My Brother’s Birthday
Father Tobin is coming down the aisle along the side of the church where the Stations of the Cross hang on the wall. It’s Friday. It’s Lent. It’s my brother’s birthday. He’s seven today. I’m eight. He’s somewhere in a pew behind me since each of the different grades in our school sit in order in the church. Big kids in the front pews, then the not-so-big kids until the back of the church is full of first graders. That’s where my brother is. I’m sitting ahead of him so it’s not as hard for him to see me as it is for me to see him. I can’t turn around to look for my brother since we have to sit still. If I could turn around, I’d find him even though all the boys are dressed the same in their white shirts, blue ties, and gray pants. I’d find him by his skinny shoulders and the way he twists his mouth and bites his lip when he has to sit in one place too long. I wonder if he sees me since all the girls are dressed the same, too. We wear gray and green jumpers, white blouses with puffy sleeves, and blue bow ties. Some of the girls don’t wear their ties, but I always do.
We sing in Latin. I hum over the words that are hard for me to say. Father Tobin is coming closer. The altar boys follow him. Father Tobin is so close to me I can see his hands are shaking. He’s the oldest priest at Saint Genevieve’s. One day last summer my brother and I walked past the rectory on our way home after playing on the swings and seesaw of the public school. Father Tobin was sitting on the porch. I was afraid he’d yell at us for playing in the schoolyard of a school we didn’t attend, but all he did was ask us if we were having a good summer. Yes, Father, my brother and I said, our voices whispery because priests and nuns bring out the quiet in us.
My brother asked for blueberry pie for his birthday. Mom said she’d bake one today. I worry about the candles. Candles stand up straight in cake because of the icing, but in a pie they’ll be crooked. The flame on the top of each candle will light up the blueberries, though. That’ll be pretty because bright light is always pretty on dark things, and blueberries are so dark they’re black. Dad will be home from work early. He’s out the door every morning before we leave for school and isn’t home until late. Sometimes I don’t see him at all except for when he stands beside my bed and I’m not asleep yet and he tells me to sleep well. Then he goes to my brother’s bed across from mine and tells him to sleep well, too. We’re both usually awake because it’s hard for us to sleep when the four of us aren’t together in the same place when it’s dark outside.
But today is my brother’s birthday and Dad will be home. He’ll meet us at the door, ask us about our day, and tell us to stay out of the kitchen because whatever Mom makes for our birthday dinner is a surprise. It’s hard to keep it a surprise, though. The kitchen is right next to the front door so we smell whatever is cooking as soon as we get home. It might be spaghetti tonight. My brother loves spaghetti. He’ll get his presents after dinner. I got him a handful of plastic Army men. He likes to play with his soldiers on the floor between our beds. He’s good at making noises with his mouth that sound just like machine guns and explosions. Mom and Dad got him one of those airplanes with a propeller you wind with a rubber band and two cars made of tin. Mom shined them up with a dishtowel. She wrapped his presents in aluminum foil while I sat with her at the kitchen table. I heard her sigh and thought she was sad. When she was done, she pressed her finger to her lips. Our secret, she said to me.
The sun coming through the church windows is smoky from the incense. The church smells as good as the air outside when people burn their leaves. We’re singing as Father Tobin and the altar boys move along the back of the church to the other side to continue the Stations of the Cross. I quickly glance over my shoulder to find my brother, but I see only rows of boy and girl faces. My brother’s back there somewhere. Maybe he saw me look for him.
When the Stations of the Cross is over, the nuns march us out to the schoolyard and send us home. My brother and I walk together. He looks up at me and smiles. It’s the smile that wrinkles his nose. That’s the smile my brother has when he’s excited. We talk about blueberry pie and spaghetti and then he starts to guess what presents he’ll get. A transistor radio, he says, an Etch a Sketch, a set of walkie talkies. He laughs as he starts to hop along beside me.
When we get home, we stop to watch the color televisions in the window of the television and radio store below our apartment. Sometimes the clerks in the store shake their heads at us so we don’t stand there long. That day, my brother’s birthday, no clerk shakes his head at us. I watch the flashing colors on the televisions and think of the airplane Mom and Dad got my brother. We’ll take it outside, wind up the propeller as much as we can, send it flying up into the sky, and then watch as it comes back down to earth.
After/Thought Literary 