Skutch by Jeanne-Marie Fleming
Despite clouded chlorine vision, Mom’s August-tanned legs extending from strappy white sandals to pressed white shorts were unmistakable. She stood at the edge of the Newbridge Road pool with Patrick, the baby, tucked on her hip and waved for us girls to get out.
Veronica, the youngest girl, doggie-paddled after me. On the ladder, I looked over my shoulder for Diane, who, unable to touch the bottom in the four-feet, bobbed in the water. A year older than me and a head shorter, she never did catch up. She wasn’t stretching out, but because of that and because she snuck desserts during the middle of the night, she was chunky. She wore a two-piece bathing suit with a loose blouse meant to conceal her stomach. Submerged in the pool, however, the fabric buoyancy rendered the disguise ineffective, and the material floated around her neck.
Diane’s chin lifted, she gulped some air, and I yelled, “Come on, Di.” We pronounced her nickname as “die” which is weird because once she almost did die. It was only thanks to all the prayers, including mine of course, that she made it out of that oxygen tent. She heard me but ducked underwater. She surfaced farther away, and I put my hand on my hip, mimicking our mother’s stance, and shouted again. Mom was waiting; I didn’t want to get yelled at.
Diane dove under. She couldn’t seem to muster the will to do the simple right thing even when she clearly knew the right thing. I always hoped she’d get in line. As the oldest of six kids, she should have been at the head of the line. But clearly, she wasn’t—not at twelve, and as it turns out, never.
I gave up on Diane and headed over to Mom, who was camped with the boys by the kiddy pool.
In a bikini, the color of faded Easter eggs with elastic stretched too wide over the tops of her thighs, Veronica skipped keeping pace with my long strides. Her suit, similar to mine with the sexy strings on the side, was a hand-me-down from someone whose kid must’ve had a bigger a-s-s than my little sister. Of course, Veronica had to wear it, as nothing was better for her than imitating me. I hated that, but still, when she asked me to tie up her strings back at the house, I did. The sweetheart bows that earlier cinched our bottoms now dribbled sadly down the outside of our thighs.
I held my forearm up to Mom’s, comparing my skin to her golden brown. “Diane won’t listen,” I said.
She shook her head. “I have to bring Patrick to the car to nurse him.” She packed him into his stroller; he needed to get out of the sun. His tattered baby blanket was folded and stuffed, along with a clean pamper and a half sleeve of crackers, into the basket below. Mom handed me a balled-up pamper, pointed to a garbage can, and said, “Throw this out.” I took it like it was nothing. Like she was handing me a crumpled newspaper. But it wasn’t paper; it was a dense ball of smelly pee.
Drunk bees hoovered in the space around the overflowing can of garbage in the late afternoon sun. Setting the pamper on top, I quickly backed away and spotted two girls I knew from the bus. They sat on long rainbow beach towels, painting each other’s toenails.
The heels of Mom’s plastic sandals clicked in rhythm, dut, dut, de dut, as she rocked the stroller back and forth. “As soon as Di gets out of that pool, I want you to bring everyone out to the parking lot.”
What in God’s name was Diane’s problem? I didn’t want to beg her. I didn’t want to threaten her. Why was Mom leaving it to me?
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I arched my back and carried the load of wet towels in front of me like a pregnant belly, leading the troops, finally, toward the car. Veronica dragged one foot to meet the other as she pulled the heavy beach bag along the ground. Eddie, one year younger than Veronica, followed; he carried a Spider-Man action figure in one hand and a red half-gallon thermos in the other, its Tang consumed hours ago.
I was dying for some cold fake O-J or even a sip of water. The water fountain was just beyond the boy on the blue lounge chair, filling out Mad Libs. I feared if I stopped for a drink, everyone would want water, and that would be chaos.
We were passing the lap lanes, getting close to the exit, except Diane was having trouble with Steven. She had his wrist, but he was protesting. He had dropped his thick little legs to the ground. She yanked his arm; he didn’t budge.
“Get your butt up.”
I could see she was about to rip my two-year-old brother’s arm out of its socket. A woman in a tangerine sundress and matching sunhat with her two daughters stopped dead in her tracks and held her arm out as if to save them from sight. Her precisely plucked eyebrows see-sawed, and her disapproving glare pierced first Diane, then me. I felt myself flinch.
Steven whined and writhed to be free. My sister, the unwitting fish frolicking in the pool just minutes ago, had surfaced as chilling as the mythical Loch Ness monster. Dread filled my chest with the danger of not knowing what Diane might be capable of.
Before I could do anything to stop her—come on, strangers are watching—she reached around with her free hand and cracked Steven a good one between his shoulder blades.
God. We needed Mom to handle this kid!
Steven screamed as if being tortured. Diane wouldn’t let go. The two of them were causing a scene. I didn’t blame her for being angry; we had to get him out of there. But, also, I did blame her for being so rough.
She was about to hit him again. I let my bundle of towels fall to the concrete. “Diane,” I commanded, “Let go of him.”
“He’s gonna run.” Diane was bright red, all over. Could’ve been sunburn; she never tanned, or else she was just red from rage. It ran in our family. The Irish.
“Let him go.”
After another satisfying wrench of his arm, she released her grip. “Owww,” he moaned, possibly defeated, but no, he scrambled off the ground and darted in the direction of the kiddie pool.
I hollered after him. To Diane, I pointed at the heap, “Take the towels. You guys go.”
Our father called this defiant middle son a skutch, and that’s what he was. A skutch. Making a scene. A God-damned scene! It was up to me, now, to handle him. Diane would have no problem bringing Veronica and Eddie out to the car; they had easygoing dispositions.
It should have been me holding the stubborn skutch by the hand in the first place, but I wasn’t in the mood for him that day. And Diane deserved him. She did! For making us all wait until she got her lazy butt out of the pool. I hated this family. I wanted to paint my toenails pink, or do Mad Libs, or just swing my arms without the hindrance of a bratty brother, an oblivious amphibian sister, and a mound of stinking wet towels. I didn’t want to feel the disgust, or pity, or whatever it was that had glommed on to me the second I realized we were being sized-up by the woman in the tangerine dress.
This summer day, so close to my birthday, had turned into a catastrophe.
“Steven, stop,” I called out and tore after him. “Stop. Stop running,” I lost a flip-flop but couldn’t backtrack. “Mommy’s waiting.” He pranced sideways with an eye on me until he tripped over his foot and fell. I pounced. He scrambled to get up again, but I was on him. Clutching his upper arms, I hauled him to his feet. “Why? Why did you run away?” I looked to see if my skinny yellow flip-flop was still there. I had to get back to it.
“Ow, ow,” Steven belly-ached as his fat feet burned on cement. His sneakers were in the tote bag with Veronica.
“It’s hot,” I said, giving him the words for his agony, “Let me carry you.” I picked up my lug-of-a-brother and set him hard on my hip. Wincing as my barefoot smacked the scorched ground, I hopped lop-sided back to my thong, slipped my toes into place, shifted Steven to the other hip, lifted my chin, and propelled forward. I was through with his antics, but this kid—he never quit. He scrunched his nose and pushed his stubby little arms against me as hard as he could. His high-pitched, whiny utterings deepened into a wolf-like growl. This skutch was fierce; I stiffened my upper body in resistance and squeezed hard to show him who was in control.
“Do you want your feet to burn?” It took all my effort to stay calm, keep my voice low, and focus my eyes on the exit. I didn’t look around as if I cared to see if the tangerine mom was watching us. Of course, I totally did, but I knew if I saw her, I’d burn with shame.
The freak show was over. I would not, would never, lose it in public the way Diane did. When I finally pushed through the hinged gate and saw our green station wagon at the bottom of the long grassy hill, I wrapped my arms around the wriggling skutch even tighter, inhaling his salty, chlorine skin, not letting him budge an inch.
Scream now, skutch, and I wouldn’t care at all. Sweat dripped between the flat triangles of my bikini top. “You’re a brat, Steven. You know that?” He weighed a freakin ton, and I didn’t know how much longer I could hold him. I walked faster. “An awful pain in the neck, brat,” I said through clenched teeth. By the time I got to the car, his sweaty torso was slipping from my arms.
I opened the back door and surrendered the savage; he quickly climbed over the seat to the back-back with Eddie. He stuck his tongue at me and then stuck three fingers in his mouth. Diane had copped the front seat. It figured. Veronica held Patrick, asleep; I got in next to them. Mom looked at me in the rearview mirror.
“I’m starving,” I sneered.
Her eyes narrowed. “I’m sure we’re all hungry,” The car started. “Don’t ruin a good day.”
What in heck was good about it? How could my mother be serious? I’d rather swim with Jaws, than the people in this family, I wanted to scream.
The car heaved onto the local road and a stream of hot air rushed in the window, licked my cheek, singed my eyelids. I pressed hair behind my ear the way I watched Mom do a hundred times and rested my chin on my damp forearm along the window. Outside on Newbridge Road, a Volkswagen Beetle whizzed by, men in white t-shirts pushed lawnmowers in orderly rows, and kids in shorts rode banana seat bikes over well-swept sidewalks.
Veronica scooted closer and reposed her head on my shoulder. I can see now it was meant as a comforting gesture. But at the time, I was imagining myself speeding in a tiny cool car over the Throgs Neck and marching with my white boots into a Mary Tyler Moore life.
“Stop touching me,” I said, recoiling from her softness.
Jeanne-Marie Fleming, writer, educator, and editor, holds an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College. Her work appears or is forthcoming in JMWW, MER Journal, Writers Read, Laughter and Tears Anthology, Black Fork Review, and elsewhere. She mentors incarcerated citizens via Transforming Lives NY. Connect on IG @jeannemariefleming, or on X @jmlgsf
26 September 2024
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