The Heart is Deceitful above All Things Page 6

  The morning light streams from the window onto his desk. ‘Step in. Close the door, Jeremiah.’ I walk in, closing the heavy door behind me. I watch my hands move the brass knob that sticks out like a dog’s tail until it clicks in its lock. ‘Jeremiah . . .’ I turn around slowly. Long rows of books, not library books, but leather bound, in blacks, burgundies, and browns, line the wooden shelves up to the ceiling. They’re the kind of shelves where if you remove the right book, a secret passage opens and a slide takes you to a secret dungeon. ‘Jeremiah . . .’ He taps his foot in rapid succession. I turn back to face him. As my eyes adjust to the light, I can see him better. He’s frowning. His hands are pressed flat on the black inlay on top of the wide desk. I want him to smile, to be better than my fucking fosters’ grandpa, and to know I’m me: who he saved. ‘I know songs, sir,’ I whisper, and immediately I feel as if I’ve tossed a water balloon off a roof and I’m watching it, powerless to stop it, as it hurtles toward a crowded street.

  ‘You’ve learned Psalms, Jeremiah,’ he says, half like a question.

  ‘Aaron told me to sing them to you,’ I take a breath, ‘sir.’

  ‘Aaron told you to sing them to me, Jeremiah,’ he repeats. He folds his hands one on top of the other. His hands are bright white with delicate blue veins, raised like worm tunnels. His little pinkie taps slowly.

  ‘I am a Annie-christ,’ I sing without melody, ‘I am a annie-kiss––’

  ‘Jeremiah,’ he interrupts, ‘what psalm is that?’ He cocks his head to the side like a dog listening to a silent whistle.

  ‘Sex Pistols,’ I say, excited he’s interested.

  ‘And where did you learn the Sex Pistols psalm, Jeremiah?’ Now his ring finger is tapping along with his pinkie.

  ‘Um . . . from Stinky.’ I examine the bookcase again. There’s only one white book on the fifth shelf; that must be the one you pull.

  ‘Jeremiah . . .’ I turn back. He tilts his head to the other side. ‘And who is Stinky?’

  I laugh and cover my mouth. He smiles back without humor. ‘Stinky has a pink Mohawk, but he cut it.’

  ‘Yes . . .’ His whole hand is tapping now. It’s making me jumpy.

  ‘He lived with us, he’s a punk rocker, and I get to be one, too, he said. He’s learned me guitar so I can be one, too, but we ran away because he was boring, Sarah said . . . we didn’t even say bye-bye. We sole his guitar at the pone shop. We didn’t say bye.’

  My grandfather just nods.

  ‘Oh, Aaron ’minded me to tell you the Dead Kennedys, I know them, ‘Too Drunk to Fuck’. I know that one, too. I know more. Wanna hear?’

  ‘No, Jeremiah, I––’

  ‘Oh!’ I interrupt him. He looks down at me with surprise, his eyebrows raised. ‘Aaron ’minded me to tell you my bath was too hot, it hurted. And Job scrubbed me hard. And I taked the bath at the hospital before, anyways. They don’t scrub ya.’

  ‘What other things did Aaron remind you to tell me, Jeremiah?’ His teeth lightly bite into his bottom lip.

  ‘That I ain’t got no pillow, and the blankets ain’t warm enough, and we haded too many potatoes to peel. But you know what? He can make ’em look like naked peoples.’

  ‘What else did he say or show you, Jeremiah?’

  ‘Well . . . he said he gets candy from your drawer, and if I do his bed for a week, I can get me some.’ He says nothing, only nods like he wants me to tell him more. I rub my head. ‘Oh . . . he says my mom is a sinner and a slut.’ His hand starts tapping again, louder. ‘Um . . .’ I can’t think of anything else. I think about making stuff up because I’m enjoying the attention, but I decide not to. ‘That’s about it.’ I sigh. ‘Sir,’ I remember and add on. I half smile up at him.

  ‘That’s all, Jeremiah,’ he says with his white lips thin as a woman’s eyebrows pulled together.

  ‘Oh yeah, I’m not wearin’ any underwears.’

  ‘OK, Jeremiah.’ I smile wider, but he frowns back. He stands up and moves rigidly to the door. He opens it, steps into the hall, and says Aaron’s name. As they enter, Aaron stares at me from the corner of his eye. My grandfather sits behind his expansive desk and folds his hands one on top of the other. He’s only looking at Aaron. Aaron’s head is turned down. I watch the dust swirl from my grandfather’s breath as he repeats to Aaron all that I told him. Aaron never raises his head. Never moves. My grandfather stands and leans forward on his knuckles.

  ‘Is this what you said, Aaron?’ Aaron’s body twitches, but he says nothing. His gaze stays fixated on the floor. My grandfather walks around his desk in front of Aaron and repeats the question. I didn’t realize that I’d been staring at the floor also, until the loud slap makes me look up. Aaron’s face is askew and bright red. Fingerprints are across his cheeks. I look up at my grandfather standing tall and dignified above us, his hands calmly at his sides.

  ‘I didn’t say it, sir,’ Aaron mumbles to the floor.

  ‘What didn’t you say, Aaron?’

  ‘None of it, sir,’ he whispers.

  ‘So Jeremiah is a liar?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Am not!’ I spit out.

  My grandfather looks at me in so direct a way that my outrage is quickly evaporated. I gaze down at the almost black wood slat floor.

  ‘Aaron, I’ll ask you one last time.’ I can hear Aaron’s breath almost a pant. ‘Is Jeremiah a liar?’

  I grind my teeth together and tighten my hands into fists.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Liar!’ I glare at Aaron, who’s still staring down. My grandfather taps his foot, once, almost softly, but it’s enough to quiet me. I don’t feel afraid, and I don’t even feel all that mad at Aaron. I like the feeling that my grandfather and I are a team. I think he believes me, because he saved me, he’s protecting me now, like he did from Sarah, and I love it.

  ‘Aaron. How did Jeremiah know I keep hard candy in my desk?’

  Aaron says nothing. A loud crack of another slap across Aaron’s face breaks the silence. I don’t look up. I bite my teeth into my lip so I don’t smile.

  ‘Who is the liar, Aaron?’ My grandfather’s foot taps like a metronome. Another slap echoes in the room, and the words start out of Aaron.

  ‘I am . . . sir,’ he says, snifflling, ‘I am the liar.’

  I bite harder into my lip.

  ‘Aaron, show me how you steal from my drawer.’

  Aaron slowly raises his head. His cheek is red, with blues and purples spreading like watercolors on a paper towel. Tears line his eyes. ‘Please, sir . . .’

  ‘Go ahead, Aaron, pretend I’m not here. That’s when you thieve, isn’t it, Aaron?’ My grandfather steps away from the desk. ‘Show me, Aaron.’

  Aaron closes his eyes longer than a blink, then walks slowly to behind the desk. He stops in front of the drawer and looks up at my grandfather.

  ‘Yes, Aaron. Show me.’ Aaron closes his eyes and slides open the drawer. He reaches inside quickly, pulls his hand out, and then closes it like he’d been burned. He stands waiting, eyes closed, his long blond eyelashes fluttering.

  ‘Aaron, show me,’ my grandfather says almost sweetly.

  Aaron opens his eyes but stares down at some floating invisible spot. He walks from around the desk, his leather shoes clicking against the wood. He holds out his right arm, turns over his fist, and opens his fingers like in a game of guess which hand. Two candy cane peppermints stand in the center of his shaking hand. I let myself smile.

  ‘So, Aaron, you told Jeremiah to sing those songs to me?’ Aaron nods, his hand still extended. ‘And you told Jeremiah to complain about the bath?’ Aaron nods. He nods a quick head jerk for each of the things my grandfather repeats to him. Then my grandfather asks Aaron to repeat it all, saying each thing he did, including lying about it all and his intention to get me in trouble. By the time Aaron’s done, his outstretched hand is shaking so much, the candy’s jumping in his palm like popping corn. I quietly step to the side to stand a little behind my g
randfather, in his shadow.

  ‘So, Aaron, what should be done? I’ve taught you otherwise, have I not?’

  Aaron nods to the floor, his whole arm trembling in the air and his body jerking in little spasms.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘What should be done, Aaron?’

  Aaron lets a little moan escape, and my grandfather slaps him again, his whole arm swinging back. A little pool of blood forms at the corner of Aaron’s mouth.

  ‘Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child . . .’ As Aaron speaks, the blood trickles down his chin. ‘But the rod of correction shall drive it far from him.’

  Sarah doesn’t like to hit my face. She hardly ever does, only if she really has to. I plan to tell Aaron how she’s never slapped my face.

  ‘Where, Aaron?’

  ‘Proverbs, Chapter 22:15,’ he whispers, the blood moving and painting his lips like gooey lipstick.

  My grandfather walks to behind the bookshelf and returns carrying a thick leather belt. He reaches into Aaron’s hand and removes the candies. ‘What else does Proverbs say, Aaron?’

  Aaron swallows loudly. ‘Withhold not correction from the child’––his voice is soft but clear–– ‘for if, thou beatest him with the rod, he shall not die. 23:13.’

  My grandfather reaches out for Aaron’s stretched-out hand like he’s going to shake it, but he flattens it instead. Aaron’s hand stays extended. The strap folded over crashes down across it. Aaron closes his eyes and pushes his hand farther away from his body. I blink involuntarily with each hit. Sarah’s never done this to me. I hope it hurts.

  After I hear my grandfather count ‘ten’ he stops. Aaron’s outstretched hand is shaking and lined in swollen dark colors. Bright red seeps along tiny cracks in his palm like bloody canals. My grandfather’s face is as composed and as calm as before, if not more so. Aaron slowly lowers his hand. Tears roll down his face, and he blinks at them as if he were only cutting onions. It makes me mad.

  ‘Thank you, sir,’ Aaron says loudly. I squeeze my hands into fists.

  ‘You’ve been punished for stealing. What should be done about your other sins, Aaron?’ my grandfather asks him, the belt still at his side.

  ‘I need to be punished, sir,’ he whispers. I nod my head yes. ‘23:14 Thou shalt beat him with the rod and’––Aaron’s voice breaks––‘shalt deliver his soul from hell.’

  ‘Remove your clothing, Aaron.’ His foot taps quietly.

  Aaron unbuttons his shirt with his left hand. He avoids moving his right hand. He takes off his pants and underwear. He covers himself with his left hand, not touching, just in front. My grandfather nods at Aaron, and Aaron walks to his desk and leans against it on his elbows. I feel jealous that Aaron knows what to do and my grandfather doesn’t have to tell him. My grandfather steps around and behind Aaron. He takes his left hand and rests it on Aaron’s head. My grandfather’s never touched me like that. He hasn’t touched me at all.

  The belt swings up and snaps down across Aaron’s back, then across his ass. I know what that feels like. I hear Aaron whimper after each stroke. My grandfather has let go of Aaron’s head, and I’m glad. The belt cracks hard against his ass. She holds me sometimes, her hand on my thing, and it’s so nice. It slaps again on his ass. Sarah holds me while her boyfriend, any boyfriend, brings the belt down. Little flecks of saliva spray from Aaron’s mouth. But her hand is beneath me, stroking me. The strap hits against Aaron’s back again. Her hand is so soft and comforting that I don’t mind the belt, I don’t care.

  Aaron’s body raises up in response to each stroke. His skin is looking like his palm. What always ruins it, though, is my thing, growing, and then evil sinfulness takes over, then her nails . . . Aaron is crying now, he’s crying hard. Her nails dig in and rip at me, at my sinfulness. That’s when I start to feel the belt. ‘You sinful, dirty fucker,’ she had said, and it hurt so bad, but she still holds me. The belt blurs down in front of my eyes. And it’s hard, my thing, it’s hard. She holds me. He’ll hold Aaron after. She holds me and it’s hurting, but she holds me. And it feels like heaven. The beating has ended, and now I hope it’s my turn, before he holds Aaron and forgets about me and my turn.

  LIZARDS

  WE PASS OTHER boys and a few girls. They look briefly at us and turn away quickly. I walk slowly with Aaron, staring at the floor in front of us, like he does, like the other kids do. We walk down red-carpeted stairs. He sucks in breaths with each step down. His grip is so tight that my fingertips are red by the time we reach the landing. We go behind the stairs to a white-painted wood slat door. Aaron releases my hand, turns the lock, and opens it, and we stare down into blackness. He reaches in and flicks on a light. The cool smell of must and mildew wafts over us as if a fan were blowing it up. He takes my arm again and we descend gray concrete stairs. At the bottom a small wood-paneled hall faces four different doors. Aaron lifts his hand, holding mine to his face, and wipes his eyes and nose with our hands. We walk over to the door on the far right. He releases my hand and unbolts and opens the door. He flicks on the light; it flickers above us like a strobe for a few seconds. We stand staring at a raw wood box maybe four feet high and not very wide. There’s a wooden stool in front of it and a black book on top of the stool. It looks like a dog cage without the wire. The prayer box.

  A small door is latched on the front; he reaches out carefully and opens it. Inside it smells like bleach. He pulls me over to the stool. ‘Take the Bible,’ he whispers. ‘Deuteronomy,’ he says. ‘32:22.’

  ‘What?’ Our voices sound spooky in the dead silence around us.

  ‘Here.’ He takes the book, thumbs some pages. The book shakes in his hand. He points at some words and hands it back to me. ‘You can read, right?’ I nod. He points at a paragraph. ‘We start here,’ he whispers. He wipes his face against his shoulder and turns his back on me. A wet spot marks where he pointed. He lowers his pants and then steps out of them; the skin of his upper thighs is red and swollen like a blister. ‘I’ll say it till time, OK, you make sure it’s right, OK?’ He sucks up snot. ‘You can tell him how many times I mess up. I don’t care, OK?’

  ‘OK,’ I say to the cracks in the cement floor.

  He takes my hand and pulls me close to the box opening. He climbs inside, still clasping my hand. He lets out a few gasps, and I feel sick. His hand is wet, and I’m afraid he’ll take me into the dark, chlorine-smelling box. He’s kneeling in the box. That’s all there’s room for. ‘Close the door and lock it,’ he says. I start to close it, and it hits against his hand stretched out behind his back, still clutching my hand. He turns and looks at me, his face like a surprised, big-eyed animal in the shadows. He had looked so old to me, but now he looks like a kid younger than me. He presses his lips together, eyes wide and blinking at me. He starts to slide his hand out of mine, but I hold on to it tightly. Suddenly I don’t want to let go. He looks at me with sad, determined eyes, and his hand slips from my grasp. ‘Close the door, lock it,’ he whispers. I do.

  ‘For a fire is kindled in mine anger,’ Aaron says from inside the box, his voice muffled but clear ‘. . . and shall burn unto the lowest hell.’ I wipe my hand dry on my pants and sit on the stool. ‘. . . shall consume the earth with her increase . . .’ I notice little airholes on the side of the box at the bottom. ‘. . . and set on fire the foundations of the mountains . . .’ There’s a framed picture of Christ on the wood-paneled wall. ‘. . . I will heap mischiefs upon them . . .’ Jesus is not on the cross. He looks like he’s in a good mood, friendly, almost smiling. ‘. . . they shall be burnt with hunger, and devoured with burning heat . . .’ There’s a black bug crawling slowly toward my foot. ‘. . . and with bitter destruction . . .’ I wait till it’s close enough, and I raise the Bible over it. ‘. . . I will also send the teeth of beasts upon them . . .’ It suddenly curls up tight into a little ball. ‘. . . with the poison . . .’ I stand up and slam the balled-up bug as hard as I can with the book. Aaron pauses slightly, then continues. ‘. .
. of serpents of the dust. For a fire is kindled . . .’ I sit on the stool and try to find the place Aaron showed me. ‘. . . in mine anger . . .’ I kick the squished bug under the box.

  Some time before my grandmother opens the door of the room we’re in, Aaron stops reciting. I only hear him whispering to himself and moaning. He doesn’t answer me when I try to talk to him. I think about opening the door, but I’m afraid he’s been taken down to a fiery furnace, and a wild hell dog is in his place, waiting for me. I start reciting because I know the chapter by heart now. He says nothing, only whines like a dog.

  When I hear footsteps coming down the stairs, I grab the Bible I had put up against the box door to try to seal the evil inside of it, like in vampire movies.

  ‘Someone’s coming,’ I whisper to warn whatever’s in there. My grandmother steps into the room, and I feel relieved but still frightened. I clutch my book up to my face like I’m reading it.

  ‘It’s been one hour,’ she says, her lips set in a disappointed line. She knocks on the wood roof of the box. ‘Up to a bath,’ she announces.

  ‘How many mistakes did he make, Jeremiah?’ She doesn’t look at me. She leans over and unlocks the door to the box. I hear Aaron moving inside. The door pushes open with a long creak. I hold my breath. ‘Jeremiah!’ she snaps.

  ‘None, he made none,’ I whisper, and stare at the black hole in the box.

  ‘Your mother never taught you your Bible, did she.’ She shakes her head as a foot, then a leg sheened with sweat, appears. ‘Come on, Aaron.’ She knocks on the box. Aaron’s other leg pushes out and then the rest of him. He sits hunched over in front of the box. ‘Aaron, I have chores to get done,’ she says impatiently. He reaches up to my stool, I give him my hand, he grabs it tight and pulls himself up. He stands shaking. His knees and the fronts of his calves are pocked with little deep round red craters. ‘Upstairs.’ She turns and walks out of the room. Aaron takes wobbly baby steps behind her, wincing at the light. Little brownish green round things fall away from him. She switches off the light, and they walk into the next room. I stare at the open mouthlike hole in the box. I drop down and reach into the floor of the box and grab. ‘Jeremiah,’ my grandmother calls. I run out and catch up with them on the steps. Aaron’s walking like a cripple. My grandmother rushes him with clicks from her tongue. I lean behind Aaron’s shadow and open my hand in the fluorescent light of the staircase. I roll around in my palm little round peas, hard little round peas.