My little sister was always physically stronger than me, even when we were kids. She could make it all the way across the monkey bars with just her arm strength. I could only make it halfway. I’d swing upside down to let my legs hold my weight or else fall as gracefully as I could onto the grass hill below us.
Brandi liked to come investigate whenever we fell the short distance to make sure we hadn’t hidden any treats in our pockets since our previous dismount. Silly Brandi. She thought we kept her dog treats on top of the monkey bars, I guess.
My sister was terrified of dogs back then. Even of Brandi. The barking took her focus away from swinging her second foot safely onto the ladder and she slipped. She managed to land on her bottom unhurt, her expert tumbling skills coming in useful yet again.
Brandi rushed over to smother her with kisses which scared my sister straight up a huge pine tree. She climbed up it so fast, Brandi didn’t even get in one face lick. Feeling robbed, Brandi jumped and scratched the tree bark as if she was going to climb up herself. That made my sister climb up even higher.
I coaxed Brandi outside the fence and returned to my treed sister. She was really high. Because she was so strong and so scared, she zoomed up higher than either of us had climbed before. We both screamed when the wind ramped up. Brandi didn’t know why we were screaming, but loyally added her vocal tones to our ensemble.
Powered by adrenaline and images of my sister exploding on contact with our grassy hill, I jumped and waved my arms franticly to get her attention on me. I signaled that I had locked Brandi outside the fence to prevent anymore climbing from my sister. I cupped my hands in front of my mouth and hollered up to her that she was okay and NOT to jump. She was the kind of kid that would have tried to jump, so I felt like it was important to remind her.
She was crying hard, and I could see the top of the tree shaking as much as she was. I tried climbing up after her. The old pine tree had lots of branches so at first it was easy. But my gymnast of a sister had gone past the thicker branches. I reached up and the next branch snapped off in my hand, dead. I couldn’t find a sturdier-looking branch and started to panic.
“How did you get up here? Do you remember? Can you show me?” I tried to find a path to direct her back to safety, but between her crying and my not-so-calm questioning, things weren’t going well. Also unhelpful was Brandi, wanting recognition for successfully tree-ing a person. Brandi kept barking loudly and paced the fence, wanting to continue our game. Brandi didn’t understand she scared my sister. My sister didn’t understand this monster more than double her size all stretched out just wanted a hug and for us to throw a stick. I didn’t know how to clarify to either one in the languages they understood.
I needed back up. We were supposed to play outside for a full hour before bothering our mother inside.
She was very pregnant, with my new twin siblings. It was getting close to The Due Date. She had to be monitored closely because twins are sometimes born early. Her doctor gave her a contraption to wear that looked like a bizarre belt. It had a long wire that hooked up to our landline. My mother was supposed to unhook our phone, plug in the belt, and lie down while it measured her contractions. We were not supposed to disturb her during her Contraction Contraption hour. If she moved much, it would mess up the magic belts’ transmission process and the doctor would be mad.
Brandi barked, relentless. I tried one more time to grab a branch above me. When it snapped like the other ones I had tried, I climbed down. This was above my pay grade. The doctor would just have to be mad then, I thought. My sister still shook in the treetop.
I slid the glass door open and apologized for disobeying with my interruption. My mother was laying on the couch, all hooked up.
I couldn’t see my sister from the windows in the living room and second guessed myself when my mother asked if it was a real emergency. I nervously explained it was, and returned to monitor my sister while my mother got unhooked.
My mother waddled out of the door, and in my imagination, the twins inside were sloshing and bumping into each other. I told her maybe if she laid under the tree belly-side-up, my sister could jump and bounce off my mother to safety like a trampoline. Dark and ill-timed humor spills out of me by default when I’m scared.
My mom made her way to the tree to coax my sister down. My sister must have been watching the squirrels while I was inside. She was able to jump from one limb to another all the way back to earth unharmed.
My mother went to call her doctor’s office to restart her test. For the next hour, we played inside, quietly.
We were both worn out from the whole ordeal. I sat on the heat vent on the floor of our shared room, letting my skirt bubble up.
“I’m pregnant too!” I joked, and my sister giggled. She rushed into my lap to squash the air bubble baby.
When my Paw Paw came to live with us, he moved into my old room. I joined my sister in hers. Moving into my sisters’ room meant a sister sleepover every night. It also meant unlimited floor vent privileges.
My old room didn’t have an air vent I could sit on. Fortunately, Paw Paw never noticed that missing amenity during his stay.
Photo by Todd Trapani
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