- Their blood runs in my veins -
As far as I remember, Crocheton and I have always been sleeping in the same room. Pendry sleeps in the room next door. As it is Sunday, sure enough, I opened my eyes at 7:30, and I saw my brother who, must I remind it, is 19 years old, I saw my brother with, in his hand, one of the rungs of the backrest of the chair, his back stuck to the wall as if he were hiding, and then he pointed with the rung of the chair as if it were a rifle. He pointed at what? Probably at the cupboard. Bang bang. He murmured “bang bang”. Just like every Sunday morning. With his hypodermic rifle he had just shot a hind or a roe-deer. He picked it up and then he carried it into a virtual enclosure in the middle of the bedroom, with the other invisible animals: gorilla, chimpanzee, gazelle…
I opened my eyes. He said to me “you want to play with me?”
I sat down in my bed. He said “if you want you can take care of the hippos.”
There are some moments in life when we almost forget that life is strange. I often spend these moments with Crocheton. If one day I have a son, I will manage to immediately have a second one. Sons are made to come in pairs. I wouldn't have liked to be an only child. It's important to have a brother.
I'm fond of my kimono pyjamas, it looks like karateka stuff. Crocheton has the same one. Crocheton asks me whether I want to make a rumble. I tell him yes. I love playing rumble with him, even if he's always the winner. Face to face we mutually introduce ourselves.
He says “I am Superman with the strength of Hulk and the speed of Flash.”
I say “I am Bruce-Lee mixed with Wolverine.”
He catches my hand and twists my wrist, I fall on my knees, I catch his calf, I pull, he falls on his ass while laughing, shhhhhhht, I think mom is coming, I can hear her steps, we jump in our beds, the door opens gently, the children are sleeping.
“Boys… “
It's crazy, the way mom says “boys”, it's crazy I think that she has always been doing that, I have the feeling I would always be 8 years old for her. It's the prettiest moment of the week. When mom enters the room to awake us by murmuring “boys”. Crocheton and I are extremely gifted at pretending to wake up. Stuck eyes and everything else. Crocheton raises a small growl. It's very realistic. Mom says softly “don't tarry too much, we are going to church.”
The yavish community counts 127 devotees who meet each Sunday morning in church. My father preaches the sermon. We are on the ringside. Mom has a flowered dress. Dad talks about the wrongdoings of the current society, of the society of unbridled sex where devil-women sell their charms by phone to irresponsible teens. Crocheton feels idiot. Me too. I have the feeling that everybody is looking at us. Dad warns the lambs against the temptations of the wolf and he says that the devil wears increasingly more attractive forms but that it is not less demoniac.
Dad entered the yavish community in his childhood. Mom is not officially registered at the community because she is mentally handicapped. That's why we don't live in the village. Crocheton, Pendry and I are not officially yavish either, as mom's blood also runs in our veins.