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“I think I hate myself.” Erik paused and covered his mouth as he began to shiver. “I c-can’t – I can’t go on like this much longer, Lyle.”
“No!” Lyle hugged Erik and held him close. “You do not hate yourself; and, even if you do a little bit, you love yourself too, right? And you love me.”
“Yeah,” Erik sniffled and leaned his head on Lyle’s shoulder. He had thought about it a dozen times before, when he woke up from the nightmares and could do nothing else except wander around the neighborhood barefoot. “I love you, Lyle.”
When he got tired of walking down the sidewalk and the culs-de-sac, Erik went into the garden behind the house to sit on the little bench where he went most nights to weep.
Lyle let go of Erik and stood silently, staring off into space. Erik tried to hold his hand, which startled Lyle. He let Erik hold his hand, but barely a minute had passed before he pulled it free.
“Sorry,” he said softly when he saw Erik’s wounded look. “My hands are sweaty.”
“Lyle,” Erik said abruptly, “do you believe in God?”
“Yes, of course. Don’t you?”
“Yeah,” Erik nodded. “Yeah, I do.”
“Why are you asking me this?” Lyle bit his lip and folded his arms across his chest. “Hey, do you want some ice cream?” Erik opened the refrigerator and took out a pint of Ben & Jerry's Cherry Garcia.
He got out a spoon and tried to hand it to Lyle, who shook his head and watched as Erik stood in the kitchen and ate the entire carton.
He waited until Erik had thrown the carton away and put the spoon in the sink before he repeated himself. “Erik, why did you ask me if I believe in God?”
“Oh, I don’t know…” Erik yawned nervously. “I guess because I feel like...He might punish us for what we did; like maybe He'll send us to Hell or something.”
Lyle stiffened. “Erik.” His voice was soft and stern. It was a tone he rarely used with Erik and, therefore, one his brother was unused to hearing from him. Erik gasped and visibly tensed.
“Erik,” Lyle repeated. “We did nothing wrong.” Erik’s eyes dilated and he tried to look away. Lyle took Erik’s face in both his hands and turned it to face his own. His voice was pinched and bitter.
“Did you hear me? I said we did nothing wrong. I didn’t pay a whole lot of attention in church growing up, but the guys in Bible times got up to some pretty sick, violent stuff. God Himself was pretty violent, sometimes.”
Erik started to cry. Lyle swept the tears off Erik’s cheeks with his thumb. He shook his head. “Erik, I mean it. We did nothing wrong. If anything, we did a good thing; we're free now, okay?”
Erik sniffed. “Okay.”
“Come here.” Lyle slung an arm around Erik’s shoulder and squeezed him against his side. “It’s just us now. We’re all we’ve got, Erik.”
Erik shuffled his weight slowly from one foot to the other. “Okay.” His face flushed. He had never felt so bad in his entire life.
"Hey," Lyle reached out and held Erik's hand, lacing their fingers tightly together. As Erik's breathing quickened and his eyes darted around the room, Lyle placed a reassuring hand on his back.
"Hey, focus on my voice," he said softly. "Take a deep breath. In...out.You're safe, Erik. I'm going to protect you."
With each deep, stuttering breath, Erik gradually felt his tension ease. Lyle squeezed his brother's fingers and looked up at his warped reflection in the stainless steel refrigerator.
Lyle was tall. He was fine-feautured, brown-eyed, brown-haired. His shoulders were broad. He was big-boned, and taller than José. Anyone looking at Lyle from the outside would think that he was strong, invulnerable, even.
He looked like someone who could protect himself, who could have protected Erik, who should have done so back then.