Brotherly Love by Pete Dexter Read Free Book Online

thinking of his father, afraid
that he will hear the music from Victor Kopec’s house too, afraid
of what he will do.
    He walks into the kitchen and pours himself a glass
of milk.
    Too full, all the way to the brim. He carries it back
to the living room, sipping at it as he goes to keep it from
spilling, and then, just as he and the milk are settled in their
places at the window, his father’s long black Lincoln stops in
front of the parking place across the street.
    His father turns in the front seat and begins to back
in. Peter’s uncle sits in the front seat with him, talking.
    The car moves backward, then forward, then back
again. His father straightens the wheels and then climbs out—his
uncle is still talking—closes the door without bothering to lock
it, and crosses the yard toward the house.
    He does not seem to notice the polka music spilling
out of Victor Kopec’s windows.
    Peter’s uncle comes out of the car after him, still
talking, and follows him.
    "You want, me and Theresa could take Petey for
you a while . . ."
    Hearing those words, Peter understands his mother
isn’t coming back to the house.
    His father opens the door and walks inside, his uncle
a step behind. Peter is still facing the window and doesn’t look at
them as they come in. He stares out at the park, watching the little
girl collect Easter eggs, coming back now almost to the silver egg
itself, then turning, distracted by her mother and father—she is in
a straw hat, he is wearing a suit and tie—who want to take her
picture.
    "Petey," his uncle says, "how you
doin’?"
    In the silence that follows, his uncle laughs, and
then turns to Peter’s father. "He’s more like you all the
time," he says.
    Peter’s father sits heavily on the davenport and
closes his eyes. Peter watches him a moment, over his shoulder, then
turns away from the park and the hunt for Easter eggs and drops down
next to him. He feels the heat of his father’s body. His uncle
stands in the middle of the room, smiling, suddenly out of words.
    "I gotta go," he says finally, "let
you talk things over with Petey."
    His father nods.
    His uncle says, "Be nice, Charles. Don’t do
nothing until you’ve had a chance to think it over."
    His father doesn’t answer.
    "Promise me," his uncle says.
    His father moves his head as if it weighed a hundred
pounds and slowly fixes his look on the boy’s uncle. "I don’t
want to go through this promise-me shit right now," he says.
"It’s the wrong time."
    "I got to hear it, I know you."
    His father shakes his head.
    His uncle begins to say something else, but his
father interrupts him. "Nothing’s changed," he says. "You
want me to promise something, this don’t change a thing."
    "Maybe," his uncle says, "it was the
best thing she left. Think about it that way .... "
    And Peter’s father stands up, takes his uncle to
the door and opens it for him.
    "I’m just sayin’ it might be for the best,"
his uncle says. "They get like that, they ain’t the same
afterwards. It’s like a scar . . ."
    He makes a cutting motion across his cheek. "It’s
there where you see it all the time .... "
    His uncle stumbles down the steps as if he had been
pushed. His father stands in the doorway.
    Across the street in the park, Larry Tock takes over
the loud-speakers and begins singing. "In your Easter bonnet . .
."
    Peter’s father closes
the door.
    * * *

    H is father stands at the
door a long time after it’s closed, until the Easter song is
finished and all the music that’s left outside is a polka.
    "What would you say," he says finally, "you
go stay for a while with your uncle?"
    Peter doesn’t look at his father; he shakes his
head no. "Your Aunt Theresa, she thinks you’re her kid
already." He smiles, making a joke.
    Peter looks straight ahead, and watches his uncle
walk up the street toward his own car.
    His father moves away from the door and sits in a
chair, holding his face. He stands up, he sits down, unable to make
up his