Today the blinds are open, no matter how hot it is outside. Mom and I look down all twelve floors. My brother’s red car, the size of a pack of cigarettes, parallel parks between a motorcycle and a pickup truck. When he gets out of the car, he’s the size of a matchstick. Some girl staggers after him.
Mom leans into my arm. “I hid my rings. I hid your watch, okay?”
“When my brother dies, I’m gonna piss on his headstone,” I say. “Then I’m gonna kick it.”
“Your brother,” she says.
Here comes Stuart. Little guy, opposite of me. Short and bowlegged like he’s crouching—a catcher’s stance. Eyes in the back of his head, expecting something outta nowhere. He flinches, maybe a bee. He’s scared of bees. The girl he’s with, she starts tucking his shirt into his pants. Brand-new shirt, nightclub shirt, sparkling in the sun. The girl brushes his shoulders, musses his hair. One of Stuart’s girls. Chubby in the waist but skinny arms, long hair in a high ponytail, a flared skirt with one of those giant elastic belts. They stare at each other for a minute, then he motions up the length of her body, and she goes back to the car, puts on a sweater.
I look at Mom. “He’s got a girl with him.”
It’s bright in here, it’s the end of June.
“Eddie,” Mom says. “This is our place.”
Brand-new apartment. The good side of Pacific Boulevard, border of Yaletown, close enough to say we live there. Washing machine. New place, new life. New life, new summer. Mom’s jogging. She does the books for a mattress company, and I go to WORKFORCE every day. I can pick up Mom with one hand. For the first time, I qualified for a credit card.
The second Mom got home, she took out the napkins, hid the crystal, and spent forty minutes stuffing Cornish game hens with lemon and salt, then an hour in front of the mirror putting on lipstick and rouge, curling strands of hair in her fingertips and cinching them with rhinestone clips, until her head looked like a chandelier.
“I’ll put some coffee on,” she says and kicks a sock into the laundry room on her way to the kitchen. We owe my brother $5,000, but we’re not talking about it. We’re not talking about it at all.
It’s been six months since Stu and I were in the same room. I want to go to sleep. I want to play Scrabble. The way I see it, you come into some money, and then you don’t. Mom was in bad shape after her chemo. But she was holding on. The $5,000 was Stuart’s idea. Get her out of the shithole she was renting. Give her enough for a damage deposit, first and last month’s rent on a nice place. So we teamed up, her and me. I got cleaned up. Found her the apartment. It was good motivation for both of us, the money from Stu, and I’m not complaining. Thing is, he meant the money to go to Mom, not Mom and me. Not me. I didn’t have cancer, Stu said, I had bad habits. Once he found out I was here, he gave her six months to pay him back.
When the buzzer rings, I don’t speak, I just push the button and unlock the door. I worked a night shift, got home this morning at eight, went back to WORKFORCE, picked up another shift till three. All I want to do is order a pizza and eat it in bed with the lights off. I wish we had one of those elevators with slow-opening doors like in rest homes so that no matter how slow the old people go, they don’t get caught in the door. Ours is like a fucking jet.
“A-hoy!” Stuart’s voice slithers into the living room. Doesn’t even knock, just lets himself in. I hear him whisper to the girl to take off her boots. “Eddie? Ma?”
“In the kitchen,” Mom hollers, and then Stuart and the girl are in front of me.
“Hey, bro,” he says. He has pleats down the front of his pants, and he smooths them with his hands. His shirt is made of silk, a purple wine color. He looks like a bank teller. He looks okay.
Mom appears with two cups of coffee and looks at the girl. “Sugar’s in the kitchen,” she says, “if you take it.”
“Raz,” Stuart says. “This is my girl, Raz-ma-tazz. Evening, Eddie. Evening, Ma.” He slings his arm over the girl. She looks fifteen. She looks like she wants to wiggle out of there, fast.
“That’s my bro, Eddie,” Stuart says. “My little brother.”
Mom hands them each a coffee and fiddles with one of the clips in her hair. She’s a little shorter than Stuart but at least a head taller than the girl. Munchkin world around here. I stand up from the couch and tower over them all.
“Don’t want it, but thanks,” Stuart says and looks for someplace to put his cup. He gives it to Raz and takes Mom by the waist. She wraps her arms around his neck and puts her head on his shoulder. They hold each other like they always do, a little too long.
“Stuart says you’re in construction,” Raz says. Minute she opens her mouth, I can tell she’s a smoker. Big yellow teeth with a gap. She puts the coffees down, steps toward me, and offers her hand, which I don’t take. Her hair is pulled back so tight it looks like her forehead’s been stretched. Her eyes are too far apart. I’d say fetal alcohol, but Stuart’s been going for the good girls lately. Bet he found this one at the community center. Salsa lessons. Poker night. When she unzips her sweater, I take a step back.
“You two wear the same cologne,” she says.
So here we are—me in my 49ers sweatpants, and there’s Stuart’s girlfriend, eyeing my crotch, trying to hide the fact she’s got a hole in her sock.
“White carpet and everything.” Stuart releases Mom and gestures to the window. “Fuckin’ view of the whole fuckin’ city!”
Mom gives me a look and picks up the coffee cups. “We’re both working. You working?”
“Raz and I are starting a business. Aren’t we, Raz?” Stuart takes a minute to run his hand over the wall, then pats the leather couch. “You guys lucked out with this place.” He reaches for my shoulder, tugs the sleeve. “That my shirt?”
“We each have one.” I knock away his hand. “This one’s mine.”
“We gonna watch the game tonight, bro?” Stuart asks. He sits on the couch and puts his feet on the coffee table. Mom disappears into the kitchen.
No matter how good my brother looks, he still wears tube socks. Raz comes over and sits on his leg. “Can I get a beer, Stu?” she says, but she’s looking at me.
“Eddie’ll get it.” He pats her thigh. “Long day today, Eddie. Longest day of the year.”
She wraps her leg around Stuart’s body, and they start rubbing their faces together like no one’s around. Booze is what’s keeping these two together. Wine and song.
. . .
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