Fault

Part 12

About a year ago, I was at Cal's apartment doing homework with him after school. The place was way too small for a family of four, but they made it work. Both of his parents had jobs, his dad even taking on two, and yet they did their best to keep tabs on their sons. Cal's little brother, Jack, was supposed to be cleaning his side of their room. Instead it sounded suspiciously like he was jumping on the bed. Being that the kid was only six, it didn't surprise either of us.

"I'll finish this problem and go tell him to cut it out," Cal said.

"It's not bothering me," I smiled.

"Yeah, but guess who gets in trouble if it's still a mess when my mom gets home?"

Then there was a boom so startling that Cal's pencil scratched a deep line across his paper. I'm not sure if he knew the sound, but I did. It was the sound of a person hitting the floor.

We pushed back our chairs and almost knocked each other over in the hurry to get to the bedroom. Cal got there first, throwing the door open hard enough for the knob to dent the plaster where it slammed the wall. Jack was on his right side, eyes open, stunned. We rushed to him, each taking a side.

"Jack?" Cal asked.

At the sound of his name, Jack's face crinkled up and the tears started flying. We turned him so he could sit up and I noticed he was clutching his right wrist.

"Did you hurt your wrist?" I asked him, but he was too far gone to focus on anything other than how hard he was crying. I lifted his arm gently and tried to get a good look at his wrist without touching it. Right away I could tell something wasn't right. It looked like there was an unnatural bend and when I pressed my fingers too close to it Jack shrieked.

"You have to call your mom," I told Cal. "I think this is broken."

Cal was on his feet immediately, running back to the living room to get the phone. Jack's face was red and soaked and I couldn't help but remember the time my mom had fallen out of her own bed, breaking her elbow. I was in the middle of health class at the time and we'd done the chapter about broken bones only two weeks before. Reading out of the health book like it was the bible and I was at a pulpit, I managed to keep my mom's elbow stable and the swelling down until the paramedics arrived. My mom flirted with the doctor so he wouldn't question her alcohol level. I grabbed Jack's pillow off the bed and had him set his arm down on it gently.

"I have to raise your arm, Jack," I said, guiding him.

I sat on the bed and he whimpered as I lifted the pillow up to set it on my lap. His sobs were subsiding, but he was left shuddering in the wake. Cal returned with a plastic bag full of ice and held his brother while I softly placed the bag on his wrist.

Cal watched me as I made sure Jack's arm was immobile and as comfortable as it could be under the ice. He didn't need to ask how I knew what to do so quickly. The look in his eyes told me he had a pretty good idea.