Secret Brother

  When Willie was at the dinner table, Grandpa always seemed to have a lot to say. Whatever Willie said about his day or something special he had done, Grandpa had a story to tell about himself when he was Willie’s age. He told it as if he was telling it to both of us, but I knew he was really telling it to Willie. Boys needed fathers and grandfathers; girls needed mothers and grandmothers. I had become more and more of an orphan as I grew older and needed them more.

  Of course, Grandpa asked me about school. I tried to make it seem as if it had gone all right. I assured him that I had caught up with my work. I kept waiting for him to say something about the poisoned boy, but he didn’t talk about him. Instead, he told me things about his business, things he never really talked about. I thought he was just trying to fill the silence. I tried to pay attention and be interested, but it was like listening to someone speaking in another language.

  The following evening, he talked about his business less, and the evening after that, he stopped altogether. Our meals grew quieter and shorter. Myra and My Faith did their best to make them festive, but as that first week drew to a close, Grandpa missed the last two dinners entirely. Myra sat with me, and one night, Lila did come to dinner. We worked on homework and talked about boys again.

  The grip that sadness had on me weakened. I could feel myself moving with more energy in school, and I was paying attention to the work again. I did well on my first tests and quizzes since returning. However, I still refused to do anything social on the weekend, and I regretted it. I insisted that Lila go to a party without me, promising her I would do something with her the following weekend. But in the middle of the following week, Grandpa introduced me to the private-duty nurse, Dorian Camden, and I couldn’t think about much else.

  He had finally decided to tell me directly of his specific plans to bring the boy to our house, how he would accommodate him and provide what was necessary for his recuperation. He went on and on about his medical treatments, the diagnosis, the horrible impact the slow arsenic poisoning had on his body, filling his descriptions with terms the doctors had used. He emphasized how important it still was for him to have private nursing care.

  I sat and listened, sullen and quiet, but if he noticed, he either didn’t care or thought that the more he talked, the better the chance would be that I would relent and be more cooperative, even happy about it.

  “I introduced her to him at the hospital,” he said.

  “Did he talk to her?” I asked sharply.

  “No. He still hasn’t said anything to anyone.”

  “Then maybe she’s not a good nurse,” I said petulantly. “Nurses are supposed to be trained for that, aren’t they?”

  “Oh, no, no. Dr. Friedman recommended her. She was the first one who came to his mind.”

  I didn’t say anything more. There was no way I could discourage him.

  When he brought Dorian Camden to our house and introduced her to everyone, I saw that she was an attractive woman, with intelligent light blue eyes and short but stylish hair the color of a ripe lemon. I wondered if my grandfather had gone searching for a nurse who bore some resemblance to the poisoned boy, with his cerulean-blue eyes and flaxen hair. Nothing seemed too ridiculous when I thought of how determined my grandpa was to provide for this boy’s needs. Although he didn’t tell me how old she was, I concluded from her description of places she had worked that she was easily in her mid-forties.

  “I hope I can count on you for some help,” Dorian Camden told me. I didn’t answer. She held her smile. It was a soft, warm smile. I wished it wasn’t. I wanted her to be ugly and mean so I could have an easier time hating her being here, but she had a pleasant voice and a kind way about her. I supposed a nurse had to have all that in order to provide tender loving care.

  Grandpa asked Myra to show her where her room would be. She was going to take the room upstairs that had always been my parents’ room when we visited. It was close to Willie’s room. Of course, it bothered me that she would stay in that room. No one had since the day we learned of their deaths, but Myra always made sure it was kept clean and polished, as if she expected their miraculous return.

  I assumed that because she was moving in now, it wouldn’t be too much longer before the boy was brought here. My grandpa still didn’t come right out and say he would be here tomorrow or the next day or anything. I could see from the way My Faith and Myra were moving about that things were being rearranged in anticipation. I wasn’t going to give anyone the satisfaction of asking about him. I wanted them all to believe I had little or no interest. I expected Myra at least would force me to know things, but suddenly, every mention of him was behind closed doors or well out of my hearing. To me, it felt like the house was full of whispers, new secrets that made me feel like more of a stranger than the boy who would be here.

  Of course, Lila was asking me about him whenever we spoke. My answers were short and simple. “I don’t know. I don’t care. No one has said.”

  “Well, maybe he’s not coming after all,” she said the day after Dorian Camden moved in.

  “Why would the nurse be there, then, Lila?”

  “Maybe only just in case,” she offered weakly.

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” I told her, and she stopped. Meanwhile, despite my sour face, our friends tried to include me in everything when I was in school. But thoughts about the poisoned boy and my grandpa distracted me again, and on the ride home, I was no better emotionally than I was on the ride back the first day. My heart was beating faster as we approached the front gates. I could feel every muscle in my body getting tense. All eyes would be on me if that boy was here. Everyone would be waiting for my reactions, for sure.

  The moment I saw that Grandpa was already home, I knew he was there. He was in Willie’s room.

  It was beginning. I had to face up to it. Right now, I thought. I would pretend that nothing was different, that he wasn’t there. I wouldn’t see him or hear anyone talking about him. The moment I entered the house, however, Grandpa turned from speaking with Dorian Camden and nodded at me.

  “He’s here,” he said.

  I looked down. For a moment, I didn’t move, and then I started toward the stairway.

  “Clara Sue!” he called firmly.

  “What?”

  “I’d like you to welcome him. I’ll go up with you, and you can just welcome him, help make him comfortable.”

  “He didn’t talk to me before, and he didn’t even want to look at me. He won’t now,” I said. “I don’t want to waste my breath,” I added, and before he could say another word, I shot up the stairway. I heard him shout after me, but I kept going. I practically ran past Willie’s room, not looking in, and when I got to my room, I shut the door quickly behind me.

  My heart was pounding. I just stood there, anticipating my grandfather coming up after me.

  But he didn’t.

  Silence was uncomfortable, but I was glad to have it.

  Later, I heard the activity in the hallway, but I didn’t look out to see. The walls in Grandpa’s mansion were thick enough to prevent talking or almost any reasonable noise from being heard by the person in the next room. I did put my ear to the wall to see what I could hear, but the murmur of Dorian Camden’s and my grandpa’s conversation was so muffled and incoherent that I quickly gave up. And then I chastised myself for having any curiosity or interest at all. It wasn’t good enough just to hide it from everyone else; I had to prevent myself from having it. Was that impossible? After all, he was here with all his mystery, his emotional and psychological problems, and my grandfather’s determination to do something about it. Those weren’t easy things to ignore.

  At dinner, Dorian Camden declared that for the first few days or so, it would be wise for her to have her dinner with the boy. She explained to Myra and My Faith, who were obviously fascinated by all of it, that what she had to do was win his trus
t.

  “All the patients I’ve had who were wounded or injured badly were angry at everyone and everything in the beginning. The first question that comes to mind is ‘Why me? What did I do to deserve this?’ ”

  “Even someone this young?” Myra asked her. I couldn’t help listening. I tried to pretend I wasn’t.

  “Oh, especially so, because at this age, you are dependent on someone who is supposed to care for and protect you. Obviously, that didn’t happen or was prevented from happening. I’ve spoken with Dr. Patrick, who has treated children who were taught to believe they were somehow unworthy.”

  “You mean evil?” My Faith asked.

  “Possibly, so between her work and what I will try to do, we have to get him to believe more in himself.”

  She looked at me.

  “We can all help,” she added. I turned away, tempted to ask, “What if he really is evil?” That would widen My Faith’s eyes for sure, but I didn’t say a word.

  Grandpa was obviously very angry with me and said little at dinner. The way we were behaving, it could have been only a day or so after Willie’s funeral. The air around us was that heavy. A phone call drew him away, and I finished eating before he returned. Then I went up to do my homework. I walked quickly past Willie’s room, tiptoeing, in fact, so Dorian wouldn’t hear me approaching and try calling me in. Then I closed my door.

  It was almost impossible to concentrate on my homework. Lila called. I told her the boy was here. Her sympathy began to irritate me, and I told her I had to finish my homework because I had been too upset to start it. She apologized for not coming over, “especially tonight.”

  “Especially tonight, it’s better that you didn’t,” I said, and said good night.

  Hours later, after everyone seemed to have gone to bed, I opened my door and peered out. The light from Willie’s room was spilling into the hallway. Would the boy always need a light on? I wondered. Was Dorian Camden still in there with him? Was he hooked up to the same sort of machinery he was hooked up to in the hospital? It was impossible not to be curious now. I relented and tiptoed down the hallway. Just before I reached the door, I heard Grandpa’s voice clearly.

  “You’re in Willie’s room. It will make it easier,” I heard him say.

  Make what easier? I drew closer and peered into the room.

  The boy was in Willie’s bed but without any machinery attached to him. He was just lying there, and Grandpa was sitting beside the bed. It looked like he was holding his hand.

  “Lots of his stuff has the initials W.S.,” he continued, “but there is one difference. You won’t be Willie Sanders, which was my grandson’s name, but I want you to be Willie Arnold . . . William Arnold. It will be more like you are another grandson. Yes, that’s my name, too, but it’s not uncommon for boys to be named after their fathers and grandfathers.”

  I tried to swallow when I realized I was holding my breath to the point where my throat and my chest ached. Grandpa was giving him Willie’s name, too!

  “Until you remember your own name,” he added. “Okay?”

  I waited to see if the boy would speak, but he didn’t.

  Grandpa acted as if he had, however. “Good,” he said. “Good.”

  I felt everything I had eaten churn in my stomach. I covered my mouth and then moaned and rushed back to my room and into my bathroom, where I vomited and vomited until I sank to the floor by the toilet.

  Which was where Myra found me in the morning.

  6

  Dorian Camden was at my bedside, looking as concerned as my mother would have. Myra had called her out of Willie’s room. I imagined everyone expected I would be happy that we had a real nurse in the house when we needed one, but I still couldn’t get used to the sight of her parading about in that nurse’s uniform and all that it meant.

  “How do you feel?” she asked.

  “Sick,” I said. I wanted to add, What kind of a nurse are you? How am I supposed to feel after throwing up and falling asleep on the bathroom floor? But I didn’t. I didn’t want to talk at all. I closed my eyes and then opened them when I felt her hand on my forehead.

  She looked at Myra, who was gray with worry. Who could blame her? Willie was killed, and now I was sick. What was next? The very walls falling in?

  “Are you going to the bathroom a lot?” Dorian asked.

  “You mean, do I have diarrhea?” I wasn’t the poisoned boy. She could talk to me like an adult.

  “Yes.”

  “No.”

  “It still could be a touch of the stomach flu,” she told Myra. “I don’t think she has any fever. I’ll check. You don’t always have a fever with the flu.”

  “I’ll get My Faith to put up some tea and honey,” Myra said, and hurried out.

  Dorian looked down at me, her eyes full of suspicion. “You haven’t eaten or drunk anything you shouldn’t have, have you, Clara Sue?”

  “Of course not.” Was she thinking I had been sneaking whiskey into my room? “You can search my room if you want,” I snapped at her, and turned away, just the way the poisoned boy would turn away when someone spoke to him or asked him questions.

  “But you threw up?”

  I didn’t respond. I could feel her gaze locked on me.

  “Do you have any pains in your stomach?”

  “No.”

  “Are you still nauseated?”

  “No,” I said, a little louder. I didn’t want her asking me any more questions.

  “People can make themselves sick, you know. They can get themselves so upset that they start to take on the symptoms of illnesses or just make themselves more vulnerable to diseases and such. Is that what’s happening here?”

  I spun around and glared up at her. “You’re the nurse. Figure it out,” I said.

  She winced, turned, and walked out. I thought that was the end of her, but she returned with a thermometer and said, “Please open your mouth.” She put it under my tongue. As soon as Myra arrived with the tea, she took out the thermometer, looked at it, and said, “Normal.”

  “That’s good.”

  “I would keep her on a light diet today and make sure she has lots of liquids,” she advised Myra. She looked at me, expecting me to say thank you, I was sure, but I just turned away until she started out.

  Myra watched her go and then set my tea down. I saw she had brought along a piece of toast and jelly as well.

  “She’s a very good nurse, Clara Sue. I watched her with the boy. I could see he likes her.”

  “The boy? You mean William?” I said disdainfully.

  “What?”

  “Didn’t Grandpa announce it today?”

  “Announce what?”

  “Drumroll, please. The poisoned boy has been baptized.”

  Myra shook her head. “I don’t understand what you’re saying, Clara Sue.”

  “Grandpa wants him to accept being called William Arnold,” I said.

  I sipped some tea and studied her reaction. She was in deep thought a moment. “He told you he wanted you to call the boy Willie?” she asked.

  “No. I overheard him talking to the boy and giving him Willie’s formal name, William, until he remembers his real name. He’s sorta borrowing it, borrowing ­everything that was my brother’s.”

  “I suppose it must be pretty frightening not to remember your own name,” she offered. “Your grandfather is just trying to help.”

  “Why doesn’t he call him something else, anything else? Jack? Mark? Tom? Or just keep calling him Boy. Tarzan called his son Boy, didn’t he? Maybe if everyone called him Boy, he would finally get tired of it and remember his name.”

  She shook her head.

  “He told him Willie’s initials are on lots of things, W.S. But he wants him to accept William Arnold. He’ll probably get the initials changed.”

 
“You think your grandfather would change them?”

  “Yes. Lucky boy, huh?”

  “Well, I wouldn’t say he’s been too lucky up to now, would you, Clara Sue?”

  “I don’t care. Right now, he falls into a vat of good luck just when my brother Willie fell into a vat of very bad.”

  Myra pressed her lips together. Her eyes were filling with tears. I realized that I wasn’t helping her feel less guilty about what had happened.

  “None of it was your fault, Myra,” I said, now struggling to keep back my own tears. “It was just bad luck to be there at the same time some horrible drunk man was driving along our street. This all just makes it . . . makes it worse!”

  She patted my hand and stood up. “We’ll see. In the meantime, try to hold down some toast and jam, and maybe you’ll be able to have My Faith’s mushy eggs for lunch.” She started to turn away.

  “Bad things can happen to good people, too, Myra. I know My Faith doesn’t like to talk about it, why God lets that happen, but it’s true. And it doesn’t matter how rich you are or where you live.”

  I thought she would stay and argue with me about it, but all she said before she left was “Don’t make yourself sicker over it. Stop having these thoughts. If you ever need strength in this life, it’s when you have troubles like this.”

  I felt like pounding the bed and screaming. How could I stop having these thoughts? All these dark thoughts seemed to have seeped in under my door and through my closed windows. They were swirling around me. Nightmares would dance at the foot of my bed forever. What Grandpa was doing was only making everything more terrible. I wanted to scream louder, until Myra would call him and he would come rushing home from work and decide to put the boy into a clinic or something, but I choked it all back and fell asleep.

  When Myra returned with another cup of tea, I felt guilty about her waiting on me like this. She wouldn’t tell anyone else to bring it up to me, and I knew she was still having trouble getting about with that cast and her aches and pains. A little while before, I had heard some voices in the hallway. One of them was Dorian Camden’s, but I didn’t know who the other person was, except that it was another woman. I asked Myra about it. I was hoping it was someone from one of those government agencies here to arrange for the boy to be taken away. She would tell Grandpa that no matter how rich he was, he couldn’t just scoop up some child and take care of him. There were rules.