Only Child(5)

When the police told us to sit down on the benches in the church, I thought about Uncle Chip and how sad it was at his funeral. We all had to fit on the benches, and the police shouted: “Slide all the way in. Make room for everyone. Keep sliding in,” and we kept sliding in until we were all smushed together again like in the closet. There was a walkway in the middle in between the benches on the left and the benches on the right, and some police were lining up next to the benches.

My feet felt freezing cold. And I had to pee. I tried to ask the policeman next to the bench I was on if I could please go to the bathroom, but he said, “Everyone stays seated for now, champ,” so I tried to hold it and not think about how badly I had to go. But when you try to not think about something, it turns into the only thing you think about the whole time.

Nicholas was sitting close to me on my right side and still smelled like throw-up. I saw Miss Russell was sitting with some other teachers on a bench in the back, and I wished that I could sit with her. The older kids with the blood on them were in the back, too, and a lot of them were still crying. I wondered why, because even the younger kids weren’t crying anymore. Some teachers and police and the man from the church—I could tell he was from the church from the black shirt and white collar he was wearing—were talking to them and hugging them and wiping the blood off their faces with tissues.

In the front of the church was a big table and it’s a special table, called an altar. Over it was a big cross with Jesus hanging on it, like in the church where Uncle Chip’s funeral was. I tried not to look at Jesus, who had his eyes closed. I knew he was dead with nails in his hands and feet, because people actually did that to him a long time ago to kill him, even though he was a good guy and God’s son. Mommy told me that story, but I don’t remember why they did that to Jesus, and I wished he wasn’t right there in the front. It made me think of the people in the hallway and all the blood and I was starting to think maybe they were dead, too, so that means I saw dead people in real life!

Mostly everyone was quiet, and in all that quietness the POP sounds were back in my ears, like an echo coming back around from the walls of the church. I shook my head to make them go away, but they kept coming back.

    POP POP POP



I waited to see what was going to happen next. Nicholas’s nose looked red and had a snot drop hanging off it, which was gross. He kept pulling up the snot with a sniff sound, and then it came back down. Nicholas was rubbing his hands on his legs, up and down, like he was trying to dry them off, but his pants were really wet. He didn’t talk, and that was different because in school we sit across from each other at the blue table and talk all the time about stuff like Skylanders, and the FIFA soccer World Cup, and which sticker cards we want to trade at recess and on the bus later.

We started collecting the sticker cards even before the World Cup started in the summer. Our sticker books have all the players from all the teams that play in the World Cup, so we knew all about the teams by the time the games started, and it was more fun to watch like that. Nicholas only needed twenty-four more sticker cards for his book, and I needed thirty-two and we both have a super-high stack of doubles.

I whispered to Nicholas, “Did you see all the blood in the hallway? It looked real. Didn’t it look like a lot?” Nicholas shook his head yes, but still he didn’t say anything. It was like he forgot his voice at school with his jacket and his backpack. He’s weird sometimes. Just pulling up the snot drop and wiping his hands on the wet pants, so I stopped trying to talk to him and I tried not to look at the snot drop. But when I looked away, my eyes went straight to Jesus, dead on the cross, and those were the only two things my eyes kept looking at, the snot drop and Jesus. Snot drop, Jesus, snot drop, Jesus. My sticker cards and FIFA book were in my backpack still at the school, and I started to worry someone would take them.

The big door in the back of the church kept opening and closing with loud swish-squeak, swish-squeak sounds, and people kept walking in and out, mostly police and some teachers. I didn’t see Mrs. Colaris anywhere or Charlie, so they probably stayed at the school. Then parents started to come in the church, and it got busy and loud. The parents weren’t quiet like us, they were calling out names like questions again. They cried and yelled when they found their kids and tried to get to them on the benches, which was hard to do because everyone was sitting so close together. Some kids tried to climb out and started crying again when they saw their mom or dad.

Every time I heard a swish-squeak sound, I turned my head to see if it was Mommy or Daddy. I was really hoping they would come to pick me up and take me home so I could put new clothes and socks on and feel warm again.

Nicholas’s dad came. Nicholas climbed over me, and his dad lifted him over the other kids on our bench. Then he hugged him for a long time, even though that probably made the throw-up get on his shirt, too.

Finally, the door opened again with another swish-squeak and Mommy walked in. I stood up so she could see me, and then I got embarrassed because Mommy came running over and called me “my baby” in front of all the kids. I climbed over the other kids to get to her, and she grabbed me and rocked me and she was cold and wet from the rain outside.

Then Mommy started to look around and said, “Zach, where’s your brother?”





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    Where’s Your Brother?