SQN - Sine Qua Non - Issue 1 - Journal - Page 72
***
Ernie told me he's between jobs, has a few leads, and he's sure to get something soon.
He's good at finding work but rarely pays me back, and he doesn't have a kid. At least that
he's mentioned. Where was he working last? That Italian joint in Cleveland? He said it was
good, he'd stay awhile, but Ernie never lasts long at a restaurant because someone is always an
asshole. One of the servers or dishwashers or other sous chefs rubs him the wrong way after a
few months, and he takes off without his last paycheck. I wonder if he doesn’t want to move
back to town because he’s burned all his bridges.
“Can I take Uncle Ernie to school tomorrow?” says Isobel from the living room.
“No,” I say while mixing garlic butter for cheese bread to go with the pasta. I can get away
with another night of ziti as long as there's cheese bread. Before he became a hedgehog, I told
Ernie what I was making. He said I wasn't creative enough.
“Fuck that,” I said. “I'm exhausted. Everyone in the co-op likes pasta, and I had to use
the walker at the office.”
“Oh,” he said quietly. “I'm sorry.”
“Don't apologize,” I said. “Just don't criticize.”
He still asked for the hundred dollars, which is when I told him he could go to hell or
stay for dinner.
***
When I was sixteen and Ernie was thirteen, he egged the mailbox of this guy who I'd
asked to be my date to Homecoming. The guy politely refused and said he wasn't going. I went
with a group of friends, saw him at the dance with another girl, came home, and spent the rest
of the night crying in my bedroom with Ernie sitting at the edge of the bed patting my back.
When I was twenty and Ernie was seventeen, I bought the home pregnancy test for him
and his girlfriend and sat in the bathroom with them after she peed on that little strip. I hugged
them both when it was negative.
***
Last year when he got the job in Cleveland, Ernie asked me and Isobel to move down there
to be closer to him. I said it would be easier for him to move back home. I had health insurance
at my job with the city, had become friends with everyone in the co-op, and there was no way
I’d find a cheaper apartment. He didn't call for three months after that. Who knows what he
might have turned into, but he came to town two days before Thanksgiving and volunteered to
roast the turkey. Everyone in the co-op said it was the best they'd ever tasted. Ernie smiled and
said it was all in the brine. He also made Mom's mashed potato casserole with cream cheese
and cheddar cheese. I'd forgotten the recipe, but he knew it by heart. Often the things going
through his head surprise me.
***
“You treat me like a kid,” he said when I told him I wouldn't give him the hundred bucks.
“I want you to grow up,” I said. To me that means being civil to your co-workers so you
can keep your job, but my brother has always been too prickly for his own good.
***
When I was nine and he was six, he toddled to my bedroom late at night and cuddled
with me when he'd had a nightmare. Sometimes I thought he was lying, but I was too sleepy
to protest and didn't mind having him in bed as long as he didn't kick too much.
When I was twenty-eight and he was twenty-five, Dad had another bout of heartburn
that turned out to be a blood clot in his coronary artery. Sitting in the hospital lobby I felt like
I'd stepped out of my body. It took a few moments before I started crying, before two-year-old
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