Machine Read online

  Liars

  Our father says not to say gone to shit.

  When people ask, and they will, our father says, you should not say gone to shit.

  But the guys were staring down into the water. The girls were holding each other’s arms. They were screaming into each other’s hair the way those girls all would.

  It was total shit, my brother says.

  Our father says, What did I say.

  We’re in our father’s study. Our father’s study is a replica of our father’s other study. But this one, because it’s at the shore, has seascapes on the walls. It has old maps on the walls. Our father’s other study, because it’s in the city, has pictures on the walls of the city.

  Our father and my brother are sitting in leather chairs. They’re the same kind of chair as the chairs in our father’s other study. They’re each on one side of the desk. I’m sitting on the floor.

  Our father says, Were you drunk.

  Were you high, our father says.

  Our father is being a certain way we’ve never liked. There’s nothing to do when he’s being like this. So my brother just sits there, arms folded across his front.

  Our father says not to say he was high.

  Not even a little, our father says.

  My brother looks at me like our father is such a dumbass. He looks at me like what does it mean to be a little high. There’s no such thing as a little high. You’re either high, or you’re not high.

  Our father says, People are going to ask.

  They’ll ask, he says, what you were doing.

  They’ll ask, he says, what you were on.

  So he says to say it was just a party.

  Just a party, he says, with friends.

  But my brother says, We wouldn’t call it a party.

  No one would call it that, he says.

  You don’t know what you’re saying, he says.

  My brother is right that we wouldn’t use the word party. A party is a different thing, a structured thing. This we would just call hanging out. This we would just call partying.

  So I say to our father, The word you want is partying.

  Our father looks at me for the first time today. He looks at me like where did you even come from.

  Still looking at me, he says to my brother not to use the word partying.

  Partying, says our father, implies something other than a party.

  Partying, he says, is not the same thing as a party.

  People, our father says, have already begun to talk.

  And these people, our father says and shakes his head like you better watch it.

  This is one of our father’s tricks for wearing people down. We’ve fallen for this trick before. And people at the boathouse, too, have fallen. And people at his business, too. They call him boss, and they call us mister and miss.

  One day, our father’s business will be my brother’s. So for now, my brother, our father says, needs to straighten up. He needs to get his act together, our father says. He needs to learn to fake it, he says, the way the people here all do.

  But my brother says there’s nothing to fake. He wasn’t even there when it happened, he says. He was pissing in the trees, he says. And when he got back to the dock, everything, he says, had gone to fucking shit.

  Our father is staring my brother down.

  He says, Why didn’t you piss in the water.

  Guys always piss in the water, he says.

  And people are going to ask, he says, why you had to piss on a tree.

  He looks at me like what the hell is wrong with your brother. I look at him like how the hell do I know.

  My brother says, I didn’t have to piss on a tree.

  He says, I just didn’t want to piss right there.

  Not in front of the girls, he says.

  Excuse me, he says, for not taking out my fucking dick in front of the girls.

  I realize my brother is being serious. That nothing could be more serious than this. I mean we’re talking about a girl who drowned. But we’re talking without any feeling. So I’m not yet feeling is what I’m saying. And I’m immature I’m also saying. So I’m too immature not to laugh at the word dick. I can’t not laugh at fucking dick.

  Our father looks at me again.

  He says to my brother, Why is she here.

  He says to my brother, Tell her to get the hell out.

  This is another one of our father’s tricks. He’s trying to get my brother to take his side in a war against me. My brother has fallen for this one before. So many times they’ve laughed in my face. They’ve made me feel like the lowest thing.

  But today, our father’s trick won’t work. My brother’s head is somewhere else. He’s turned to face the window. And it’s here he’ll face from this point on.

  Last night, my brother didn’t come home. None of us even noticed. We just went to bed, woke in the morning, sat at the table.

  Then my brother walked in looking like he’d been dug up from the dirt.

  Our father said, Well, look who’s here.

  My brother said nothing, went to his room.

  Our father went back to eating.

  But you could tell there was something up. You could tell by the speed at which my brother was moving. The quiet way he closed his door.

  Tonight, I’ll find out how my brother, after, wandered around all night. I’ll find this out from one of my brother’s friends. He’ll say my brother sat in people’s boats. He sat in trees in people’s yards. They found him at the market, late, lying in the empty lot.

  I’ll ask if he was sleeping, but who cares if he was, my brother’s friend will say.

  Now my brother is looking at something past the window. Like something he wants to move toward. Like he’ll step right through to some other world. And I’ve dreamed this too. Some holy world, and I’ve wanted it bad.

  Now I’m worried that my brother is done. That our father is too. That we’ll leave the room and never get back to this night.

  But my brother says, I can prove I wasn’t on the dock.

  He says, I remember the tree I pissed on.

  It had a giant knot, this tree, he says.

  And I pissed, he says, on that giant knot.

  At first, I imagine the tree. The knot in the tree like some kind of face.

  Then, I imagine the girl who drowned. She’s the only local girl there. The local girls hang out on the jetty. They don’t hang out on the dock. The other girls want her to leave. But she’s too fucked up. So she’s doubled over laughing. No, she’s doubled over crying. Now she’s falling down, now falling in. And I should be feeling something.

  But it’s like watching a movie of a girl who drowned. A movie of guys talking about a girl.

  You know what you sound like, our father says.

  You sound like a liar, he says.

  He says, This is what liars sound like.

  This is another trick we know. My brother should just ignore it.

  But he says, Fuck you.

  I’m not lying, he says.

  And our father says, I’m not saying you’re lying.

  I’m saying, our father says, that you sound like a fucking liar.

  Our father and I were at the table when the cop knocked at the door. Our father told me to go somewhere else. But I stayed right where I was.

  So the cop and our father walked outside. I could still hear some of what they said. The cop said it was late. The kids were on the dock. The girl was in her underwear.

  Our father said, Her underwear.

  Then they walked away, farther across the lawn.

  The thing is, we often swim in our underwear. We also swim in nothing. It depends on who’s on the dock. And what our bodies look like. And what our underwear looks like.

  So I imagine how this girl would have swum. I mean was she stripping down to nothing. Or had she stripped down as far as she meant to strip down.

  I mean did she go into the water before she meant to go in.
/>   Like was she pushed is what I mean.

  Tonight, I’ll ask my brother’s friend what really happened.

  He’ll laugh and mess up my hair.

  Just tell me, I’ll say.

  Just tell me, he’ll say, in a voice that’s supposed to sound like mine.

  Then he’ll wrestle me to the grass.

  I’ve seen our father wear my brother down for less than this. The smallest scratch on the car. Not walking the dog. I’ve seen him nearly bring my brother to tears for so much less.

  But my brother is back in that other world. And now I’m part there too. And I could stay there too. I could stay there forever, pretending.

  In the future, I’ll feel it all. It’ll start on a night this summer. I’ll be walking past the dock with some kids, and I swear I’ll see her ghost.

  So I’ll scream, and the kids will say, What the fuck, and I’ll point and say, It’s her.

  And they’ll throw me into the water for being fucked up.

  Now our father is looking at me.

  Now he winks at me, and this means something.

  It means my role has changed.

  He says, What the hell is wrong with your brother.

  What guy, he says, would leave the girls to piss on a tree.

  What guy, he says, and I don’t yet realize what he’s asking me to do.

  I mean I realize he wants me to take his side in a war against my brother.

  But I don’t yet realize, he wants me to objectify these girls.

  To imagine these girls as solely bodies.

  And to imagine these girls as solely bodies, I must imagine my own body as something else.

  Like a field covered in snow. Like a spread of clouds. A pile of dirt.

  So forgive me for where I go with this. Forgive me for the crazy shit now going through my head.

  For thinking I’m now our father’s son. That the business, one day, will be mine. That people will call me boss. That I’ll never again be miss.

  Forgive me for forgetting we’re talking about an actual girl who drowned.

  In her underwear, I say and laugh.

  What kind of guy, I say.

  Tonight, I’ll get too fucked up.

  My brother’s friend will tell me things.

  Like that everyone was on the dock.

  Like that my brother was on the dock.

  And the girl had gotten way too wild.

  So what happened, I’ll say.

  She fell, he’ll say.

  That’s it, he’ll say.

  And she drowned.

  I have a chance now to be useful. To pull the truth out of my brother. And if the truth is my brother was there on the dock, if the truth is my brother was high, if the truth is my brother just lost his shit, that he pushed her in, that he held her under, or knows who did, then our father will twist that truth into a lie that will save my brother’s ass.

  I say to my brother, What kind of guy, but my brother is covering his ears with his hands.

  I’ve only seen him do this once before. This isn’t what I want to remember right now. Lunch in a restaurant with our father. A fancy room, and we’re way too small for this place.

  There are white cloths and white plates and vines growing on the walls.

  And because I’m young and because I already hate so much, I dare my brother to pour a glass of water over his head.

  Our father says to me, Don’t start.

  He says to my brother, Don’t.

  But my brother pours the water. It all happens so fast. I’m amazed by how wet his face is. How wet and flat his hair is. These ladies near us are laughing. And at first, we’re laughing too. But then my brother covers his ears. Because he has to shut them out, these ugly old ladies laughing at him.

  Well, all of this is irrelevant. Our father dragging my brother outside. Then me just sitting alone at that table. Me sitting there like a grown-up. Staring these ugly old bitches down.

  The night I see the girl’s ghost, it won’t be that. It’ll just be me too fucked up. And a shadow, a light. Some peripheral thing moving about.

  But I’ll feel the loss you feel when waking from a dream that’s better than your life.

  So I’ll scream. I mean I’ll scream like crazy.

  So the kids will throw me in.

  But I won’t drown that night. I’ll rise to the top the way a body can.

  Now I say to my brother, What happened last night.

  Just tell us what happened, I say.

  This isn’t one of our father’s tricks.

  He has better tricks than being direct.

  I can feel our father’s disappointment.

  I’ve totally fucked this up.

  Our father’s face, you don’t want to see it.

  And my brother’s face you don’t want to see.

  Our father says, You’re done.

  He points to the door, says, Go.

  It’s easy to imagine the guys staring into the water. To imagine the girls losing their shit. The summer cops not knowing where to start. Then the real cops come and tell everyone go the fuck home.

  But it’s harder to imagine my brother. To imagine where he’s standing.

  Or how he’s standing. Or what he’s wearing.

  Or if he jumped in. If he pulled her out.

  If he pushed the wet hair from her face.

  If he pressed his mouth to her mouth.

  If he breathed as hard as he could.

  If she jumped back to life for a second.

  Our father says, I’m counting to three.

  But forget about that dumbass.

  I’m walking out of his study.

  I’ll go the boathouse and find my brother’s friend.

  He’ll be smoking with some guys.

  He’ll mess up my hair like I’m a child.

  He’ll pin me to the grass.

  I often imagine a life just wandering around. I imagine living in boats or in trees or riding trains across the world.

  And how hard I’ve tried, since, to have this life. How many times I’ve walked a street unknown and wanting to stay unknown.

  But how hard it is to fully shed the fucked-up thing you’ve always been.

  To know you’ll always be this fucked-up thing, no matter what.

  Dumb and drunk on the grass.

  Tracing shadows on his face.

  You whisper, Tell me, into his ear.

  He whispers into your mouth.

  Machines

  if I never learned the earth was spinning;

  that there was no bottom and there was no top;

  that light from stars I could see left years before I could see the light;