In 2009 my brother Ian went to Cameroon, which was
the farthest any of us had ever been from home. After 4 months we were all
excited for his return, especially my father.
The
night before, my father couldn’t sleep; he just baked with James Brown playing
until sunrise. When I came home from school there was a “Welcome Home” banner
draped across our living room, complete with streamers, balloons and an apple
pie, a blueberry pie, a chicken pot pie, and a pan of brownies cooling on the
table.
He thought
that Ian would come home a different man, that he would realize he didn’t like
my father anymore, or wish he’d never left Cameroon, so two hours before Ian’s
flight arrived we filed quickly and silently into the sedan, me in the back
seat, my brother Kyle driving, and my father holding a warm plate of fried
yams: a recipe he found online. Behind the car, the cat sat in the driveway;
with a sick desperation my father turned to my brother and said, “Fuck it. Run
over the cat.”
After
an hour Ian came into view, with a sun bleached beard and skin the color of
African clay. He came over to us, gave my father a hug, and said his first
words to us in four months: “Hey guys.” He yawned, hugging my father. When we
got home he gave us gifts. My father cried and we all stayed up eating
blueberry pie and popping balloons.
-JL
No comments:
Post a Comment