knew, but he thought he should not interfere with feelings. He knew what she was and accepted it!

We all remember the death of our mother. The accident. You were inconsolable, your grief reminded me of me, the nights after Belle. Even my father hung his head, but I thought it was for your sake more than his own. I held my head high, I did not cry, and people noticed. "They grieve in their own way." I heard our relatives say.

You came to me for comfort, gone was that look our mother was teaching you, in its place was the expression of innocence in danger, like the day we nearly drowned. I soothed and I cuddled, I told you that it wasn't fair all the time thinking of the confrontation I had with our mother. It happened in the garage, where they kept the hessian sacks.

Five years in the planning, the thinking. Five long years I waited, rusting a tiny hole in the garage tin roof, that watered my fungus garden on the beam above the hessian sacks. Waiting for it to be close to collapse, to have a finger to point at. I baited the trap, desperate, because I saw you becoming our mother. I left her a note.

"Belle is still under the sacks."

I put it in her purse, and stole her money. An hour later the garage door banged open, and I swear her mouth worked like a dogs. In the corner unseen, I watched her bound to the sacks, hurling them asunder. Her facial expressions were devilishly mobile, first enraged, then sly, then that solemn contemplation we knew so well. Her teeth clenched, she whispered secretly. Above her the garage support beam hung like a thread, rotted by my little wood eating, deadly garden. It was not the hammer blow that killed her, that duty was mine. With the spade I would jolt it into collapse. The terrible spade that killed Belle, the spade I had used daily for five years, the spade my calloused hands knew so well. It whistled through the air like a war hammer, striking her above the temple, meeting resistance before a crunch. She died like a dog, but unlike Belle, she died unloved.

The woman put a letter from her brother to one side. She tapped it once, twice, staring out the window. Outside her children screamed and yelled and laughed and adored their father. She frowned slightly, but quickly smoothed her brow when she felt faces look up at her. Why did they have such fun? Why didn't they include her? They showed more attention to the disgusting dog than her. Whenever they looked at her they seemed to burst out laughing. Was she a joke? She thought back to her brother, did they play like this when they were children? Surely their mother had taken part, she couldn't remember. Her brother! (she snorted) As if she didn't know he had killed their beautiful mother. It was only the facts that eluded her. Murderer! Cunt! His work of fiction in the form of a letter made her head spin, she hoped the cancer would devour him like acid. She looked at her own son, hurling leaves at his sister, he, the lynch pin in the trio. She looked on, expressionless.
By Andy Parker