Trains

“Jake, your brother’s a retard!”
Jake feels the sting on his fist at the same time he hears the crack.
“You broke my nose. I’m gonna kill you.”
Jake can still feel the sting of the fist hitting his face as he races towards home. Jake constantly gets into fights. He just doesn’t think that he’s very smart. He is smarter than his older brother Brian is. Brian isn’t at all smart actually he’s quite stupid. Jake feels smarter thinking about his stupid older brother. He turns a corner afraid that his attackers are following him still. He’s almost home. Just another block and then he’ll really have something to worry about.
Jake has to face Mom. She is quite beautiful and knows it. She spends hours each day on her appearance. Brian is always with her. It’s their ritual. Brian isn’t smart or able to take care of himself, but Mom decided to make sure he looked nice. As pretty as she is though, she has a temper in equal measure. Generally she is calm, but whenever Jake does something wrong, she explodes. He’s in trouble for sure this time, even if someone else started the fight. Jake runs through the front door and up the stairs, trying to make it to his room before Mom sees the bruise forming around his left eye. Maybe if he calls out to her, she won’t come looking for him.
“Mom!” he calls out to the house. “I’m home.”
There is no answer as he reaches the door to his room.
“Mom?”
Still there isn’t an answer. He is standing with his hand reaching out for the doorknob. Usually she calls out to him the second he opens the front door.
“Brian!” He waits for a response. “Brian!”
There is still no answer.
He goes back down the stairs. The whole house seems to be deserted as he wanders from room to room. His eye is really throbbing now. He wants his mom to worry over him and take care of it, but at thirteen that is too childish a thought so he pushes it away. Just as he is about to go up the stairs again, he notices a note on the hall table. He goes over and reads the note.
Jake,
The principal called. Went to your school.
Don’t leave the house. Will be home soon.
You’re grounded until further notice. Brian’s in the attic.
Take care of him till I get home.
Mom.
Jake is angry. Why do I have to take care of my older brother? He’s eighteen, Jake thinks with exasperation. He heads for the attic. The sound of train noises comes to him as he reaches the door.
Brian is standing over an elaborate model train set. He is making whistle and chugging noises.
“Hey, Brian.”
“Whoo, whoo!” Brian bellows in response.
“Whatcha doin?”
“Playing train. Chugga, chugga, chugga, whoo, whoo!”
Brian is adjusting something on the track. Jake can’t see anything wrong. He turns and looks out the window at the sound of a car. Brian picks up the engine for his model train and places it on the track. He never looks at anyone. He just continues to focus on his train set, scanning each car. Brian examines each tree, house and miniature person, making sure that they are in their places. Places only he can identify exactly.
Jake looks at Brian; a shiver runs up his spine. The idea that someone, who embodies perfection on the outside and has the mind of a three-year-old bothers Jake. It makes him crazy that Brian is his brother. Jake also envies him. The time Mom spends with him. She wakes up early every morning and takes Brian out jogging. Then she makes him lift weights. Brian cries sometimes because he doesn’t understand why Mom makes him hurt himself. Then Mom takes him in the bathroom and gives him his bath and helps him shave. Once Jake asked Mom if he could go with them on their jog. She told him that he could take care of himself and that it was her special time with Brian. Jake resents it, sometimes. Now here he is taking care of Brian. His eye is swelling and throbbing, and it’s Brian’s’ fault. That’s what the fight was about, Brian.
One of the guys at school had said that Brian was just a big retard. Jake knew he was right, but it made him angry anyway. So he swung at the kid. Hit him square in the nose too. His nose started bleeding and then they really got into it. Jake knew he was going to lose the fight. His opponent was bigger. So first chance he got, he started to run for home. The guy and his friends chased him for awhile, but he managed to lose them, until tomorrow at least.
“Whoo, whoo.”
Brian sets another car down on the tracks and begins to connect it to the engine.
“Brian, don’t you ever get tired of playing trains?”
“Chugga, chugga, chugga, whoo, whoo.”
Jake feels like he is talking to a wall sometimes. He wonders what Brian will do if he moves one of the little plastic trees along the side of the track.
“I got into another fight today.”
Brian picks up a third car and starts inspecting it.
“You got a scratch I can’t use you. You’ve had an accident, go night night and rest.”
Brian returns the car to its spot exactly as it was before he picked it up.
“Don’t you care that I had a fight over you today?”
Brian picks up another car and places it gently on the track. In frustration and the desire to get his brothers’ attention, Jake picks up one of the plastic trees and moves it. Brian notices the movement and looks at his brother, tears welling up in his eyes. Jake moves the tree back, and spends time making sure it is in the right spot. He hates seeing Brian cry. When the tree is back to his satisfaction Brian goes back to the business of putting his train together.
“Robert’s a big goon. He was saying stuff about you. I don’t know why but I just hit him. I think I broke his nose. You should have heard the crack. He hit me in the eye. It really hurts you know? But the principal was right there. Man, Mom is gonna kill me when she gets back.” Jake stares out the window at a bank of dark gray clouds moving in. He notices all the houses and trees are beginning to look as if they are enveloped in dark “All you care about are those stupid trains.” Jake sarcastically imitates Brian’s train sounds.
“What does retard mean?”
Jake turns to Brian startled. “It’s a mean word used for people like you.”
“Am I a retard?”
“No! No! Course not. You’re just slow. That’s all, just slow.”
Brian continues with the train. He is just about done putting all the cars on the track. He starts looking over the cabooses, trying to choose. He seems confused.
“Oh, oh!” Brian cries out.
Jake looks at him to see what’s wrong. Brian is standing in place looking down at himself. Jake follows his brothers’ gaze downward and sees that Brian is wetting his pants, a puddle forming by his feet.
“Do you want to play trains with me?”
“Let’s change your pants first.”
Jake takes Brians hand and leads him down the attic stairs to Brians room. The room is unusual for an eighteen-year-old. It is decorated with Winnie the Pooh wallpaper, stuffed animals, and a twin bed with Pooh sheets, blocks and Pooh curtains. The room fits Brian. Jake stands Brian in the middle of the room.
“Wait there while I get a wash cloth.”
Jake walks out of the room and Brian sits down on the floor by the window and starts playing with the blocks. He forms them into the semblance of a train and starts making the sounds of the train again. Jake returns to the room wash cloth in hand. He sighs when he sees Brian on the floor, then starts the long process of trying to get him to sit still while cleaning him up and changing his pants. As soon as Brian is finished being dressed he takes off for the attic. Jake trails behind putting the soiled clothes in the hamper and picking the blocks up from the floor.
“Do you want to play trains with me?”
Jake thinks a minute. “Sure.” Jake sits down next to Brian. “So what are we doing?”
“Putting a caboose on.”
“Why don’t you just use that one?” Jake points to a black one.
“Cause it’s sad.”
“Sad?”
“Yeah, sad. Black is for sad.”
“Well, how bout the blue one?”
“No, blue is for special times.”
“Why is blue for special times?”
“Cause I like blue.”
Jake asks Brian more and more questions, not just about the cabooses, but all the cars. Brian answers and tells Jake all the different stories that go with each of the train cars. Brian explains that he is making a happy train, so the cars all have to be happy. Jake continues to listen, fascinated, as Brian tells him all about the trip the train is going on.
“It’s going to go by the store too.”
“The store?”
“Yeah, Mr. Jack’s store. He only sells candy to kids. Big people aren’t supposed to go in.”
“That sounds like a fun store. Where will the train go after that?”
“It goes to the forest. The forest can be scary sometimes, but since this is a happy train, the fairies and animals will protect it.”
“But what if the train were sad?”
“Then the monsters would come and try to scare it off the tracks. The monsters used to come a lot more, but I put a brave train that looked sad on the tracks, and it scared the monsters, so they’re more careful now.”
“What about after the forest? Does the train stop there?” Jake points to an elaborate model of a Victorian house on the trains path.
“Yeah, that’s Mrs. Grandmas house. She has cookies and milk for everyone on the train. She likes the train, but she doesn’t get on anymore cause she’s too old to travel.”
“She sounds like our Grandma.”
Jake doesn’t notice the time passing, as he joins Brian in creating the adventures of the train. The noise of Mom’s car pulling in the driveway or her climbing the stairs doesn’t penetrate the wonderful world that Jake and Brian have created for themselves.
Jake notices as Mom stands in the doorway watching the two boys play and discuss the adventures of the train. Brian waves to her briefly, but Jake continues to pretend she isn’t there. He’s enjoying the fantasy that he and Brian created. Mom steps out of the doorway and watches from the side, so the boys can’t see her. Brian continues to tell Jake all about the people in the villages along the track, about their jobs and families. They finally put the caboose on the train. It is a bright red caboose, a happy caboose that is a birthday present from Grandma.
Brian slowly moves the train by hand along the track.
“Brian, why don’t you turn on the train?”
“Turn it on?”
“Yeah it turns on by this little switch.”
“Show me!”
Jake flips the switch. The little engine lights up and starts to move very slowly at first. As each minute ticks by the train moves a little faster. Jake looks at Brian. His face is alight. His smile glows, and his eyes are bright. He has found the key to Brian. He can communicate with his brother who only lives in the fantasy world of his trains.
Mom steps back into the doorway.
“Hello, Jake, and how’s my Bri- Bri?”
Jake looks at his mother, and then back to the trains. He can’t understand why she is smiling when she is supposed to be yelling.
“So Mom, did I get suspended for fighting?”
“Yes, for the next three days.”
“Am I in really big trouble?”
“Depends on what the fight was about.”
“He called Brian a retard, and it just made me mad.”
“I don’t like fighting for any reason, but under the circumstances… your punishment will be to spend the entire three days with Brian.”
Jake looks at his mother, then to Brian and the trains. He turns back slowly to his mom.
“I think I can live with that.”
“I can as well. It’s nice to see you getting to know your brother.”
Jake smiles slightly and hugs Brian again.
“What do you think about me spending time with you?” “The train’s leaving. We better get on. WHOO! WHOO! CHUGGA, CHUGGA!” “We’re going to take all kinds of train trips together, Brian.”

Copyright August 31, 1999