Hammy came home.
Late that afternoon, I watched our handsome brother step out of the Mt. Shasta blue Merkur he rented at the airport. I ran down the steps of the porch. "You look beautiful." I threw my arms around his neck. Hammy and I looked exactly alike. Growing up, people had thought we were twins. Sadly for me, our features worked better on a man than a woman. Hammy looked like a movie star. I looked like Hammy in drag. But I was forty-three and had become comfortable with who I was. I’d never be a traffic-stopper like Hammy and that was okay.
Gene leaned on the door frame with his arms crossed. "Little Brother."
"Big Brother."
"What’s this?" Gene picked up Hammy’s ponytail between his thumb and index finger like it was a dead oppossum.
"What’s this?" Hammy poked Gene in the gut. Then they wrestled on the porch like brothers.
"Boys!" I went in to check the orange-poppy cake.
Hammy dropped himself in the chair where our father died. He could be insensitive. He was, after all, the baby and Mom and I had spoiled him. I walked over and rearranged the plastic cover on the Louis XV reproduction our mother died in instants after our father. I was hoping Hammy would get the point. He didn’t. Instead, he pushed down on the arms of the lounger so the foot stool would pop out. Our parents passed immediately after two police officers sat down on the Duncan Phyfe and told them their son Tim was the Fox Gap Career Girl Murderer. Mom had offered the officers limeade and frosted shaggy dogs and they’d accepted, which struck me as strange, given they were about to advise our parents that their son had mutilated three short-haired career girls who vaguely resembled our mother and me.
We moved out on the deck and drank iced tea and Hammy regaled us with stories from the Left Coast. There was the shrink who skinny-dipped with his patients. "Boy, people are weird out there," Gene said. The actor with seven Ferraris. "Some serious cake out there." Gene rubbed his fingers together. There was the Raiderette who did the StairMaster at the gym and Hammy wanted to make his move. "You’re so L.A.," Gene said after each of Hammy’s anecdotes. "This guy is so L.A." I imagined Hammy out west, soaring through the sunny world in a red Miata, the Raiderette by his side, pushing it to ninety down Mulholland Drive. Hammy adjusted well to our tragedy. He’d really carved out a meaningful place for himself in California. My life went to pieces after they caught Tim. I kept seeing images of those poor girls wherever I went. I worked as a dancer at The Camelot in Shapsburg and married a Formica counter installer who liked my act but punched out my teeth. Three hours after we lowered Mom and Dad into the Mintwood Country Cemetery and Mausoleum, Hammy drove westward in a tan Delta 88. But now our baby had come home; home to the brother and sister who loved him. I felt happy and safe.
I’d marinated a top round two days for Sauerbraten and served it along side nutted wild rice, sweet & sour red cabbage and sautéed carrots mixed with snow peas. I asked Gene to slice.
"No meat for me, just the rice and vegetables." Hammy held out his plate. Gene looked up from the beef. "I’m a vegetarian."
"Since when?" Gene asked.
"Well, actually, since they got Tim."
Gene let the carving fork and knife drop on the platter.
"Gene," I cautioned.
"What the hell does Tim have to do with a perfectly fine piece of Sauerbraten?"
"It’s all right," I said.
"It’s not all right. Your sister spends two days cooking for you and you show no appreciation. How dare you impose your morals on others."
"Gene, could it be that you’re reacting so strongly because of your own doubts about eating meat?" Hammy asked.
"Don’t give me any of that L.A. nutrition-action-psycho-babble, hippie."
"At least I’ve done something with my life."
"You’re a scuba instructor."
"At least I’m not living off my inheritance in Mom and Dad’s house." Hammy then pointed at me. "Or spreading out for a bunch of hard hats like they were a gynecologist convention."
"I wore a G-string," I cried, my hand over my heart. "I was tasteful."
"Like that husband who fucked up your face and made you more ridiculous-looking than ever?"
I sank to the floor.
Gene slammed the table with his fist. "This house takes enormous effort to maintain. And Trix and I have committed our lives to helping others."
"Helping others?"
"Trix volunteers at the Community Center and I have my work with Tutor Tots."
"So you can twiddle little boys."
Gene shot up from his chair and flipped the oak table. "You," he said through clenched teeth. "You."
Hammy locked his fingers behind his neck and crossed his feet at the ankles. "Yes, Gene?" He said. "Me?"
"I don’t have to take this from a, from a, from a, from a," Gene turned purple and lumbered to the back door with his arms out and his legs apart like a matinee mummy. Hammy and I watched from the dining room window as he staggered around the patio.
"It wasn’t supposed to be this way," I said. "This was supposed to be a nice time. Family time. You were coming home to build on that."
"Family time?" Hammy said. "I’m on my way to New York to pick up my advance on the book I’m writing about Tim."
"Your w-w-what?"
"Last Rites: A Killer Among Us."
"No."
"Shit yeah. I’m gonna blow life into that son-of-a-bitch."
I let out a scream that was so guttural, loud and blood curdling that I thought it was coming from someone else.
"Trix, Mom and Dad have any records? You know, from shrinks, report cards, clippings? Oh, I’ll need to take those photo albums. How ‘bout it, Trix? Any documents or reports?" I’d been sitting in Mom’s rocking chair all morning, laconic. Gene stayed outside and hit himself. "Trix?"
It seemed too big an effort to talk. "I... don’t... want... the... pictures... to... leave... the house."
"Growing up, you kept diaries," Hammy said. "I’ll need a look-see."
"They’re personal."
"I’m not interested in your love life or lack there of, Trix. Just the goods on Tim. The seeds. Where it all began. Is violence hereditary? Is it learned? Some specialists believe deviant behavior can be traced in DNA samples. It boggles the mind, Trix. There’s a neurologist in Quebec who says the violent brain has an excess of metal manganese."
"I thought I’d bake a broccoli millet casserole from The Tassahara Cookbook. Would that be satisfactory?"
"Make whatever you and Gene like and I’ll eat around it. Anyway, I’ve got miles of microfiche to zip through at the library. Don’t know that I’ll make it to chow."
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