Half Brother (6 page)

I was about to say no, but for some reason I didn’t. Back in Toronto I would’ve said no. But maybe here I could be the crazy kid for a change. I’d never been that kid before.

I took a run and hunched over as I leaped through. I hardly even felt the heat of the fire. It was just like passing your finger fast through a candle flame. I was inside the tube now, and I felt good. I’d done it. The flames smelled greasy. The other three were watching me, and behind them I could see the road and the entrance to the construction site—

And a pickup that hadn’t been there before.

“Hey, get out of there!” someone shouted, and my eyes spotted a man, hurrying towards us.

“Crap!” I said, and the other guys all turned at the same time, then started running. I ran out the back end of the tube and kept going, cutting across the construction site towards the road, veering around machinery and piles of steel and crates, skirting sludgy pools. It was pretty dark by now. I could still hear the man shouting, but I couldn’t see Tim and the others anywhere.

I staggered on through some tall grass, vaulted over a low
wooden fence, and was back on West Saanich Road. I didn’t know what had happened to the other guys. I wanted my bike, but there was no way I was going back right now. What could I do? Miserably, I started home on foot. I’d come back later for my bike. I walked way off to the side of the road, near the trees, so I could hide in case the guy in the truck came past.

When I got back home it was really dark, and Mom opened the front door as I came down the driveway.

“Where’ve you been?” she demanded, not looking at all happy. Then: “Where’s your bike?”

“I just left it,” I said vaguely.

“What happened?”

There was no way out. In the kitchen I told her and Dad what we’d been doing at the construction site.

“That was very foolish behaviour, Ben,” Dad said.

Mom shook her head in horror. “Jumping through
fire?”

“Well, let’s see if we get a call from the police,” said Dad.

“The police?” I said, feeling wobbly. “I don’t think he was a policeman.”

“No, he was probably a security guard. But he might call the police. Trespassing. Destruction of property. Setting a fire … this is serious stuff.”

“It won’t come to that,” Mom said, frowning at Dad.

“He didn’t see any of us,” I said. “We all ran.”

But what if he’d caught Tim or one of the others? Would they tell on me?

“I can’t say I think much of the company you’re keeping,” Dad said.

“Tim’s okay,” I told him, hesitantly. “He’s got a good heart,” Mom said.

Dad raised an eyebrow. “I wouldn’t say it’s a friendship that has much of a future.”

“‘Cause his dad’s a plumber?” I asked. I don’t know why I said it exactly, except that it was the kind of thing Mom and Dad argued about sometimes, with Mom accusing Dad of being a snob, or too uptight. It just came out.

“That kid’s going nowhere,” Dad said.

“Richard! Don’t tell him that! He’s going to be at school with these boys.”

“I don’t think so,” said Dad. “I talked to the headmaster of Windermere today, and he offered Ben a place.”

Mom looked at Dad in astonishment. “You didn’t tell me about this.”

“I was going to tell you both tonight.”

“No, but you didn’t even tell me you were
pursuing
this,” said Mom firmly.

“I think it’s a better fit for Ben—”

“Ben might’ve liked a say—”

“I’m okay with it,” I said, thinking of Jennifer Godwin’s legs. “Good,” said Dad. “I don’t think the Windermere kids spend too much time setting fires at construction sites.” There was a knock at the door. I looked at Mom and Dad, my heart racing. “Well, let’s see who it is,” said Dad.

I trailed after him and Mom. It was Tim. He’d walked my bike back for me. He looked pretty sheepish when he saw Dad.

“Sounds like you boys were up to no good,” Dad said. Tim just hung his head and nodded. “Thank you very much for bringing Ben’s bike back,” Mom said.

“It’s okay,” he mumbled.

Dad just walked away, like he was too disgusted by the whole thing to say any more. I went out to Tim and took my bike. Mom left us alone.

“So what happened?” I asked. “Anyone going to jail?”

Tim gave me a little grin. “Nah. We just ran off. That guy didn’t even chase us. He just stood there shouting. Said if he ever saw us again, there’d be big trouble. Is your dad gonna call my dad?”

“I doubt it.” He’d never done anything like that before. “Good. I should get home. See you.” “See you. Thanks.”

That night, I couldn’t sleep. My mind was still swirling with all that had happened. Leaping through rings of flame like some circus performer. Running for my life through a construction site. Going to Windermere. Going to Windermere with Jennifer Godwin.

Later, I heard Mom and Dad talking from their bedroom. I heard my name a few times, so I crept closer to my door to listen.

“Can we even afford it?” Mom was saying. “Oh, sure,” said Dad. “On my new salary, that’s not a problem.”

“I just don’t see why it’s necessary,” Mom said. “Even after tonight?” Dad said.

“He’s a thirteen-year-old boy. You never did foolish things when you were that age?”

“You know it’s not just that,” Dad said. “I don’t want a repeat of last year. And I think he’d benefit from a more disciplined school environment.”

Mom’s voice was angry. “The way you talk about him sometimes. He’s a good boy, Richard.”

“I know he is. But he also needs a good kick in the pants. I want him with the right sort of kids, and I want him to start taking school more seriously. Windermere will sort him out.”

The next morning, Mom and I were in the kitchen, feeding Zan mashed-up banana in his high chair. I sat beside him, spooning it into his mouth. He loved banana. He loved pretty much everything we fed him—hot cereals and mashed vegetables and Jell-O.

“Eat,” I said, and made the sign, touching the tips of my fingers to my mouth. “Zan eats.”

Not that he needed any encouragement. His mouth would open for more even before I’d loaded up the spoon. If I was taking too long he’d make an impatient high-pitched bark.

He was tiny in his high chair, much smaller than a human baby of the same age. His little head was barely above the tray, but his coffee-coloured eyes were, as always, incredibly alert and eager.

So far Zan hadn’t made any signs, but he was sure good at imitating us. When I widened my eyes, he widened his. If
I stuck out my tongue, he did the same. And if I patted my head, he sometimes patted his own.

“Drink?” Mom said when he was done his food. She made the sign, touching her thumb to her lips. Zan’s hands shot out, as if to hold a bottle, even though Mom hadn’t shown it to him yet.

“He certainly understands a lot of things,” said Mom, screwing on the top of the bottle and bringing it over. She took Zan out of the high chair and held him as he drank. He loved being close to people, and was still almost always attached to one of us.

“In the wild,” Mom said to me, “the babies stay with their mothers for four or five years. They get carried everywhere for the first year or so.”

“You know way more about chimps than Dad,” I said.

She had piles of books everywhere, by people like Jane Goodall, who studied chimps in the wild. I read bits of them sometimes. It was really interesting.

“Well, Dad’s been busy designing the whole experiment, but someone has to learn about them as animals.”

Dad was in charge of Project Zan, but Mom was in charge of actually taking care of him. Which was perfect, because Mom’s thesis was about cross-fostering. That’s what they called it when you raised one species as a different one. There were lots of cases of kittens growing up thinking they were dogs, or chicks identifying more closely with sheep than other chickens. Zan was being cross-fostered as a human, and Mom wanted to find out just how similar the two species were. What made a chimp a chimp, and what made a human
a human? She figured there might be some things that were purely chimp-like, and even if we raised Zan as a human, he’d never lose them.

Dad wasn’t very interested in this part. What he cared about was whether we could teach Zan language.

Zan finished his bottle and Mom put him down on the kitchen floor. He liked to walk around on all fours, pulling up on the chairs and cupboards. He still wasn’t strong enough to climb onto things yet. After a while he scampered over to Mom’s foot and sat on it, his long arms tight around her leg.

Mom walked around for a while like that, laughing, and then reached down and lifted Zan up, where he snuggled happily against her chest.

We talked about Windermere and the uniform and what private schools were like, and how I shouldn’t ever think the kids there were smarter or better than other kids. I loved talking to Mom because I never felt like she was trying to study me. With Dad I sometimes got the feeling he wanted me to think something, or realize something, or admit something. Mom and I just talked.

When Dad got home from the university he called out hello from the front door and came into the kitchen. He gave Mom a big hug and kiss, and Zan went really weird. He started hooting and pushing at Dad’s arms—like he didn’t want him to be touching Mom. At first Dad laughed and Mom did too, but then Zan seemed to get even more upset, and I saw his mouth open and before I knew it, he bit Dad on the wrist.

Dad pulled his arm back. Zan shrieked at him.

“No, Zan!” said Dad. “No biting!”

But Zan ducked his head lower, trying to bite Dad’s hand again.

As I watched in astonishment, Dad leaned down swiftly, grabbed Zan’s shoulders, and bit him on the ear.

Zan squealed and flung himself against Mom, clinging tight, peeing through his diaper all over Mom’s shirt.

“You bit him!” I yelled.

“Yeah, I bit him,” said Dad. “Now he’ll know not to bite me ever again. It’s a tip I got from the chimp handler at the Chicago zoo.”

I rushed over and looked at Zan’s ear. There wasn’t any blood. There wasn’t even any mark.

“He’s fine,” Dad said. “A bit of a shock, that’s all.”

Mom frowned at Dad. “They’re very protective, Richard. He might have thought you were attacking me.”

“We can’t have him biting,” said Dad.

“He’s terrified of you now!” I exclaimed.

“He
needs
to be scared of me,” said Dad. “He needs to know I’m the dominant male.”

I shook my head, not understanding. “But you said we were raising him like a human. When I was a baby you didn’t bite
me
on the ear.” I looked over at Mom. “Did he?”

“Of course not,” Dad said. “But he’s not human, Ben, all right? We can raise him like a human for the purposes of the study, but he’s still a chimp, and we need to be able to manage him.”

“You didn’t need to bite him,” I muttered, and looked at Mom, hoping she’d come to my defence. She looked sad, but not angry.

“Your dad’s right, Ben,” she said. “If we let Zan bite now, it’ll be harder to get him to stop later, when his teeth come in. Chimps want to dominate. Dad needs to be the dominant male. Now, I need to change my shirt.”

She tried to pass Zan to me, but he clung tight and wouldn’t let go. I felt a little hurt that he wouldn’t let me comfort him, but I guess it was natural he’d want his mother right now. She went upstairs with him.

Dad put his hand on my shoulder. “It’s all right, Ben,” he said.

But I didn’t want to look at him, and the Dominant Male went off to mix himself a drink.

J
ennifer Godwin and I lay side by side on the sand.

It was the day after Dad had bit Zan. David had called me up and asked if I wanted to go to Beaver Lake with him and Jennifer. Maybe his father had put him up to it. I didn’t know. I didn’t care. I was here. Beside Jennifer.

David’s older brother, Cal, had picked me up in the station wagon. He was seventeen and had his licence. He’d brought one of his own school friends, and they didn’t have much to say to us. At the lake, they didn’t even want to put their towels near us. Right now they were down in the water, throwing a football around, showing off how hairy their chests were.

David was stretched out on my other side, tanning his front.

I was pretty nervous, being in my bathing suit around Jennifer Godwin. She was wearing a red one-piece. I was relieved to see she didn’t have really large breasts; I think that would have finished me off. She wore her hair in a ponytail.

Being so near her, I couldn’t really relax. I had a magazine, but I was just staring at it, not reading. It was all just letters and colours on the page. I couldn’t get over all her bare skin, all of her, stretched out on her stomach. She was reading a book called
I Capture the Castle.

“Is it good?” I asked.

She nodded. “Pretty good.”

“What’s it about?”

“These two sisters who live with their crazy writer father in a castle. They both fall in love with the same guy.”

“Your back’s getting a bit red,” I told her.

She raised herself up on her elbows and looked over one shoulder to see. “Where?”

“Just near the middle, where it, uh, scoops down.”

She passed me her bottle of suntan lotion. “Could you put some more on, please?” she asked politely.

“Yep,” I said, trying to sound like girls asked me this practically every day.

I squirted some lotion onto my hands and rubbed them. I didn’t want my hands to be cold on her skin. When I touched her back it felt really hot, and amazingly soft and smooth. I didn’t push too hard. I rubbed the lotion in carefully. I wanted to make sure I covered every inch of exposed skin.

“I think that’s good,” she said, without looking up from her book.

“Yeah, I didn’t want to miss any spots,” I said. “It really is pretty red.”

“Thanks,” she said, and turned the page of her book. She seemed pretty involved in it.

David and I did most of the talking. He told me stuff about Windermere, which teachers were cool and which ones were total goofs. I was looking forward to going there now. I liked David, and Hugh and Evan had seemed nice too. It was good knowing I already had a couple of sort-of friends.