Free Sleeping Tigers by Holly Robinson Page B

mother for the ironing board and iron. Peter changed his clothes, stuffed his wet things into the dryer and then stood in the kitchen to iron his money, bill after bill of it, until the green rectangles were smooth and dry and warm on the kitchen counters, laid end-to-end like an enormous chain of green chewing gum wrappers.
    “Peter was a little compulsive,” I admitted now. “But he kept me organized.”
    Cam rolled his eyes. “You need somebody to help you jump fences and whistle in the dark, Jojo, not keep you confined to your safe little sawdust cage,” he said. We sipped our coffee in silence for a minute. Then Cam finally asked, “So what’s with the ‘rents? Is Mom still up to her eyeballs in handicrafts?”
    “She’s onto crocheting now.”
    “What, like afghans?”
    “And hats. Lampshades. Toilet paper covers.”
    “You’re shitting me.”
    “Nope. Cows, Santas, the Virgin Mary, fleecy lambs with pink tongues. They’re amazing, really. You’d never guess there was a roll of toilet paper under them.”
    Cam cracked up, tipping his head back. “Amazing? Yeah, Jordy, that’s one word for it. Jesus. And how about Dad? Still mowing down the roses?”
    “He took a pretty good chunk out of the big lilac bush the day before I left.”
    We were both laughing hard by now. Dad had mowed the lawn every Saturday for thirty years, even on the weekend after his hernia operation. Four years ago, everyone in the family–even Cam, though minimally–had chipped in to buy him a riding mower for his fiftieth birthday. Our father had kept it buffed and shining: Dad’s chariot, we called it. Unfortunately, the mower had more horsepower than our tiny yard could withstand. So far, Dad had flattened the knee-high boxwood hedge, Mom’s flowerbeds, a neighbor boy’s bike, and even the mailbox. It was like launching a speedboat in a duck pond.
    “Can you believe our gene pool?” Cam shook his head. “There’s Mom, vacuuming up sandwich crumbs around our lunch plates, always in her pearls, like June Cleaver on Speed. And then there’s Dad in his recliner, soaking up Fox News. Christ, Jordan. Remember that time on the town common? Our perfect All-American Fourth of July picnic?”
    I had just taken a sip of coffee. Now I laughed and snorted the coffee up my nose. I’d nearly forgotten about that. My father had become increasingly patriotic through the years, obsessed with war because he hadn’t served in Vietnam. During that Fourth of July picnic, Dad spotted a trio of young men lounging on a blanket made of American flags. Without warning, he had risen from our family blanket and stormed the group, my mother shrieking after him to stop.
    “Those guys scattered like pigeons, didn’t they?” I gasped. “It was horrible. Dad was out of his mind.”
    “He always was a pissy drunk. Mean as a snake,” Cam reflected.
    “At least he eventually quit,” I reminded him. “AA or not, that must have taken guts.”
    “Jesus, Jordy!” Cam shook his head. “Why do you always defend the guy? He was a bastard. Dad quit drinking only because his doctor said his liver was blowing up like a balloon. So what if he lost his job? Lots of people don’t have jobs, and they don’t take it out on their kids.”
    I flicked my brother’s wrist with two fingers hard enough to sting. “You’re never going to forgive Dad for being human, are you, Cam? Even if he’s the guy who always found a way to keep food on the table and a roof over our heads? Even if he’s the one who taught you how to ride a bike and throw a ball? He drank and he made mistakes. He wants to apologize to you for that, if you’d ever let him.”
    Cam snorted. “Oh, really?”
    “Yes, really! He keeps telling me so. And maybe you don’t want that, but Cam, if you hang onto this kind of anger, you’ll die with it eating a hole in your heart.”
    Cam poked a finger into his own chest. “What’s that you say? A hole in my heart? And here I thought it was