Truth's Consequence, A Braji Short Tale

 Truth's Consequence

  A Braji Short Tail Tale

  P.S. Wright

  Copyright 2012 P.S. Wright

  .

  Kraut rubbed the one year chip he wore on a string around his neck. He rubbed it for comfort, to remind him how far he had come, for the strength to keep going. Today he rubbed it out of habit. It provided no comfort now. He tried to sit, found it too constraining. He paced around the little room, glancing up occasionally at the two way mirror. Behind the mirror eyes would be watching him, Patrick Henry Fitts, cops, maybe their lawyer, maybe other people. They were there because he might try something, he was a rat kid. His heart hurt. He had told them he could not face the grandmother, it would be too much. So her grandson, just out of Big Muddy on an armed robbery charge, had agreed to come for her. He would meet the boy who could tell them what had happened to her youngest grandson, his baby brother. The people behind the mirror were there for his protection, not Kraut's. Kraut paced and glanced up at the mirror and nervously scanned for an escape. Beyond the only door were those people, waiting, expecting this. He rubbed the chip, but it provided no reassurance. Kraut wanted to believe he would be in control when the time came. But he knew he would feel intimidated like he always did. He wondered if the faces behind the mirror would come running if he screamed for help.

  The time to run was past. Bryan Jerome Browne filled the doorway and ducked his head instinctively to enter. Kraut checked him automatically with the eyes of survivor. He was tall, broad shouldered, athletic, not a body builder. He was dressed in new jeans, hoodie over polo shirt, white label sneakers, close cut hairdo, the only thing flashy a silver earring in his left ear. He took one hand out of his pocket and revealed a chunky watch, neither flashy nor cheap. Kraut's heart hurt and he rubbed the coin. He should approach, should show his respect, show he wasn't afraid... but his feet remained rooted. He did not offer to shake hands. He wondered if Bryan Browne recognized this was not a sign of disrespect, that rat kids just do not shake hands. Does he know anything about rat kids? "Hey." What am I doing grinning like an idiot? This guy doesn't want somebody grinning in his face. He dropped the grin and glanced back at the mirror and its hidden faces.

  Bryan Browne nodded at the table and its two chairs. "Hey. Start?"

  Kraut took the seat opposite Charles "Chaka" Browne's second oldest brother, pacing himself so he neither sat first or last, but right at the same time, watching for any sign of disapproval in the calm brown eyes. He rubbed his palms on his pants. "So um, you know, Chaka, I mean Charles, you called him Charles or Charlie? He said you called him Charlie Brown. We called him Chaka." Slow down and breathe idiot. Bryan Browne had the most perfect skin, same round cheeks and curling lashes as his baby brother. He was lighter though, more milk chocolate. He knew he was staring. He probably shouldn't do that. He has the same dimple in just one cheek. He's got the same big forehead. We called him big head. He wanted to see the smile, the teeth, the smile that made grown men change their tone of voice, made him the pet of all the girls. Bryan was waiting. Kraut nodded as if he had answered. "He was, we were, Special Detail. We were on the same detail."

  "My Grandmamma just want to know how he died. We know he's dead. We just wanna know how it happened."

  There was not enough oxygen in the room. He sucked air into his lungs but he couldn't breathe, really breathe. And his heart hurt. They said it would help with his recovery. That's what had got him. They used the same words the Braji did when they talked about God. And God had given up on Kraut. Or Kraut had given up on God. And they said all he had to do was tell the truth and make amends. Make amends. That was what he had to do. He had to sit across this table and tell this man about the murder of his little brother and everything would be all right. He squeezed the coin until it cut into his hand.

  Six weeks ago he had sat in this same room and faced the parents of another boy. Miz Taylor had not remarried. Her maiden name was something Irish; he could never remember names. They sat there like cold statues and not a word between them and he told them. "It was the day of the march, that's what we called it, the march, you know?"

  Miz Irish was pale and covered in freckles and skinny and broken. She twitched whenever he looked at her. She stiffened when her ex-husband tried to take her hand, or pat her shoulder. She was shut down and far away and unreachable. Mister Taylor looked ready to cry. He kept reaching toward his wife, then pulling back. Neither of them asked any questions.

  "So all of us were Special Detail. We was all together in one group, all but Frenchi and the Freak, you know? We was all together and we was walking through the jungle like, toward the backside, I don't know why. Like some people said there was these inspectors that came down and stuff, but some other people said they was going to kill the ones that stayed back and stuff, or... " Mister Taylor's eyes begged him to get on with it. "Well I don't know but anyway we was walking and K.T. started crying. Oh, I guess you didn't call him K.T. huh? Um, Keavin, you know? Well who else would I be talking about huh? Duh. Ok, so you know, K.T., he never cried or complained or anything, nothing like that. He never complained. He was always like, a real hard worker and stuff like that."

  Kraut thought he saw something in the father's eyes, flickering just there behind the thin film of tears that never went away. Maybe he was happy to hear K.T. was a good boy. "Yeah, he was kinda my favorite. Like, he was always the first one to pick up a shovel and stuff. When we had to work, I always picked him first and he never complained or whined or nothing like the others. He was a real good boy, you know? Well, of course you do. Duh. Of course, he's like, I mean he was your son. Yeah." Again the impatience. He squeezed the coin around his neck. His mouth was dry. God he wanted a drink. "He started really crying and I knew there was something really wrong so I took him out of line and we sat down and took his shoe off and it was all..." Kraut remembered the guard shouting at him, shoving him. He closed his eyes and tried to control his heartbeat. The doctors said not to go getting himself too wound up. He told it with his eyes shut, remembering and not wanting to remember. "I got him to take his shoe off. This other guard came running and ordered us to get moving again but I blew him off. I knew I shouldn't, shouldn't have been disrespectful and all. I shouldn't have done that. So any way, when I peeled the sock off, his foot was all swollen, like huge, like twice its size you know? It was all like turned purple and black, and his ankle too. I think something, I don't know, a spider, or a snake, or maybe a scorpion or something, something bit him, I think. It was pretty bad. It was bad. I seen bad and that was pretty bad so that was why he was crying and stuff. But this guard, he was yanking at my arm, trying to pull me away for something. I know I should have handled it different. I know I should have been like, you know, more respectful and that. It's my fault. I started to yelling at him. Like, couldn't he see Keavin needed a doctor? and stuff like that. I was cussing him out and stuff and him and his buddy tackled me. We was rolling around and... " Kraut looked up into the expectant eyes of K.T.'s father. No matter how he told this, it was going to end with K.T. dead. His chest squeezed his heart and lungs. There was a buzzing in his head. "I was fighting pretty good till he got my arms pinned behind my back. I should have just stopped fighting. I know I should have... They got me on my feet and that should have been the end of it but I don't know... K.T. was trying to help. He was just a little kid and he didn't mean nothing and we shouldn't have been fighting in the first place but I don't know what he was doing. I seen this cog put a hand over K.T.'s mouth and I didn't actually see it so much as just see everybody just jumbled together so I can't say but... I don't think this guy, he was kind of new, I don't think he even realized what
we has doing. He stabbed Keavin--twice." His voice caught as he saw it again in his memory. He felt the knife go in. He brought his fist to his chest, remembering, two blows. "...in the chest." He couldn't stop the tears. He had no right to cry. "I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. It was my fault. It was my fault." Kraut dragged the air into his lungs, fought to get it past his seizing throat and fill his empty chest. "He was a good boy. He was just trying to help. We shouldn't have been fighting. I pulled the knife out. But he was bleeding, it was just spurting out...so much blood. I tried to stop it, you know? I put my hands over it, but it just seeped out between my fingers." Kraut looked at the back of his hand. He could see it clearly, the bright red blood that ran like water across his knuckles as he examined them. They were sitting there waiting. He wasn't sure they were still breathing. "I couldn't stop it. It was coming out of his mouth too." He had to reassure them. Is this what they had come to hear? "We buried him. We put