Half Brother

by Kenneth Oppel

“Yeah it was!” I said. “If I heard Mom screaming I’d try to help her.” I left Dad out of my example on purpose.

  He started to say something, then shook his head. “Ryan’s going to be in the hospital overnight. Zan’s bite went all the way to the bone. The doctor said if it had gone just a bit deeper he would’ve lost the tip of his finger. As it is, Ryan’s got an IV full of antibiotics in his arm to prevent an infection.”

  “Will there be any permanent damage?” Mom asked.

  “Just the scar,” said Dad. “We’re lucky he’s not suing us.”

  “Thank God,” murmured Mom.

  “But he is quitting,” said Dad.

  “Good!” I said. “He didn’t care about Zan.”

  “Ryan’s one of my best students,” Dad said. “He was methodical and rigorous and he was an asset to the team.”

  I shrugged.

  “You’re off the project, Ben.”

  It was like being punched in the centre of the chest. My body suddenly felt airless. “Why?” I gasped, like some little kid.

  “Your attachment to Zan’s getting in the way.”

  “But … you said I was good with him—”

  “It’s too emotional for you now,” said Dad. “Probably it was never the greatest idea. That was my fault. Having my own son as one of the assistants—it throws the reliability of the data into question. I’m sorry, Ben, but it’s not in the best interests of the project.”

  “What about my interests?” I shouted. “What about Zan’s? We want to spend time together!”

  “You’ll still see Zan, evenings and Sundays,” Mom pointed out.

  “Frankly, you could use the extra time for your own school work,” Dad added.

  I just stared at both of them, and no words came, just the drumbeat of my heart. When words finally did come, they were stupid and childish, but out they rushed.

  “You are so mean,” I yelled, and burst into tears.

  Mom tried to hug me, but I didn’t want her touching me and trying to make me feel better, so I pushed past her and ran upstairs to my room.

  I felt crappy all Saturday, so I stayed in bed reading, watching TV, and thinking about Jennifer. Sometimes I stood at the bedroom window and looked at Zan in the backyard with the students. Mom tried to be really nice to me, but Dad didn’t talk to me much. He was in a really bad mood because a reporter from the local paper had called this morning to ask about the biting incident. Someone from the hospital must have blabbed, and now it was going to be in the papers.

  The story ran Sunday. It wasn’t a big piece, not front page or anything, but they did call it “a chimp attack.”

  “Let’s just hope it doesn’t get picked up in the nationals,” Dad said darkly.

  I didn’t have a fever any more, and even though I still felt wiped out, I wanted to be with Zan. I think he was glad to see me. We spent a lot of time just tickling and hugging. It was good to feel the squeeze of his arms around my neck, his hair warm against my cheek.

  Mom made me bundle up before I took Zan outside to play. I hid his dolls all over the backyard and tried to get him to close his eyes while I did it. He tended to peek. Then he’d scamper all round, looking for them. It was almost impossible to find hiding places he couldn’t discover in less than two seconds.

  “Hey, it’s the killer chimp,” said a voice.

  I looked over and saw Mike, with Tim Borden beside him, standing on the other side of the chain-link fence.

  “Hi, Ben,” said Tim, lifting his hand.

  “Hey,” I said warily.

  “Doesn’t look very scary,” said Mike, watching Zan as he scampered down the jungle gym and made his way to the fence.

  I went over with him. “He just bit someone’s finger,” I said. “It’s not a big deal.”

  “How do you know he doesn’t have rabies?” Mike asked. “He’s had shots.”

  Zan looked the opposite of ferocious as he stared up at Mike with his big brown eyes. He made the hug sign, but I didn’t feel like telling them what he was saying. Mike didn’t deserve it.

  “Are you still teaching him sign language?” Tim asked.

  “Oh yeah,” I said. “He knows forty signs now. He’s pretty smart.”

  “Can we come in and see him?” Tim asked.

  I remembered how gentle Tim had been with Zan whenever he’d seen him last summer, but I didn’t trust Mike. Anyway, Dad would probably freak out if he found out. He didn’t want to risk any more biting incidents.

  “Maybe another time,” I said, and felt kind of mean. I still liked Tim.

  “Fetch,” said Mike, and he lobbed a stick over the fence. It came down about five feet from Zan. Zan looked at it without much interest.

  “Geez, my dog’s smarter,” said Mike. He bent down and picked up another stick and lobbed it over, staring defiantly at me. That one landed a bit closer to us this time.

  “Careful, Mike,” said Tim.

  “Just trying to make it easy for him,” Mike said.

  Zan picked the stick up and shoved it back through the fence.

  “Good boy!” Mike said sarcastically. “Maybe you’re not so stupid.” He started poking his fingers through the chain link near Zan’s head, wiggling them and then jerking them back.

  “Come on!” said Mike. “Try it! Try to bite me!”

  Zan tried to grab Mike’s fingers, but Mike kept pulling them out of reach. Zan looked at me and signed funny.

  “Is that sign language?” said Tim. “What’s he saying?”

  “He’s saying Mike’s funny,” I told him.

  Tim laughed. “Yeah. Funny in the head, for sure.”

  Mike got bored of the finger game and picked up another stick. He chucked it high over the fence, and this time it almost hit Zan.

  “Knock it off, Mike,” I said.

  “I’m just playing with him,” Mike said. And he picked up another stick.

  Zan hooted excitedly.

  I lifted Zan into my arms and started carrying him back to the house.

  “See you, Tim,” I said.

  I was halfway across the yard when I saw a rock skitter across the grass near my feet. Then one hit me in the back. I whirled around. Mike was standing there, whipping rocks through the fence at me.

  “Don’t be a goof, Mike,” Tim was saying to him.

  “I want to play with the killer chimp!” said Mike.

  “Get lost, you idiot!” I said, and he threw another rock.

  It hit Zan in the shoulder and he gave a shriek. On his fur was a tiny bead of blood. I’d never felt such fury. It had a sound and a colour and it tasted like blood in my mouth. I slid open the patio doors and got Zan safely inside. Then I ran for the gate in the fence, flung it open, and bolted towards Mike, shouting at him.

  “Hey,” he said, kind of smirking, “hey, bad shot, okay?”

  He was way more solid than me, but I had a lot of momentum and I put my hands up and shoved him hard, sending him staggering backwards.

  “If. You. Ever. Hurt. Him. Again—you’re dead!” I shouted.

  Then he hit me in the face and I was punching him back, but it seemed like I was mostly just getting clobbered. I didn’t care. I was so mad, it felt good just to be lashing out at Mike and hurting him as best I could. Dimly I was aware of Tim telling Mike to stop, and saw him trying to push Mike away. But Mike just kept at it, his scary, calm eyes fixed on me. We were both down on the ground now, kicking and punching—and suddenly I was pulled up and Dad was there.

  “Stop it!” he shouted.

  Mike scrambled up, and the look on his face was so scary I thought he was going to have a go at Dad. Then he just turned and started walking away.

  “If I see you boys here again, I’ll call the police,” Dad told them. “Your parents’ll be hearing from me.”

  “Tim didn’t do anything,” I panted, wiping blood from my nose. I was only now starting to realize where I’d been hit. My face and chest really hurt.

  “Come on inside,” Dad
said to me, taking me by the arm.

  He’d stopped the fight, saved me from getting totally pulverized, but the weird thing was, I barely felt grateful.

  It was pretty great showing up at school on Monday with a big bruise on my face.

  “Oh my God!” Jennifer exclaimed when she saw me in homeroom. “What happened to you?”

  I shrugged nonchalantly. “Got in a fight,” and told her the story, which I’d carefully written down and revised many times in my logbook.

  Shannon, and even Jane, looked genuinely shocked.

  “That guy’s a psycho,” said Shannon. “Does it still hurt, your face?”

  Jane said sarcastically, “Yeah, Shannon, I think it probably hurts.”

  “It’s not so bad,” I said to Shannon with a smile. “I’m just glad Zan wasn’t hurt any worse.”

  “Poor you,” said Jennifer, and she touched my cheek gently.

  It was a very good day. I felt my status as dominant male couldn’t get much higher. I was a fighter. Project Jennifer was in excellent shape. If there was a grant I could apply for, I was pretty sure I’d nail it.

  When I got home from school, I went to the kitchen for a drink. In the backyard, Peter saw me and hurried inside, leaving Zan with the other student. He was grinning ear to ear.

  “Take a look,” he said, leading me into Zan’s suite.

  I walked into the playroom.

  The learning chair was gone.

  “Hey!” I exclaimed. “All right! What happened?”

  Maybe I’d been too hard on Dad. Or maybe Mom had convinced him the chair had to go.

  Peter grinned. “Your dad decided it was counterproductive.”

  I snorted. Counterproductive. That was so like Dad.

  “He was right,” said Peter. “Zan’s daily signing was way down. His behaviour was terrible. Also, I told your dad I’d quit if he didn’t get rid of it.”

  “Wow! Did you really?”

  Peter nodded. “Yup. I told him I just couldn’t keep going with the project. I said I’d be leaving at the end of the week. I don’t know if it made any difference.”

  “I bet it did,” I said. “You’re the best with Zan. He wouldn’t want to lose you.”

  “Well, he already lost Ryan, so maybe he was worried about someone else taking off. Anyway, the main thing is, that freaking chair’s gone!”

  “Thanks, Peter,” I said, and then frowned. “Would you really have quit?”

  He shook his head. “No way. And not because of the money,” he added quickly. “Not entirely, anyway.”

  “So why?”

  “I just think Zan needs as many allies as possible. People who care about him—as more than just a specimen.”

  FOURTEEN

  SUMMER

  There was no way we would’ve been invited to the party if it weren’t for David’s brother, Cal. He was on the 1st XV rugby team, and they’d just won the Howard Rees Cup this afternoon, which was a huge deal. The school always won. The main hall was filled with trophies. I think they might have lost once, back in the 1950s, but only because three of their best players had polio or something.

  It was Saturday night, second week of June, and there was a bonfire going on the beach, and lots of beer, and people with painted faces bellowing rugby chants and jumping into the lake. Most of the kids were seniors, so I hardly knew anyone. I was sitting on the sand with Jennifer, Jane, and Shannon.

  “I think we’re the only grade eights here,” I said.

  “It’s pretty cool,” said Jennifer. “This is, like, the party of the year.”

  “Some beverages?” said David and Hugh, grinning. Dripping bottles of beer dangled from their fingers.

  “My parents made me promise I wouldn’t,” said Shannon.

  “Mine too,” said Jane, and took a beer.

  “I’ll share yours,” Jennifer said to me, when I took one.

  Beer was disgusting, even worse than wine, but David and Hugh were drinking it, so I figured I had to, also.

  The shadows got deeper and more jagged. Kelly Browne appeared suddenly from the darkness and then she and Hugh disappeared together, hand in hand.

  “She’s like a vampire,” said Jane. “It’s like she wants to suck out every last ounce of his blood.”

  “Ugh,” said Jennifer.

  Then, a few minutes later, Shannon said she needed to go to the bathroom, grabbed Jane and Jennifer by the hand, and they all went off together.

  “We won’t be seeing them for several hours,” said David, slouched against a tree. “So, Tarzan. Good year for you?”

  One of the best things about private school was that it finished earlier than public school. Classes had ended yesterday. Next week was exams, then it was summer.

  “Great year,” I said. “As long as I don’t flunk finals.”

  He snorted. “You’ll be fine. But how’re you going to cope this summer without us?”

  I laughed. “What do you mean?”

  “The entire Godwin family is going to Europe, my friend.” “Are you serious? How long for?”

  He held up all five fingers of his free hand, then put down his beer and held up his thumb. “Six weeks?” I exclaimed. “Yep. They’re calling it the trip of a lifetime.”

  “Are you seeing every country or something?”

  “One every two days, I think, yeah.”

  I took a big gulp of beer. In my Project Jennifer logbook, I’d already written down a list of all the fun things we could do this summer. And I had a whole schedule drawn up of how I was going to get to second base with her. Third base wasn’t even under consideration yet. I thought it was important to set reasonable goals.

  “So you get back when?” I asked.

  “Early August.”

  “Oh man!” I said.

  “Yeah, I know.” He smirked. “Watching The Flintstones alone isn’t much fun.”

  I looked at him, wondering how much he knew. Everything, probably.

  “I need another beer,” he said, and ambled off.

  I waited for him a while, and then felt like a goof sitting all alone. Empty beer bottle clutched in my hand, I wandered along the beach, looking for Jennifer. The bonfire had burned down and the only light came from the occasional blinding flare of car headlights up in the parking lot. I nearly tripped over a couple making out. I thought I caught a glimpse of Hugh and Kelly Browne all tangled up, groping furiously. A group of people with their faces painted blue ran past me, screaming, towards the water. I kept walking until there was no one around.

  Six weeks in Europe. Jennifer hadn’t mentioned anything. Maybe she’d just found out.

  “Ben?” said someone, walking towards me.

  I squinted. It was Shannon. “Hey,” I said.

  “Oh, thank God!” She actually grabbed me and leaned her head against my shoulder. “I thought I was lost. The bathroom is a million miles away.”

  “Where’re the others?”

  “They took off. Jane said she saw a black widow outside.”

  “Hilarious.” I could see Jane doing something like that.

  As we kept walking, I realized this was the first time I’d ever talked to Shannon alone. She hardly ever talked when she was around Jane and Jennifer. Maybe Shannon was afraid of being mocked too.

  “I hope I get to meet Zan one day,” she said.

  I looked at her and smiled. “Yeah, he’s great. He’s turning one next week.”

  “It must be amazing, what you guys are doing.”

  “It’s pretty neat, yeah.”

  “This sounds stupid, but I loved those Curious George books when I was little—you know those books?” “Sure. I loved them too.”

  “I thought having a monkey as a pet would be the best thing in the world. I mean, I know Zan isn’t a monkey. Is he as naughty as George?”

  “Much naughtier sometimes.” I laughed. I always liked talking about Zan, so I told her a bit about him as we headed back towards the party.

  Jane and Jennife
r were there at our old spot with David. Hugh had returned with Kelly, both of them looking pretty rumpled.

  “You guys are such good friends,” Shannon said sarcastically to Jane and Jennifer.

  “She said there was a black widow spider!” Jennifer protested. “Someone got bitten last month—didn’t you hear about that?”

  Jane snickered into her beer bottle.

  I sat down beside Jennifer, and waited until the others were talking about something. I leaned in closer. “I can’t believe you’re going away,” I whispered.

  “Dad kind of sprang it on us,” she said.

  “Six weeks!” I said.

  She looked at me gravely. “Yes. But I will return, Tarzan, I promise.”

  And she kissed me in front of everyone.

  On June twentieth we celebrated Zan’s first birthday in the backyard. Peter was there, and lots of the other students. I’d wanted to invite David and Jennifer—it was my last chance to see them before they left for Europe—but Dad said it should just be people Zan was very familiar with; he didn’t want Zan to get overexcited. As it was, he was pretty darn excited.

  I didn’t know if he understood what was going on, but he wolfed down three huge pieces of Mom’s banana cake, had more glasses of ginger ale than was good for him, and ripped the wrapping paper off his presents with lots of hoots and shrieks.

  Mom and Dad got him a new ball, and I got him another birdfeeder that we could hang up in the backyard to attract even more birds. (Listen bird, he signed to me when he opened the box.)

  Peter got him a pair of his own sneakers, because Zan was fascinated by people’s shoes and was always pulling them off and trying them on himself.

  Dad invited the local paper, and they sent a photographer to take some pictures of Zan surrounded by all of us, singing “Happy Birthday to You” before we cut the cake. Dad figured it might undo some of the bad publicity we got after the biting incident. See, he’s adorable and no one lost a finger!

  My own birthday, ten days later, was pretty good too—much better than last year’s. This time we actually made it to Beaver Lake, leaving Zan at home with Peter. I really liked it just being the three of us. When Zan was around, all eyes, including my own, were on him. He was the star of the family, the celebrity. I wondered if I was still a bit jealous of him sometimes.