Compared to his older brother’s, Jackie’s short legs would only carry him half the distance with each stride. It was this difference, not a lack of athleticism or concentration, that would keep Jackie lagging behind his brother a couple hundred feet or so. He’d periodically get frustrated that there was this distance, and sprint ahead until they were once again side-by-side. He’d catch his breath to get in a word or two, only for Neil to nod, tousle Jackie’s hair, and then quickly regain the lead over his brother, his long legs effortlessly carrying him ahead over the overgrown pavement.
Neil stopped on his own accord this time, and waited for Jackie to catch up. He put down his bags, and stood at the side of the road, inspecting a huge green bush that spilled out over onto the pavement. Plucking off a thin yellow flower, he squatted down to meet Jackie at eye level.
“Check this out,” he pinched the end of the flower with his fingernails, which were always long and full of dirt underneath, and pulled one of the filaments out through its base. From it came a small droplet of clear nectar. “This flower’s got juice in it. It’s called a honeysuckle—you pull out the back like this and you can get the juice out and you can drink it.” He put the base of the flower in his mouth and sucked, exaggerating the sucking noise until Jackie squealed in delight. Neil let out a long exhale, again exaggerating the sound as if he had just drank an entire glass of ice water. “Ahhhh—” Jackie squealed again.
“Lemme try, lemme try!” He plucked a low-hanging flower off of the bush, clipped the end with his front two teeth, and pulled the orange-white filament out of the back. To his delight, he was able to produce a similarly sized drop, and imitating Neil’s exaggerated drinking noises, he stuffed the flower in his mouth and loudly sucked out the nectar. Only this time, he shoved the entire flower in his mouth, and chewing it up briefly behind a toothy grin, swallowed the whole pulpy mess. “Ahhhh,” he imitated Neil again, “delicious.”
Neil slapped the back of his head, “what are you doing?” Jackie’s smile evaporated. “You’re not supposed to eat the whole thing, just, you know, get the honey from it and spit it out. You’ll get a stomach ache that way.”
Jackie rubbed the back of his head, his eyes wetting over, “alright, oh. Right.” He rubbed his face with his forearm.
“Alright, alright,” Neil pulled him in by the shoulder and rubbed his back, “You’re fine. I didn’t mean to—just try it again, and try not to eat the whole thing this time.”
Jackie sniffed, and grabbed another honeysuckle off the bush. He repeated the process again, clearly having to restrain himself from chewing and swallowing the whole flower. He sniffled again.
“Anyways,” Neil picked his bags up off the asphalt and they both continued walking, Neil now matching Jackie’s slower pace, “there used to be kings that would grow millions of honeysuckles in their kingdoms, and once a year around this time, they’d make their servants go around to each bush, breaking open the flowers one by one just so that they could have a single glass of honeysuckle-juice.”
“No way,” Jackie’s eyes lit back up.
Neil looked down at Jackie briefly to make sure he had stopped crying, smiled, and then looked straight ahead. He returned to his natural pace, and leaving Jackie to stammer in awe, exclaimed, “Yup—so really, you just tasted something that kings started wars over. Just don’t drink too much of it.” He added shortly, already having walked far ahead of his brother, “I don’t need you turning into a king on me just yet.”
Jackie looked towards the hedge of honeysuckle bushes, which extended in either direction for dozens of feet, and practically running into it, instantly pulled off two handfuls of flowers to eat at once. Without having to look back this time, Neil grinned, pleased at having entertained his brother for the foreseeable future.
They continued down the empty road for a while. Neil was lost in thought, whistling a tune he had heard on TV, and Jackie was gleefully sucking on and spitting out honeysuckle flowers from a bagful that he’d collected. Mostly, however, they walked down the road in silence. The late-August sun beamed down on them, and as they walked one in front of the other, neither wished they were anywhere else, or that tomorrow would ever come.
Jackie occasionally ran to catch up to Neil to ask for a sip of water, or to ask about the honeysuckle-juice-drinking kings. As the sun rose to its prominence in the noon sky, the intervals between Jackie’s questions grew longer and the distance between them grew wider. Neil decided to stop for lunch. There wasn’t a cloud in sight, and the sun was now burning directly overhead—he figured both of them could use a break.
He stopped walking to look around for a good place to rest, and spotting a giant Elm around a quarter mile from the road, turned to call to his brother, who was lagging quite far back—“Jackie! We’re stopping for lunch!” Neil motioned towards the tree, which was easily the largest in sight, and began to wade through the tall grass, not waiting for Jackie to catch up.
Jackie had beat him to it, however, and as out of breath as he was from running there, still had air enough to be doubled over in laughter, finding his victory over Neil exceedingly funny. Neil smiled his soft smile, and while Jackie laughed, took his shoes off and sat on an exposed tree root, unpacking their lunch ingredients from one of his plastic bags.
Despite taking a liking to the honeysuckles petals and all, Jackie actually liked his food prepared in a very specific way. It had gotten to the point where he would refuse to eat mostly anything aside from a small select set of foods. At home, it was a point of contention at every meal, and Jackie’s mother would break out in tears whenever he pushed away a plate or ran away from the table.
Jackie was short for his age, and very thin too, and so believing that he had some sort of growth disorder, she sent him to see the town doctor, complaining that he wouldn’t eat anything she prepared. The doctor said his behavior was perfectly normal, however; children often get very attached to certain ideas or people. It’s not their fault if they seem particularly fixated or caught up in things, he’d said, it was all a part of healthy childhood development, and he’d get over it soon enough.
That was two months ago, and Jackie was still only eating food if Neil prepared it for him. In truth, he just liked spending time with Neil, and wanting him at every meal, would refuse to eat otherwise. For he had overheard a conversation between Neil and their mother the other month—Neil had gotten into college, and was leaving for school in September. He tried his best to keep the knowledge a secret, believing that Neil would be furious at him for eavesdropping, but he couldn’t stop himself from needing Neil at every meal, afraid that if he didn’t show for one, he wouldn’t come back for the next.
Neil pulled out the bread, turkey, and mayonnaise from his bag, and very carefully setting them out all on a square hand-towel (believing that Jackie’s pickiness stemmed from his cleanliness), made two sandwiches, one for Jackie and one for himself, layering the ingredients on top of each other one-by-one.
Jackie had calmed down by the time the sandwiches were finished. “Alright get over here Jackie, it’s time to eat.” Neil bit through half of his sandwich in one bite, again not waiting for his little brother, and washed it down with a long drink from his water bottle.
Jackie sat down on the grass by his sandwich. He pretended to examine it as if he had cared about anything other than Neil’s presence at his side. After deciding that he had looked at it long enough, he picked it up and began to eat.
Neil finished the other half of his sandwich in another bite. He took a swig of water, swished it around in his mouth, and looked up through the leaves, letting the small triangles of light filter onto his face. They both sat in silence for a while—Neil sat cross-legged with his eyes closed, and trying not to disturb his brother, Jackie took quiet, small bites of his sandwich, afraid that Neil would fly away like a robin at the slightest provocation.
“Neil,” he spoke quietly, as if trying to lure a wild animal—“how long does college take to finish?” Shifting ever so slightly from side to side, Jackie avoided eye contact, instead picking at a tuft of crabgrass between his feet.
Neil stared a little bit longer at the trees, and then looked down at his brother, who was still picking at crabgrass. He figured that Jackie had known this whole time, and yet he still hesitated to answer. “It’ll be four years.”
Jackie let go of the clumps of grass and dirt that had been in his hands, which fell directly on top of his half-eaten sandwich. His hunched-over shoulders and back started to jerk quietly—Neil didn’t need to see his face to know that he had begun to cry. His brother was a loud laugher and a quiet crier. “But I can finish in three if I work hard enough at it.” He added the second clause after realizing how harsh-sounding the first seemed to come out of his mouth. Although he doubted he could earn a degree that quickly, Neil figured that three years seemed somewhat more manageable to Jackie than four, and trying to convince himself of this as much as he was to Jackie, began to explain how he could visit twice or three times a year, and that he would call as much as he could.
Neil didn’t like when other people cried in front of him; he always felt as if there was something more he could be doing, that there was a word or a sentence that he could say to them and they would instantly feel better. They were sitting only a couple of feet apart, but the distance between them seemed infinite. Neil continued to search for the word that could shorten it. “C’mon Jackie, it’s not that bad, really. Plus, you know I can’t stay at home forever with you.”
Jackie’s shoulders continued to shake. “I-, I…” he stammered out. “Why can’t you?” He shook silently, and Neil struggled for a response that wouldn’t come. The sun had sunken lower in the sky, and the tree was no longer shading them; they both noticed each other’s skin, which had grown pink and scaly over the course of the day. They also suddenly became aware of how tired they both were, and how the sun had drained them. It was the type of tiredness that was usually enjoyable, the type that meant a day well spent, a day ready to be retired in good conscience—but as they sat there in the heat, both of their faces worn and red, the tiredness instead wore on them like a heavy blanket, one that they both desperately wished they could cast off, but couldn’t.
Everything hurt. It hurt to move, it hurt to sit still, and it hurt to talk. In truth, Neil couldn’t find a reason not to stay at home with Jackie, other than that it was somewhat expected of him to go off to school at his age. He wished that he didn’t have a choice in the matter, like he were getting drafted into the military—it would be so much easier to explain if that were the case. But it was his choice, and not finding a single answer that he thought would make sense to Jackie, instead avoided the question entirely, turning his attention to the grass-covered sandwich on the ground—“you know you’re going to have to start eating mom’s food again right?”
Jackie stopped shaking, and for a second it sounded to Neil like he heard a small chuckle escape through the tears. Suddenly he saw the way to cheer his brother back up; he’d stumbled across the words that he’d been looking for, “You’re also going to have to start to take care of things at the house you know,” Neil spoke softly but assuredly. He was beginning to regain his composure, and quickly resumed his role as Jackie’s older brother and thereby advice-giver, “that means you’re going to have to help with the yard, and shovel in the winter.” It was a role he was comfortable with, and one that he didn’t have to think about very hard to do well. Neil was unsure of his own future, but he could be sure for Jackie’s—“maybe if you’re lucky Mom will let you have my room too.”
“You think so?” Jackie looked up slightly from the mess he’d made on the ground.
“You’ll have to be really good, but I’m sure that she would. Maybe we could ask her tonight if you eat without a fuss.” This seemed to have a great effect on Jackie, and he rubbed at his eyes, already trying to hide the fact that they had been filled with tears just moments ago.
Neil too started to feel much better, and he breathed a deep breath, not caring that he’d given up his room in the slightest. He stood up. “Alright, let’s get going—Mom’s probably wondering what’s taking us so long anyway.”
Jackie followed his brother’s lead, uncrossing his legs and standing up alongside him. He was short, hardly reaching up his brother’s elbows, but as he stood up in the low, afternoon light under the elm tree, rising slowly from his pile of honeysuckle petals and ripped-up grass, he seemed somehow taller to Neil, and for the first time that Neil could recall, older and more mature than his age.
Neil looked at his younger brother proudly, and as Jackie turned to start walking, noticed a dark-brown speck on his thigh he didn’t recall being there. “Hold on Jackie, don’t move for a second.”
“What?” Jackie held his breath, and Neil bent down to inspect his brother’s leg. “What happened?”
“Aah shit—” Neil shook his head, and puffed out his cheeks, exhaling heavily. “You got a deer tick stuck to you.”
“Get if off! Take it off!” Jackie tensed up his arms and started to shake again. Deer ticks were not uncommon where they lived, and Neil had removed dozens from his own body. Jackie, however, had never had bitten by one.
“Alright, alright—just, stop moving around so much, will ya?” Jackie froze, and Neil squinted. “Yup,” another long exhale, “that’s one ugly sucker alright.”
“Eek!” Jackie squealed, and Neil backtracked immediately—the last thing Neil wanted was for his brother to start up crying again. “Don’t worry though, it probably just latched on to you—I bet you it hasn’t even bitten you yet. I’ll take it off easy.”
The approach seemed to work, and Jackie soon calmed down. Neil was right—looking closer, the tick hadn’t bitten him yet, and so with his long fingernails, Neil pinched the tick’s head, which was hardly as large as a pencil point, and pulled the parasite off, raising it up to his face briefly to look at before flicking it back into the grass where they had been sitting.
“Done! Not too bad, right?” Neil stood up straight, but before he could say anything else, Jackie turned around and hugged him violently—he began to shake against his brother’s body, letting out a loud, confused mixture of teary sobs and laughs. Neil wasn’t worried, however; he knew that his brother was just relieved, tired, and full of emotion. He was too. He let his brother hold on to him as long as he needed, unsure of who was holding on to the other tighter. Neil swallowed the sweet, honeysuckle-scented air through his mouth in large gulps, and rubbing his younger brother’s back, looked out over the tall grass, not worried if tomorrow came any sooner.