Cosmo by Spencer Gordon Read Free Book Online Page A

spider-collecting gig is totally new; I’m trying to see how long it’ll hold his attention. I told him that every black spider he plops into the jar equals ten minutes of playtime with me later on. I figured it would give him a real thrill; the shed is crawling with those leathery bastards. That’s basically my summer job: keeping my brother busy, creating distractions. I don’t get paid.
    â€˜But I don’t like the black spiders,’ he whined earlier, looking sideways at the Cheez Whiz jar and rubbing his crotch.
    I clucked my tongue and flexed my biceps, as if to say no pain, no gain . He got the hint and stepped out into the flat, smoggy heat of our north Hamilton summer. Just in time, too, because Gorilla started up his whimpering just a few seconds later.
    Mom’s at work down at Robin’s Donuts, past all the drooling pit bulls tied to front-porch lattices, past all the little flower gardens and dried-up lawns. She works days, preferring the fat people on their motorized scooters to the drunken teenagers at night. She gets home at 6:30 and brings us boxes of doughnuts. Or doesn’t.
    Just as Gorilla starts going absolutely bananas, Uncle Keith crashes down the stairs. I start humming what I think would be his WWF entrance music, if he were ever on the card: Hank Williams’s ‘Kaw-Liga.’
    â€˜I’m gonna cover this,’ he says to me, smirking, holding up a chipped block of wood and chewing on a cigarette filter. He doesn’t mean the song: Uncle Keith has a small pile of wooden blocks near the shed, and he’s determined to cover each block with beer caps before the end of the summer. Keith stands shirtless and barefoot in the doorway, his gut sagging hairy and swollen over his yellow swimming trunks. He’s really tanned, loves to sit out in the sun, pounding bottle caps onto blocks, bitching about things like the puppy, like the food Mom doesn’t cook him, like Eddy and me. He’s got a serious black moustache and a cleft, a scar, on his jaw.
    I wish he was a wrestler, always on the road and working out, sending letters reminding us to take our vitamins and say our prayers. Sometimes Keith watches wrestling with us, but I don’t think he gets it; he spends two-thirds of every Saturday Night’s Main Event chuckling into a Pilsner, telling us how dumb we are to be watching. He keeps saying, ‘It’s fake. What the hell, it’s fake,’ as if I could be seventeen years old (old enough to drive! almost old enough to vote!) and not know this.
    â€˜Don’t let the dog out of the bedroom. Don’t go near the bedroom. The dog’s got shitloads of food and water up there.’
    â€˜I’ll take him for a walk,’ I say. ‘I’ll take him to the park.’
    â€˜Like hell you will.’ He says this in a way that means business, like he’s cutting a mean pre-show promo. He says this like Hulk Hogan would say, ‘Whatcha gonna do, brother?’ but without all the cartoon goofiness, the reminders to exercise and stay in school – his version of Hogan is pure aggression. Keith hates the Hulkster, thinks he’s all water weight and juice. He hates all the good guys. He prefers the heels, like Sgt. Slaughter, or Big Boss Man, or Mr. Perfect – guys, he says, who ‘just don’t give a fuck.’
    â€˜You ain’t goin’ nowhere. You see that list?’ he asks, pointing with the block at the refrigerator. There’s a yellow strip of paper stuck to the door with a Hamilton Ti-Cats magnet. It’s covered with Mom’s cockamamie scrawl: a list of chores that I’m supposed to finish before she gets home. There’s only three hours left to go.
    â€˜Yeah,’ I say.
    â€˜Well?’ Then Keith pushes open the screen door and walks into the backyard. It’s clear that he’s won the match, retained his title as King of the Ring (King Shit, I call him).