CELL PHONES ARE THE NEW CIGARETTES, HEARING AIDS ARE THE NEW EYEGLASSES
My older brother E was quoting movies again, and we were going along with it.
The three of us were sitting around his basement drinking Miller Lite. There was E, me (the youngest) and our middle brother, W. E lived in Cincinnati then, having moved from back from Florida and a failed first marriage; he was on his second wife, with two young kids.
There was beer in a cooler next to the drumset, and after a bass/guitar/drum jam, somehow we started talking about our parents.
“That's what I love about these high school girl, man,” E said. “I get older, they stay the same age.”
“Yes, they do,” I said.
“We are getting fucking older.”
“I'm just quoting the movie, man,” E said. “Why be a bummer about it?”
“I've just been thinking about getting older, is all,” W said. “Turning fucking 40 this year.”
“So?” I said. “You're still the same guy.”
“Yeah,” E said. “But you know what I think about a bunch about getting older? Now that we're parents and shit?”
“What?” I asked.
“We all know: the apple doesn't fall far from the tree, right?” E said. “But, like, what if it does, sometimes?”
“Look, you turn into your parents, full stop.” W said. “We turn into our parents. We do.”
“What, so I'm dad now?” I said, then took another sip. “You're both full of shit.”
“Well, our dad fucking killed himself, so what do you do with that?”
“That's what I'm saying. Are any of us going out like that? Hell no, so.”
“How do you know? Are you dead yet?”
E was sitting on a guitar amp. He took a long drink from his can. Then he cracked another. He took his Reds hat off, rubbed his head. We had spent the afternoon at Great American Ballpark, watching Cincinnati lose to Chicago. E's face was a little sunburnt. The last of the night's light streamed into the room from those little cube windows people have in their basements.
“Here's what I know: I thought about it.”
“What? When?”
“During my divorce. Well, actually, when P left me. You know why I didn't? Stand up.”
W did. E lightly playfully carefully punched him repeatedly in the ribs, the stomach, then finished with an upper-cut to the chin.
“TKO!” he said, dancing around the room, his arms raised in mock victory. “I didn't do it because I thought of you two. How shitty it would be for my brothers if one of us killed ourselves.”
“That would be shitty,” I volunteered.
“How did we start talking about this anyway?” W asked. He finished his can and asked for a new one.
“All I know is,” E said. “Once you become a parent, that option is over.”
“Tell Dad that,” W said.
“Man, why do you have to be like that?” E said, pouting.
“This is bumming me out,” I said.
“Me too,” E said.
“Actually,” I said, clearing my throat. “I have some news.”
“What is it?” W said.
“Well. K is pregnant. Wanted you guys to be the first to know.”
“Dude!” E said.
“Great!” W said. “Congratulations.”
“We gotta celebrate. Shots!” E said.
W shook his head. “Uh uh. Beer before liquor.”
“Dude, it's his first kid. We gotta do a shot – it's good luck.”
“It's all right,” I said.
“I don't know. What do you have as far as liquor?”
E opened a guitar case. There was a bottle of bourbon inside.
“Beam?” he said.
“Bourbon? Shit,” W said. “OK, fine.”
“You give in too easy,” I said, laughing.
“I'm doing this for you, fFuck Stick,” W said. “I don't even want to.”
“Well, thank you, kind sir,” I said, and gave him an imitation bow as E poured shots.
“To my little brother, he's gonna be a dad!” E said.
“To parenthood,” W said, raising his glass in the air.
“To you guys,” I said.
We drank. It burned. We chased the shots with beers and a series of burps.
**
E was looking at his phone. “We gotta go to a bar to celebrate,” he said.
“Fuck that, I'm not leaving this room,” W said. He was sitting on the throne behind his drum kit, rolling a joint on the snare drum.
“Yeah, I don't know about that,” I said.
“Guys,” E said. “Guys. Really?”
“Yes, really. I'm already pretty drunk,” W said. “And I just wanna smoke this joint, all right?”
“Say? You got a joint?” E said to me in that accent again.
“No, not on me, man...” I said.
“It'd be a lot cooler if you did!” E said, laughing.
“You guys are dumb,” W said, lighting his joint.
“None of us are in any position to drive, anyway,” I said.
E farted. My phone rang. It was K. I walked into the bathroom to take it.
“Hey,” I said. “How are you?”
“Good,” she said. “Tired, but good.”
“Good,” I said.
“How was the game?” she asked.
“We lost.”
“Sorry. Where are you now?”
“E's place. I just told them.”
“You did? What did they say?”
“They're happy for us. We did shots.”
She laughed. “Of course. E's idea?”
“Of course.”
“Well, I'll leave you to it. Be safe. I love you.”
“Love you too. You and the little one. Hey, before you go, a question.”
“What's up?”
“Kinda weird, but we were talking: do you think, as you get older, that you become more like your parents, or that it's possible to let the apple like fall away from the tree or whatever?”
“Um,” she said. “That's what you guys were talking about?”
“Yeah.”
“Here's what I think.”
“Yeah?”
“I think you guys need to quit drinking,” she said, laughing. “I'm tired, OK? Goodnight.”
“Goodnight,” I said, and hung up.
**
When I got back, E had lined up three more shots of the bourbon.
I shook my head as I entered.
“Jesus,” I said.
“That's what I said,” W said.
“Pull your panties up, we're doing them,” E said.
So we did them.
“I asked K what she thought,” I said.
“About what?” E said.
“The thing about whether or not you become your parents. About Dad and stuff.”
“What did she say?” W asked.
“She didn't answer, said she was tired.”
W nodded. There was a silence, some small feedback from a guitar amp. E turned it off, the tubes in the amp made a popping noise.
“You know how he did it?” E asked. “You don't remember, do you?”
“We're still talking about this?” W said, relighting his joint.
“I think I do,” I said.
“You were so young though, probably don't know the details.”
“I was four,” I said.
“Four. Fuck. Four.”
“Nobody remembers anything from when they're four,” W said. He passed the joint to me.
“Ah, I want to hear it anyway. I should know this story,” I said, breathing out smoke.
“Hung himself with his belt. You didn't know that?”
“How did he get a fucking belt in the psych ward?”
“That's what the lawsuit was about.”
I thought about it for a minute.
“Do you remember going to see him? The hospital?” E asked.
“Vaguely.”
“They caught him before he died. Had to cut him down. Was in a coma. Mom took us to see him. Wires all over his body, a breathing tube, monitors with those old glowing green lights. I went over and talked to him. You guys stood at the door, scared I guess. I don't blame you, but for some reason I wasn't scared. It was just like he was sleeping to me. Mom told me later the therapist was worried about me, wanted to see me in a solo session.”
“Did you?”
“Yeah, I love getting my head shrunk.” I passed the joint to E and he took a puff, promptly coughed.
“Someone's tokin' some reefer,” I said.
E laughed, continued: “It was just an observation.”
“Oh, an observation, huh?” I said. “Well who the hell are you, man? Isaac Fucking Newton?”
“I only came here to do two things,” W said. “Kick some ass and drink some beer. Looks like we're almost out of beer.”
“I know we're doing movie quotes and shit,” I said. “But we're not actually almost out of beer, are we?”
“I don't think so,” E said. “Let me go check the upstairs fridge.”
W and I passed the joint around, and I started to feel it.
“My little brother. Gonna be a dad.” He shook his head and smiled.
“Yep. Actually: I wanted to see if you'd be the godfather.”
“Of course,” W said. “I'd be honored.”
“Thanks, man,” I said.
“When's the baby due?”
“January.”
“Just like your wife, huh?” he said. “See, I told you: we become our parents.”
“You really believe that?”
He gave me a look like I was crazy.
“Yeah,” he said. “Don't you?”
“Then how are you becoming like our parents? You don't have any kids.”
Just then, E came downstairs wearing an old coat.
“What are we, having a costume party or something?” W said.
“Dad's old coat – used to wear it when he would go on TV,” E said.
W gave me that look again, see what I mean? The sport jacket fit him perfectly, so much so that I wondered if he had gotten it tailored.
E pulled 3 cans of beer out of the pockets of the jacket and handed one to each of us.
“Shotgun?” he asked.
W groaned. “I'm stoned,” he said.
“Me too,” I said.
“C'mon!” E said. “We're celebrating! How often do we get to see each other? We gotta maximize! We gotta make the most of it!”
“All right,” I said. “Fuck it, I'm in.”
“No,” W said, waving his hands in front of his face.
“Just one, then I'll leave you alone.”
“Dude, what is this, high school?” W asked.
“Did you drink in high school?” E asked in mock horror. “That's illegal!”
“Yeah yeah, what's with all the peer pressure? If I don't want to drink, I don't want to drink.”
“Fine, fuck it,” E said. He grabbed the beer out of W's hand. It wasn't forceful, but it wasn't gentle either. “Forget it.”
“Dominant male monkey motherfucker,” I said.
E sat back down on a folding chair in a huff.
“Jeez, if you're gonna be like that, let's just do it,” W said.
“No, who cares. Let's just talk about our parents again. That's more fun.”
“God, don't pout about it,” W said. “Let's just have one last drink, OK? Then I'm done.”
“Don't do me any favors.”
“I'm not. Throw me the beer.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah,” W said. E threw it to him. We all stood up, and I said what I was feeling at the time:
“I'm happy to be with you guys right now. Happy to be your brother. Happy to be hanging out, drinking, watching the Reds, quoting old movies, jamming. I love you guys. Nobody knows me like you guys do.”
“Holy shit,” W said. “You're fucking hammered.”
“Nah, it's the weed talking,” I said.
“Love you guys, too,” E said. “If I was gay, I'd do you. I'd be your homo.”
“We're brothers!” W said.
“We're homo bros. Bromos!” E said, laughing.
“Let's get this over with.”
“Seriously, though: love you guys.”
So we poked holes in the sides of our cans with whatever was near us – drum stick, drum key, guitar tuner – cracked the tabs and tipped them back.
We tossed our cans on the ground. I sat down, feeling lightheaded. E burped. W doubled over.
“You OK?” E asked.
W puked on the floor.
“Ah, fuck!” E said, throwing W a towel.
He ran to the bathroom and continued puking while E and I cleaned up.
“Cleaning up his puke, Jesus,” E said.
“Fucking gross,” I said, holding my nose with one hand and paper towels in the other.
“W is trying to act like we become our parents, well if he thinks that, he should be worried because he's the most like Dad anyway. So what does that mean? Same curly hair, same temper, same inability to hold his booze. You know what Mom told me one time?”
“What?” I said.
“He was drinking a lot before he died. Vomiting a lot, the whole thing.”
“I don't want to hear about it,” I said.
“Fine, but we gotta talk about something,” he said. “Gotta take my mind off my brother's puke.”
“Look,” I said. “I don't know how is right about this thing about becoming or not becoming your parents, but it doesn't take much to be better than Dad. Just don't fucking kill yourself.”
“Did you know our grandparents were trying to split us up?”
“What?”
“After Dad died, Grandma and Grandpa came to the funeral and talked to Mom's therapist about splitting us up, easing Mom's burden now that she was a single mother. They were gonna fucking send me to Illinois. Can you imagine? Me on their fucking farm?”
“Jesus,” I said.
“I know, right. Who does that? What kind of parenting is that?”
W came back in the room, wiping his mouth.
“Sorry, guys,” he said, his head down.
“It's all right,” I said. “Gave us time to talk about parent shit some more.”
“Will you guys shut the fuck up about that already?”
“Man, relax,” E said.
“No, you know? What do any of us know about being a fucking parent? We're just overgrown kids doing our best, fucking up, making mistakes that scar kids forever. We're all just making it up as we go along. I'm sure if I had a kid I'd fuck him up just like dad fucked us all up. Honestly, I didn't realize when I was a kid that all the adults are playacting too – they don't know anything I didn't know then, they're just better at hiding it.”
E and I stayed silent, just looked at each other for a moment.
“Is that why you don't have any kids?”
“Fuck you guys,” W said. “I'm going to bed.”
“No, come on!” E said. “Let's stay up, like old times. Like when we were kids and used to build forts in the living room. Let's build one!”
“Dude, I'm tired, I puked, I'm stoned, I'm pissed off, I'm done. Just leave it alone.”
“Don't be like that. I'm just trying to have fun.”
“This is not fun for me. I'm going to sleep.” He started taking his shoes off.
“OK, no problem,” E said. “We'll get back on it tomorrow.”
“No, I'm leaving tomorrow,” W said, taking off and folding his pants.
“What? Why?” E asked.
“It's just time.”
“Dude, what's going on with you?” E asked. He pulled out a bag of dollar-store orange slice candies from the pocket of the sport coat.
“Don't go,” I said. He offered me one. I ate it. “Let's sober up, get something real to eat.”
“Yeah, what M said,” E said, eating another candy.
“No, I gotta go.”
E pulled an orange slice out of the bag and offered it to W. He shook his head. E threw it at W and hit him right on the tip of his dick.
“What the fuck?” W howled.
“Oh shit, I'm sorry, dude!” E said. “I was just trying to toss you one as like an incentive!”
“You hit my cock, fucker!”
“Sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry.”
“God damn it, I'm tired of you fucking assholes. Fuck tomorrow, I'm leaving now.”
“No don't don't don't, sit down, chill out. You can't even drive right now, you've had too many beers. Just go to sleep and we'll talk about it in the morning.”
“I just got an orange slice bruise on my dick. I can't sleep now. Hang me that sack.”
I reached out for the plastic baggie on the snare drum and handed it to him.
“You sure you need another hit?” E asked.
“You like quoting the movie, right? You liked “Dazed and Confused”? Here's a quote for you: 'I'm the one smoking marijuana, motherfucker. So what, I'm a pothead?”
“I'll be watching you, Newton,” E said.
**
I didn't know if we were going to leave the basement, if we were going to get something to eat, if we were going to smoke that joint, if we were going to keep drinking, or what. Everything was a little confused at that moment, so I excused myself to piss, but called my fiancee instead.
It was late at home, and her phone went straight to voicemail. I don't remember what I said on the message, but I remember going back into the jam room and E was in the middle of a monologue:
“Everybody talks about how you're never gonna get a good night's sleep again. You know what they don't tell you about when you have a kid? Yeah, the kid wakes you up in the middle of the night crying, but nobody ever tells you that you're sitting there with this baby, and he's crying, and you fed him, you changing his fucking diaper, you burped him, you gave him a pacifier, and he's still crying and won't stop and you're so fucking tired and when it's your own baby screaming and crying, it's not like when you hear a baby on a plane and it's annoying but you can just put headphones on and ignore it, when it's your own baby you can feel their screaming somehow inside you, like it penetrates you somehow and hits you in a place in your body you didn't even know existed. And you just want it to stop. You'd do anything to make it stop. You'd shake the baby, you'd put a pillow over it's head, you'd throw it out the fucking window just to make that screaming stop and let yourself sleep for more than 2 hours at a time.
“Holy fuck, dude.” W said. “If that's what it's like, I'm definitely not having kids.”
“Good, then don't,” E said.
“Thanks for telling me now!” I said in a goofy accent.
He glared at me.
“Do you ever think about how W and I came out of Mom's vagina and you didn't?”
“Never thought about that, no.” I said. “Literally never. Not until this very moment.”
“Look, man, I was trying to do what dad did. I was trying to teach college, be a professor, be an intellectual, live the life of the mind. But the language study fucked me up – I couldn't learn Sanskrit, I couldn't learn Tibetan, I couldn't fucking wrap my head around the languages – I couldn't wrap my tongue around them. And so I had to settle for a master's degree, which felt like I failed. And I had spent years chasing that dream, that dream to be like dad, and then it was gone, over. What will happen with my son? The same thing? Will he try to be like me and fail? Or is he a reincarnation of someone else? The Buddhists really believe that, you know. That's why I don't think we become our parents. Do you understand what I'm trying to say?”
Silence. No one said anything, we just looked down at our feet.
“I'm gonna do it,” W said.
“What?”
“Been thinking about it for a while and I think tonight might be the night to do it.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked.
“I think I'm going to quit drinking,” W said.
“For the rest of the night?” E asked.
“No, for good,” W said. “Like, be sober. AA, 12 steps, all that.”
“What? Why?” E asked.
“I don't know. It just doesn't work for me anymore, you know? It's hard to explain. Just makes me tired now.”
“One last shot then,” E asked.
W sighed. “Let me piss first.” He walked out of the room.
E poured three shots.
“You think he's really gonna quit drinking?” E asked.
“I don't know,” I said. “Sure.”
“Ah, it won't last,” E said, handing me a shot glass.
“Why not?” I asked. I felt defensive.
“He doesn't really want to quit.”
“Maybe he does, but he just doesn't know how to go about it.”
“We'll see,” E said.
“I hope he does,” I said.
“Me too,” E said.
E nodded. W came back into the room. E handed him his drink.
“Last one,” W said. “Ever.”
“Here's to that,” E said. “And here's to you.”
We took our shots. I winced because mine burned.
“You guys hungry?” I asked.
“Those orange slices did me OK,” E said.
“White Castle's open late,” W said. “We could get some sliders.”
E and I groaned at him.
“Nah, just kidding.” W said. “Unless you wanted to, then I might.”
“Let's finish these fucking beers first.”
“Is Skyline open at this hour?”
“Right now? Maybe Gold Star.”
We groaned again.
“I feel like another shot.”
“I feel like lying down. But I could eat too. You got any cheese?”
“Ah, fuck you, Cheese Fuck.”
“Forget it. Let's smoke a joint – on the fifty fucking yard line!”
“All right, all right, all right.”
But we didn't go anywhere. We didn't smoke another joint, take another shot, drink another beer, or eat any food. W didn't even go lay down to sleep like he said he would. We just sat among those silent instruments in that basement as the sun rose and shone through the little cubed windows right on all of us all at the same time.