(A work in progress)

Beginnings: Vancouver to Winnipeg  1/11/2005  1

I don't remember much about my mother and the things I do remember are probably only because my older brother, Lane, used to tell me about her. I remember the smell of perfume and cigarettes and someone catching me when I tried to walk across the living room. 2

She died when I was two. We lived in Vancouver then, in a one storey house I don't remember. She commit suicide one day while my brother (who was 7) was at school and my dad was at work, and Lane came home to find her in the basement where she had hung herself and me crying in my room because I hadn't eaten all day. 3

At her funeral, my brother held me and we sat with our next door neighbours instead of with my dad, who was drunk as always sitting at the front while we sat near the back. It was winter and the snow was up to my brother's knees at her gravesite but still he held me in his arms and he stood with Mrs. Martinez, who kept a hand on his shoulder and glared at our dad across our mother's grave. No one in my family cried. My dad went out after the funeral to the bars and didn't come home until they closed. My brother gave me dinner and put me to bed, and waited for my dad to come home and whip him like he always did. 4

A few weeks after the funeral we moved. The house was sold and one day our dad packed us into the car with as much else as we could fit and we drove for days, until we reached a small cold apartment in Winnipeg, Manitoba. 5

Up until my mother's death my dad had mostly ignored us. He had never really wanted kids and was happy to let my mom take care of us. He would beat on Lane whenever he was drunk but he mostly just considered me an inconvenience and wanted nothing to do with me. He wasn't home a lot of the time. He dealt drugs and was always on the streets meeting people, or at bars drinking away the money he had made that day. He always stumbled home after midnight, half of the time to our room to drag Lane out of bed to beat him and tell him how we had fucked up his life. 6

Once Lane started in school in Winnipeg, both he and my father were gone all day most days. Usually my dad would leave me in the crib so that I couldn't cause trouble while I was alone, and my brother usually came home to find me crying because I was hungry and bored and lonely. The year before I started junior kindergarten, when I was too big for the crib to keep me prisoner any longer my dad gave me free roam of the apartment, except when he was home and I was stuck in my room because he didn't want to see me. 7

I was excited to start school mostly because it meant I would be in the same place as Lane all day. I barely slept the entire week before school started, and Lane got frustrated with my constant chatter about it, telling me repeatedly that it was a waste of time and that I was going to hate it once I actually got there. 8

The year I started JK, Lane was going into fourth grade. I didn't sleep the night before and woke Lane up an hour early. He yelled at me for trying to drag him out of bed, which woke my dad up and he yelled at both of us from the next room, he had better not have to come in there. 9

He was up before we left, sitting hungover at the table with a coffee while Lane made me breakfast. Our dad cringed at the clicking of spoons against bowls and told us to keep it down, would we? his head was killing him and we were making it worse. Lane muttered something in reply that I didn't hear but my dad did and he was suddenly on his feet, his head aparently fine now dragging Lane out of his chair and smacking him hard across the head, now shoving him backwards against the wall, still hitting him, yelling something about his smart mouth, how much of a worthless fuckup he was. 10

After my dad stumbled off to his room and probably back to bed Lane couldnt drag me out of there fast enough. He shoved my backpack onto my back, grabbed my hand and pulled me from the apartment. I asked him if he was okay while we walked too fast down the hall and he said, Yes, I'm fine, hurry up. It was the only thing he said to me on the entire long walk. He walked fast through the streets, pulling on my hand with me jogging beside him to keep up. I didn't understand why we were in such a hurry but when I asked he didn't say anything, just kept walking. 11

There were more kids than I had ever seen, inside the school, outside the school, climbing off of buses in long rows. Lane took me inside and down to the very end of one hall, where he turned into a classroom. 12

He introduced me to my teacher, Mrs. Shields, who looked like a grandmother and smiled and said, Isn't he cute? to my brother when she saw me. He had to pry his hand away from mine when he left. I didn't want to be left alone in this room full of kids I had never seen before, even if Lane kept telling me it was okay and I'd like them after I knew them while he pulled at my fingers with his free hand and kept telling me to let go already. 13

I did enjoy the class, except for one thing. For the first few weeks everything we did involved parents. We talked about our families, and drew our families so that the teacher had something to put on the wall and we had something to show our mother when she came in for Meet The Teacher night. I missed the mother I never knew and felt jealous of the other kids, who talked freely about theirs. 14

So I started asking Lane endless questions about her. He told me about how she tucked us into bed and sang us songs, and was always waiting for him with a snack when he came home from school so that they could talk about how their day had been with each other. I wondered why someone like that had to die while my father could live and drink and beat his son, and Lane told me he'd like to know as well. 15

Winnipeg to Brandon  1/11/2005 16

If we left for school at 7:00, we could get there in time for the free breakfast our school served 3 days a week. At 7 the streets were just beginning to wake up, and I held Lane's hand and jogged beside him to keep up, past the crackhouses, the raving schizoid on the corner who always followed Lane and me for a block or two, the carjackers and the drunks stumbling home after a night passed out on a parkbench. 17

For the six months more that we stayed in Winnipeg we went to every free breakfast the school offered. We heard teachers talking about us, voices low, always tsking and shaking their heads. My teacher was always carefully gentle around me, soft voice, no sudden moves, talking to me and complimenting me at any possible opportunity. 18

In February that year, my dad had a "business opportunity" and we moved this time to Brandon. My new school was different. I had joined the class in the middle of the year, when who was friends with who had already been sorted out, and the kids were hostile. I was easily the smallest kid in my class and Michael Cole, who was twice my size, spent the first two months bullying me, pushing and shoving me, making fun of my name, size, clothes, anything was a potensial target for him to laugh at. 19

Lane was having problems too. After only three days at school, he was sent home for jumping another boy in his class who had been making fun of him. He was sent to the office every few days for acting out in various ways. 20

I told him about Michael one day while we were walking home. I had spent an hour that day sitting in front of the office with an ice pack to my cheek from when Michael had pushed me and I had hit my head on the desk. Michael had been given a Timeout - told to sit at his desk with his head down and he couldn't play for the rest of the morning. Don't let him push you around, Lane told me. You have to stand up for yourself. No one else will. He's all talk anyways. If you fight back he'll stop. 21

What am I supposed to do? I asked. And, Can't you just beat him up for me? 22

My dad said nothing about the big blue bruise on my cheek. He probably hadn't noticed, or figured it was just something he had done when he was drunk. 23

At school the next day, after thinking all night about what Lane told me, I turned around and punched Michael in the mouth when he made a crack about me. He fall backwards and started to bleed, and once he realized he was bleeding he started crying. All of the kids immediately rushed into a circle around him and some of them started crying because Michael was bleeding and crying, and the teacher was pushing through them and saying, Go to the office Kael, right now, go to the office and tell them what you did... 24

They sent me home, and after my dad picked me up he yelled at me the whole way home for making him do all this and beat me up for a bit when we got home, but when my brother came home he was grinning and said, I heard what you did to that kid who was giving you trouble, that's so awesome, so it was all okay. 25

The teachers talked about us amongst themselves and called us Those Horrible Vitti Brothers. But Michael didn't bother me anymore and some of the other kids who Michael had picked on started inviting me to join their games, and my dad didn't acknowledge my existance anymore, so I was happy. 26

Paper in the wind  1/12/2005 27

On the weekends my dad threw parties - every weekend, almost - my brother and I went on walks. Lane learned how the buses worked and would drag me, every Friday after school and every Saturday morning, somewhere new. I must have seen every park in the city, every store, every street. We would stay out until it was dark, or I was tired and begged Lane until he said we could go home. We wandered the streets through the winter, through more than one snowstorm, and I never new what he was trying to protect me from until on particularly cold Friday night when we had stayed in instead. 28

We were in Lane's room, Lane lying on his bed reading and me drawing on the ground beside him. There was a party in full swing at the front of the house and occasionally we heard someone stumble into the wall, or our door. A few people walked right into the room, reeking of alcohol and weed and looking for the bathroom. It was late but it was no use trying to sleep with the pounding music and people laughing and yelling. 29

Two men came into the room, holding hands and tripping over their own feet and looking for the exit. You should try the first floor of the house, Lane suggested and one of them grinned and leered at him and came to sit next to him on the bed. Are you Steve's son? he asked, and when Lane nodded he asked, How old are you? 30

Ten, Lane said, and the two men were looking at each other from across the room. Lane and I looked at each other, confused. One of the men, the one still standing in the doorway, reached across Lane's desk and pulled the telephone cord out of the wall. Lane understood immediately what that meant and jumped to his feet but the other one grabbed him and pushed him back onto the bed, pinning him there while the other one tied Lane's hands behind his back. Lane struggled, and the one tying the phone cord kept hitting him and telling him to stop it. I tried to pull him off of my brother, but a five-year-old can't be much help and the man just pushed me off of the bed back to the floor and told me I'd be next. 31

I crawled under Lane's desk, hiding behind the chair, trying to block out my vision and my hearing and not being able to do either. They took turns raping him, beating him. At one point one of them left and returned with a third man, who took his turns too. They had forgotten about me and when Lane blacked out for the second time they untied him and left him there. 32

I went to his side, and there were spots and slashes of blood on the sheets. Lane's wrists were scraped and bleeding from the phone cord, and there were bruises on his neck from being choked and bitten. His lip was bleeding from biting down on it and his mouth was bleeding from I don't know what, and after he finally woke up he was coughing up blood for hours. 33

When he woke up, he didn't move for a long time. He buried his face in his pillow and lay completely still and silent. When he finally looked up and saw me, he put one of his bruised arms around my shoulders and pulled me closer to them. Are you okay? was the first thing he said. 34

I got water and a towel from the bathroom and because he could barely move I washed the blood off of his face and wrists. When the first of his coughing fits started and he coughed blood into his hands, I wanted to get our dad, but he didn't let me, so I lay beside him in the bed all night and heard him cough and moan every time he tried to move, and curse the men who had hurt him and both our parents after he thought I was asleep. 35

The party was over by Saturday morning, and it still hurt Lane to move. Our father was passed out on the couch with a girl lying beside him, head on his chest. There were a few other people scattered about the house and someone passed out in the bathroom so I couldn't use it until my dad woke up and kicked them all out. 36

He was sitting at the kitchen table surrounded by empty beer bottles and cups waiting for his coffee to brew when I approached him, even though I knew that before he'd had his morning fix was the worst time to talk to him. Dad, I said, and had to repeat myself at least three times before he finally looked up at me. People came into Lane's room last night, I told him. 37

They were probably trying to find the bathroom, he told me and got up to get his coffee. They hurt Lane, I said, and he didn't answer. I started to repeat myself again and he said, in the sharp voice that warned you a blow wasn't far behind in coming, Fuck Kael, it's early and I feel like shit, go bother someone who cares. 38

I went back to Lane's room, and he was still lying on his stomach with his head buried in his arms and didn't want to talk to me. He wasn't coughing blood anymore but he could still barely walk, and the bruises on his neck were purple and swollen and you could tell exactly what the bite marks were. He wore turtlenecks for a month and pretended he had strep throat. 39

Our father saw the bruises and the limp and said nothing. For a month or so he was easier on him, but things gradually went back to normal, as always. 40

Putting on a smile 41

Lane dealt weed to the other kids at recess. He sat behind the shed at the back of the school's property with a cigarette in his mouth and weighed it up on a scale that sat in front of him. His friend Mark kept watch, and if a teacher approached he would loudly begin counting as if they were playing hide and seek, and behind the shed Lane would stab out his cigarettes, throw his bag and scale into his pockets and stroll casually out. 42

I was the quiet, weird kid in my grade, and not long after my fight with Michael the year before the other kids had given up on me. So I took to hanging out with Lane who put up with me with the tolerance of an older brother even though he was in sixth grade by now and his friends made fun of him behind his back sometimes for it. I watched him weigh his weed and get money from the line of seventh and eighth graders every recess and wished I were old enough to the smoke the joint he shared with Mark at the end of every lunch recess. 43

Lane didn't always come home after school now so a lot of the time I walked home alone, to the drunk people in my living room and the cloud of marijuana smoke that always filled the house by that hour of the day. With no friends or brother or fun to distract me, I did a lot of reading and writing to keep myself occupied. I was working my way through the Redwall books by the end of first grade, and my dad scoffed and told me it was a waste of my time and if I weren't careful I'd end up fucked up like my brother44

-- 45

My teacher, Mrs. Flemish, started to hold me back sometimes at recess. At first, she talked to me about trivial things. School, and my hobbies and my favourite books. The conversations got more personal, and soon she was talking to me about my family and my home, and she never seemed satisfied with the answers I gave her. 46

She'd tell me that my marks were much lower than they had been at the beginning of the year, and that she was worried because I was always distracted and looked tired. And I'd just tell her that everything was okay and give her the smile that usually charmed people out of whatever sort of trouble I was in, because it wasn't like I could tell her I never slept until Lane came home drunk or smelling like weed and cigarettes after midnight to try to bait my father into hitting him. 47

-- 48

He got arrested for the first time near the end of the school year. He had been off school property, cutting class and dealing weed to a seventh-grader when he was arrested. Because he was only eleven they couldn't charge him, just send him home to my dad. 49

Of course, I didn't actually know any of this until two days later. 50

When I got home from school that day, Lane was missing and my dad was in the kitchen going through the drawers and finding the longest, sharpest knives. I asked him where Lane was and he mumbled a few curse words and didn't really answer me. He picked up three or four of the knives on the counter and went downstairs into the basement. 51

I went to my room and picked up my book, and had been reading for a good twenty minutes before the screaming started. The sudden noise shocked me and I didn't move for the first few of the gut-wrenching screams. 52

The door in the basement was locked, and stayed locked for the next two days. I didn't know what my dad was doing with those knives, but the screams continued for an hour before my dad gagged him so the neighbours wouldn't say anything. I could still hear the muffled yells, they went on another hour and then stopped until after midnight when my dad came home from the bars. 53

I couldn't sleep with the noise and sick with fear and worry and rage, so I was awake until the sun was rising and exhaustion overcame me. 54

I slept until screams woke me up. There wasn't a gag anymore and I could hear Lane pleading, begging him to stop. I tried the get the door open again and even shouldered it a few times, but it was useless and I couldn't stand hearing it anymore. I had to leave the house, so I went to school. 55

My mind was still at home and the teacher had to call my name three or four times every time she wanted to talk to me. She sent me out in the hall for a drink, for a snack I didn't have, let me put my head down on the desk for an hour and when nothing helped she sent me to the office to see if maybe I could go home. 56

I spent the rest of the day sitting in front of the office staring blankly at a wall, and when it was over my feet carried me automatically home, where the house was quiet and my dad was gone but the door in the basement was still locked and Lane wouldn't answer me when I called his name. 57

When my dad went to the bars that evening, he left the door unlocked and three bloody knives in the sink. 58

Lane was conscious but barely, and he was red from his shoulders to his waist, and all down his arms. I had to saw the rope open with the last bloody knife which was still in the room in the basement, and it were so tight and swollen with blood that I cut his wrist but I don't think he even noticed. 59

I couldn't move him, so I ruined 6 or 7 towels wiping the blood away, but I couldn't even do that until he blacked out because he'd whimper and try to push me away every time I touched him. His body was scored in long deep cuts that wouldn't stop bleeding no matter how many times I cleaned them and put pressure on them. He looked deathly pale and there was still blood everywhere, and I was worried he would bleed to death and it would be my fault because I didn't know what to do to help him.60

Metaphor for a missing moment                               1/14/2005 61

A few months into second grade, Lane woke me up late one night. He smelled like vodka and slurred his words together when he spoke. I love you Kael, he kept telling me, I just wanted you to know that. 62

I was half-awake and didn't much care. I told him I loved him too, but to leave me alone because I wanted to sleep. Okay, he said, and hugged me again. I just wanted you to know. And he left. 63

I went immediately back to sleep and didn't think anything more of it. Lane was sleeping the next morning with his pillow over his head and refused to wake up, so I went to school without him. 64

Halfway through the day, my dad's girlfriend came to pick me up at school. There was an accident, she told me, although it had been anything but that. She had borrowed my dad's car and I climbed into the back seat, asking, What happened? 65

Your brother is in the hospital, she told me and I immediately started thinking of all of the possible things my dad could have done, until she added, He took a lot of pills this morning. Why? I asked, and she shook her head. I don't know. 66

He wants to die, I told her and she looked back at me in surprise. Did he tell you that? she asked. No, I said, but I know it's true. We were quiet for a while, then I asked, Will he be okay? 67

Yes, she told me and I didn't know if it was a lie or not. I was lied to enough not to trust anything an adult told me. 68

My dad was at the hospital, pacing back and forth in the waiting room, and he actually looked really worried, but maybe that was a lie too. I sat with Erica and she kept her arm around me and watched my dad pace. No one talked, and I was restless. I wanted to see Lane. I occupied the time by trying to decide whether I was sad or just mad at Lane for what he'd done. 69

He was home the next day when I came home from school, lying on his stomach on his bed because his back was to raw and sore to lie in any other position. He looked up when I came to the door of his room, but I had nothing to say to him and turned and walked away to my own room. I heard him get up a few minutes later, and knock on my door. Go away, I told him, but he came in anyways. 70

He talked to me even though I didn't want to listen and wouldn't look at him. He tried to make me understand, or at least pretend to. C'mon Kael, he said, I know it was stupid and it won't happen again. Dad will definitely discourage me from trying and failing again over the next few weeks. You can't ignore me forever, you'll have to talk to me sometime. 71

I won't if you don't fail next time, I told him, and he looked like he'd been slapped. I didn't know why I wanted to hurt him more, just that I wasn't ready to forgive him for very nearly leaving me on my own with our dad. Fuck off, I told him and for a second I didn't know if he would cry or hit me, but he did neither. He stood up and walked out of the room. 72

-- 73

Three weeks later, we moved to an apartment in Ottawa and Lane and I shared a room. I couldn't ignore him anymore and I realized I hadn't even been mad at him for a long time, so I started talking to him again. 74

My new school was more or less like my old one. It was three months into the school year by the time we moved, and none of my classmates were very welcoming. Lane didn't let me hang out with him anymore, but I wouldn't have wanted to anyways. All he and his friends seemed interested in doing was smoking and getting high behind the fence at recess. So I mustly hung out by myself, or with Sarah, the other outcast in my grade. She was challenged though and hit me if I didn't do things her way, so most of the time I tried to avoid her and wandered the playground by myself. 75

I usually walked home by myself too, with my head down looking at my feet and trying to ignore the shouts of Jamie and Cody behind me, who insulted me and with every name they could think of, and told me my brother was a skid, a druggie, a faggot and that he'd end up locked up for most of his life. 76

Home was almost a respite after the walk home. I would put my brother's headphones on to tune out the rest of the noise in the apartment and listen to whatever was in his CD player while I read until Lane came home and took the CD player from me every day and told me to stop borrowing his stuff. 77