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HOLDING ROPES AND HERO brOTHERS

Lizzie

OCTOBER 15, 1998

A FTER THE DOCTORS CHANGED MY MEDICINE AGAIN , I DIDN’T FEEL PANICKED ANY more. In fact, I didn’t feel anything at all. I went through the motions at school and home, content in a hazed numbness.

No scary lady.

No monster under my bed.

Nothing at all.

Focusing was difficult because all I wanted to do was sleep, and I found myself zoning out a lot during class.

Mam told me that the fog would soon wear off and I would go back to normal again, but I wasn’t sure what that looked like. Not when I couldn’t remember a point in time when I had been me.

The only time I truly felt anything was when I was with Hugh. He seemed to be the only person capable of kick-starting my emotions, and boy did they kick-start when he was around.

The me without chemicals, that was.

Exhausted by the time Thursday came around, I offered to hold the skipping rope for my friends at big lunch. I didn’t have the energy to engage further. Right now, holding the rope was the best I could do.

“Cinderella dressed in yellow went upstairs to kiss her fella, by mistake she kissed a snake, how many doctors will it take,” the girls around me all chanted, while I held one end of the jump rope and Marybeth held the other. Between us, Claire jumped over every loop like a superstar. “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten…”

Claire was the best jumper at school, even better than the older girls, and I knew she could go all lunch break without missing a skip. She reminded me of the bunny rabbit on the television commercial for batteries, except Claire didn’t need batteries to charge her up, just sunshine.

“England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, inside, outside, puppy-dog tails!” another group chanted across the schoolyard, while two girls stretched the elastic with their legs and another jumped and weaved between it as fast as she could without touching the elastic.

They were loud.

Everyone was so loud .

Behind me, I could hear another game taking placing.

“Orange balls, orange balls, here we go again, the last one to touch the ground has a boyfriend!”

Hands trembling, I closed my eyes and took a steadying breath.

“A sailor went to sea, sea, sea, to see what he could see, see, see, but all that he could see, see, see was the bottom of the big blue sea, sea, sea.”

It was too much.

All of it.

“You’re messing up,” someone declared before snatching the rope out of my hand. “Move, Lizzie, I’ll swing the rope.”

Feeling overly stimulated, I backed away from the skipping rope, only to be intercepted by another girl from my class.

“Come on, Lizzie,” Cadence encouraged, holding her palms up expectantly. “Play the clapping game with me. You know the pattern.”

I did know the pattern, or at least I was supposed to know, but right now I couldn’t remember. Everything was blurry in my head.

“Backwards, forwards, clap right, clap left, clap, clap,” Cadence chanted, clapping her hands against mine. “Come on, Lizzie, you’re not even trying.”

“Sorry, I need to use the bathroom,” I mumbled, hurrying away from the yard.

I didn’t.

I just needed some quiet .

The louder the noise grew, the more disorientated I became.

I already knew that.

I’d learned it a long time ago.

Find Shannon , the kind voice in my mind instructed, she makes it go quiet for you .

She didn’t want to play in the yard at lunch today, so I thought she might be still in class, but when I checked our classroom, it was empty.

Returning to the schoolyard, I searched the playground for my friend before heading down to the big field, a.k.a. the pitch.

As usual, the fifth and sixth class boys were on the pitch, kicking the living daylights out of each other under the pretense of hurling.

I didn’t care about them.

My whole focus was on the small girl crying on the sidelines.

Shannon .

She was holding her school jumper in her hands and sobbing inconsolably, while her big brother comforted her.

I felt something then, a lurching sensation in my chest, as I took in the sight of her torn jumper.

Anger . That’s what I was feeling, and it was bubbling inside of my stomach, growing hotter with every tear that spilled from her eyes.

When Joey whipped his own jumper off and placed it over her head, I felt another wave of emotion hit me.

Sadness.

Because his jumper wasn’t in much better condition than hers. But at least it hadn’t been torn to ribbons by bullies. The move left my friend swamped in an oversized jumper that fell to her knees, while her brother perished in his creased, white school shirt that had seen better days.

In fact, the cuffs seemed so old, they were practically worn off and barely reached his forearms. Oblivious to the fact that his shirt was about three sizes too small for him, Joey Lynch rolled what was left of the sleeves up to his elbows before ruffling his sister’s hair and offering her a warm smile.

It wasn’t raining today, but the cold October breeze was skinning, and I knew he had to be freezing.

So why did he do it?

Why did he give her something he didn’t have to spare?

I didn’t have the answer, but his selfless gesture sparked something inside of me, and I made a mental note to sneak my spare jumper into school for Shannon tomorrow.

At least that way, her brother wouldn’t be cold.

When I got to school on Friday, I waited for the perfect opportunity to catch Joey Lynch on his own.

It wasn’t easy because, unlike Shannon, everyone seemed to flock to him. It didn’t matter that they feared him. They still wanted to be around him.

I understood that he had something mysterious about him that made people want to get closer, but I thought his sister was even more mysterious.

To me, at least.

My opportunity arrived near the end of the day, when Ciara Maloney hit Shannon on the back with a blackboard duster, and I, in turn, hit Ciara in the face with my fist.

Of course, I was told to pack up my belongings and sit on the bench in the hall until school was over. This was nothing out of the ordinary for me. I spent a lot of time on the bench, but today, I had a companion, and just by happenstance, that companion was Joey Lynch.

Again, this wasn’t out of the ordinary because he spent even more time than I did on the bench. But it was good fortune.

Shannon’s brother didn’t speak to me when I slumped down beside him. In fact, he didn’t even look in my direction. It didn’t bother me because, aside from Claire and Shannon, I never wanted anyone at school to talk to me, either.

Like yesterday, he was wearing a shirt that looked small enough to belong to Shannon, and he didn’t have a jumper. He didn’t even have a coat resting on his schoolbag to wear when school ended. No scarf, gloves, or hat either. His left runner had a tear on the side that revealed the color of his sock. Gray .

Settling my schoolbag between my legs, I unzipped it and rummaged under my books until I found what I was looking for.

Withdrawing the plastic carrier bag that contained my sister’s Sacred Heart uniform, I tossed it on his lap.

“Do I look like a bin, blondie?” he drawled in a deep, sarcastic tone.

Ignoring him, I zipped my schoolbag back up and leaned against the wall at my back, arms folded across my chest. Just like him.

“You’re Shan’s buddy, aren’t ya?” he asked then, voice not nearly as mean as before.

I turned to face him and nodded once. “Yep.”

He stared back at me with his big, green eyes. “What’s in the bag?”

“Just some spare stuff I had lying around the place.”

Frowning, he slowly opened the bag, took a glance at the contents inside, and then quickly deposited the bag onto my lap. “No thanks.”

“Take it,” I argued, grabbing the bag and tossing it back to him.

“No.”

“Why not?”

He sounded furious when he hissed, “Because I don’t want your charity.”

“It doesn’t matter if you don’t want it,” I argued back, unwilling to back down. “Because you still need it.”

He looked at me like I had slapped him. “Fuck you, kid.”

“Fuck me?” I grumbled, feeling just as outraged. “Fuck you, fucker .”

“Wow.” Joey arched a brow. “Is that the best you’ve got?”

“Not even close, fucker .” I narrowed my eyes. “Do you want to hear some more, fucker ?”

He continued to glare at me for several seconds before his lips twitched. “Jesus.” Releasing a growl, he shook his head and looked away, while muttering, “Where did my sister find you?”

I kept my frown in place when he unzipped his schoolbag and shoved the carrier bag inside, but on the inside, I was smiling.

And I think he was, too.