Mutations

September 7-8, 2002

September 7-8, 2002

Matthew and me were playing hide-and-seek, I was only seven, Matthew was fifteen. My parents were having some special dinner and I think they were paying him to watch me. He was counting I ran out to the pine tree we had in the backyard. There was a row of branches about two feet apart going up the trunk of the tree, like on every other pine tree. The first row of branches was close enough to the ground that I could just step on to it. The second row was at the height of my shoulders. I'm not very tall now, I wasn't tall at all then. I pulled myself up and sat on the second row of branches. I kept climbing higher and higher until I was over an area of branches dad had cleared for Matthew when he was younger. My dad told me he would sit under the tree for hours playing. It was his fort.

"Ready or not here I come!" I heard Matthew yell. I was standing in the tree for a good ten minutes and my feet started to hurt from standing, Matthew was on the side of the house looking in bushes so I slowly started sitting down on one of the branches. I guess I wasn't watching which branch I picked to sit down on because once I sat down there was a big CRACK! And I fell out of. I scraped my face on the branch next to the branch I was siting on. My arms were flailing trying to grab anything I could not to fall, but there was nothing to grab. I landed face down my right arm was under my body. I could hear a snap when I hit. I screamed and started crying. The scrape on my face was burning from the dirt and mud my head was leaning on. Matthew came running over to me. He rolled me onto my back and helped me sit up.

"What happened?" he asked me, he softly brushed some of the dirt off my face. Matthew has always been gentle with younger kids.

"I... f-f-fell out of t-t-the t-tree," I said sobbing. He just looked at me and brushed the hair out my eye. He looked at my arm too. I think he knew it was broken he just didn't want to scare me.

"It's gonna be okay, buddy," he said. "Come on let's go get you cleaned up." He must have known that I didn't want to walk because he picked me up. He carried me into the house trying to be as quiet as possible because my mom would have been pissed at him if he interrupted her special dinner. We went into the upstairs bathroom, he set me down on the counter and closed the door behind him.

"Which arm hurts?" he asked me. I looked at my hands and made the letter "L" with my pointer finger and thumb on both hands. It hurt really bad to move the one with the backwards letter "L" so it must be my right arm.

"R-r-right," I half sob. My crying has slowed down, Matthew had leaned my head into his chest to muffle the crying while we were in the hallway.

"I have to take off your shirt, okay?" He said and I nodded. He took my left arm out of my blue superman shirt first. Then he pulled it over my head, he moved it as smoothly as he could over my right arm and it still hurt. There was a scrape and a couple scratches on my chest and stomach from my landing. He got a wash cloth from the cabinet from under the sink, he wet it and put a little soap on it. It stung when he wiped my face off, over the scrape, but I knew he was doing the right thing. Then he wiped the dried mud off my arm and the dirt off my chest. Occasionally rinsing the washcloth out and putting more soap on it. My right arm had a lot of mud on it, I didn't want Matthew to touch it, even with how gentle Matthew was to me.

"Okay, buddy, if you let me wash your arm I'll go out and buy you a bunch of candy, how does that sound?" He bribed me and I took it. First he pulled off all the bigger chunks of mud which didn't hurt much. Then he gently brushed the wash cloth over my arm, it sort of hurt but not really. He put the wash cloth down on my arm and added some pressure. I had stopped crying, but after that I was crying again.

"Stop!" I half yelled half sobbed, pushing him away. He probably felt bad for hurting me, he looked like he was about to cry to but he didn't. He just came over to me and hugged me.

"It's okay, you're okay. I won't do that again, okay?" I nodded and hugged him back. I heard someone stomping down the hallway to the bottom of the stairs. Matthew let go of me and looked out the door.

"Matthew!" It was my mom. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

"What?" He yelled back, he pushed the hair out of my eyes again. At the time my hair was more of a dirty blonde.

"Get your f..." My mom yelled but I didn't hear all of it because Matthew covered my ears.

"No! I'm helping James!" He yelled. My mom is one person who hated to get no for an answer.

"No?" She asked and stomped up the stairs. Now she was standing in the doorway to the bathroom. She had a long red dress on, it had jewels at the top. She also had a ton of make up on. Her hair was straightened and pushed behind her shoulders. Then she took one good look at me. "What the hell did you do to my son?"

"He fell out of a tree," Matthew said. Turning towards her.

"Why did this interrupt this vary important dinner?" she asked, she was just trying to make him feel bad.

"Do you care what happened to him? His arm is broken and you're lecturing me about interrupting your dinner?" He yelled at her. The only reason she could have this dinner is because dad wasn't home, he was on some business trip.

"I'll take him to the hospital tomorrow," she said and turned to go back down stairs. Matthew wasn't going to let that happen. He followed her.

"You don't even take care of James, dad and me do. And what do you do? You get fucking drunk every other night!" I had never heard Matthew use language like that before. She just ignored him and went back down stairs. He came back over to me and gave me a hug. My crying was almost stopped again. "I'm really sorry you had to hear that, buddy."

My jeans had a rip in them at the knee there was blood on the jeans around the cut. I let him take my jeans off too. I didn't care if he saw me just in my underwear, he's my older brother. After he cleaned the cut and all the dirt off my legs. He told me he should wash my hair since he washed the rest of my body. I didn't disagree with him because I thought he was right all the time unless it was hurting me. He filled the bath tub with warm water and I got in. I hesitated at first because I was a little shy about being naked in front of my brother, but he said he was only going to wash my wait then I could get out.

Matthew put shampoo on his hand and spread it out in my hair. Then he poured water over my head and rinsed all the soap out of my hair. He wrapped me in a white towel after he drained the water and I got out. He carried me to my room and helped me put on my pajamas, it hurt less to put the shirt on then take it off.

"Do you want to spend the night in my room tonight?" He asked me. I nodded then he carried me to his room. He really didn't need to carry me his room is just across the hall. Matthew only let me sleep in his room when I was sick or I had a nightmare. I liked spending the night in his room, he always made me feel safer. He sat me down on his queen size bed and I got under the covers. He took off his shoes, socks, shirt and jeans then put on a white t-shirt and got on the bed with me. He turned off his lamp and rolled on his side facing me.

"Matthew?" I asked.

"Buddy?" He replied.

"I love you."

"Love you too, buddy," he said then mess up my hair, "Now go to sleep." And I did.

The next morning my arm was throbbing and Matthew made my mom dive us to the hospital. The doctor was really nice, he let me pick what color cast I wanted for my arm, I picked blue. But right now I don't have a nice doctor or Matthew to take car of me I'm all alone not able to move on a cold concrete floor.