Growing Pains
Category C: Highly Commended (2024) Monash Short Story Writing Competition
Author: Karen Sargent
The setting sun, a bright orange disc, was highlighting the crisp snow peaks lining the ridge. Marla marveled at the scene from the kitchen window, knowing she would never tire of it. Her eyes were drawn to the three weary figures making their way along the gravel driveway. Seven-year-old Tom looked far too small for the canvas pack clamped upon his back, but she could see that his father’s hand was also gently placed there, encouraging him forward. They were talking together, Tom’s little round face serious. Nine-year-old Rory was several paces behind them, looking sullen. Marla sighed. Something had obviously happened out there, on a day that had been planned with brotherly bonding in mind, an optimistic tonic to the strain that had fallen between them lately. Her husband had hoped that a day’s easy hiking in the freshly fallen snow would brighten the mood. It didn’t seem as if that had been accomplished entirely, but she’d wait to hear his side of things. She heard them all enter the mudroom, and then the clumping sounds of damp bags and boots being dropped onto the floor, and the more muffled noises of jackets being peeled off and placed upon the bench. There was no conversation now. The young boys moved through the house and up the oak staircase to their shared bedroom. Simon came into the kitchen, kissing Marla as she turned from the sink, running water for the saucepan she was holding.
‘You’re later than I thought you would be,’ Marla said. ‘Everything alright?’ She looked at her husband to confirm this, noting his heavy shoulders. He sat on one of the bar stools at the kitchen bench and carefully smiled at her.
‘Better than they were. Sorry, we got held up.’ Simon nodded in the direction of the boys’ room. ‘Give them a minute, they’ll come good.’
He was betting on the foundations that he and Marla had provided for their sons, instilling in them, from the time they were very young, the same core values: do the right thing by your brother; be respectful to your parents; mind your manners in company. They were essentially good boys, something friends had often told them when they spent time with the family. This validation of their efforts was something they leaned on in times like this.
Simon watched his wife light the gas and place a series of pots on the stovetop, and soon the smell of wholesome flavours began to fill the room. He wondered how many evenings he had witnessed this familiar routine, like a steady heartbeat to their lives. They had been married for eleven years, and together for almost three prior to that, so there had been many during that time. Marla, a born cook, enjoyed having hours to herself in the kitchen, ‘conjuring nourishment for my men’, she liked to say. It was her happy place.
Marla continued preparing dinner, letting Simon gather his thoughts and his energy. She liked this part of their day too, when they mulled over the things that concerned them both. They could hear quiet murmurs from their boys, and were soothed into feeling that things were settling down between them, the passing of time helping to mend whatever had been broken. The wood stove from the adjoining living-room was gently emitting heat. Simon felt sleepy, content, but roused himself from his seat.
‘I’ll put the boys’ packs in the barn,’ he said, ‘and then I’ll pour you a drink and catch you up to speed.’ Marla smiled at him in response.
It was biting outside, now that the sun had set. It would snow later. Simon trekked to the barn and slid open the solid door. The earthy smells greeting him, hessian sacks stuffed with home-grown vegetables, herbs drying on hooks from the ceiling, bales of hay, as well as the underlying tang of engine fuel, filled him with a strong sense of home, as they always did. This familiar space grounded him. Despite the fact that the afternoon hadn’t turned out as successfully as he’d hoped, he felt at ease. He placed the backpacks onto their assigned pegs, and also deposited the gun he had taken with him back into its position in the gun cabinet. So far, he’d never had to use it on a hike, and he hoped he never would, but he was always grateful for its presence when he went into the woods, particularly when his sons went with him.
When he returned to the house, Rory and Tom were sitting on the floor of the living-room, setting up a board game, keenly choosing their playing tokens. A sword for Rory, a dog for Tom. Whatever tension had been between them had blown over. Simon gently tussled Rory’s hair, signaling to his son that he knew he was playing the role of the older brother graciously, and was proud of him.
In the kitchen, over fruity, dry wine, Simon conveyed the events to his wife, turning every now and then to see if the boys were listening, but they were too immersed in their game to take notice of what their parents were saying. Their young voices rose and fell with the rolling of the dice.
The day had been a pleasant one, until the trio were on their way home. They had reached the gully where a birch tree had fallen in recent weeks, creating a low gangly bridge over a slow-running stream with its trunk. Simon carefully walked over on it first, checking the safety for his sons. He could sense Tom trailing along behind him.
‘Tom had almost made it to the other side,’ Simon explained, ‘when he stopped and looked back at Rory, who was just beginning to make the crossing. Rory was balancing, arms out like a tightrope walker, lost in his own world. Then he looked up, and saw Tom looking at him.’
Simon stopped, replaying the next part in his mind before relaying it all to Marla. Tom was facing away from him, so Simon couldn’t see the expression on his face, but like a sudden wind shift, everything changed in an instant. Rory charged across the log to get to his younger brother, his crazed momentum holding him steady and upright. Tom shrieked, scrambling to get to land before Rory got to him. But Rory caught him, and shoved him, hard, onto the ground. Fortunately, Tom landed on a soft part of his backpack, and apart from being slightly winded, and shocked, wasn’t otherwise injured.
Simon took a sip of wine before resuming the story.
‘This is the part that really alarmed me. Rory grabbed the shoulder straps of Tom’s backpack and thumped him into the ground a couple of times, screaming ‘I hate you! I hate you!’ I don’t know where this behaviour came from. But I was witnessing a real-life Jekyll to Hyde moment. I’ve never seen anything like it.’
Marla stopped cooking and looked at her sons, absorbed in their game. It certainly seemed that whatever had happened by the stream had now been resolved. She thought about the heavy feeling both she and Simon had been having recently. It was hard to put a finger on exactly what was going on between the boys, but something seemed to have shifted. It certainly wasn’t worth ignoring. For now, though, they had time to talk things through, and to come up with some sort of plan to help the brothers get along. The problem, if there was one, seemed to be more Rory’s than Tom’s. Maybe it was just growing pains.
Simon conveyed how he had spoken to both his sons about what had happened, and although Rory couldn’t explain his actions, he had shaken hands with his brother as a sign of reconciliation, hopefully long-lasting. The remainder of the walk home had been slow, both boys in pensive moods.
At Marla’s call to wash their hands for dinner, Rory and Tom obediently left their game, and the talk turned to the adventures of the hike. Home-baked rolls and a dish of steaming potatoes were passed around the dining-room table, as Marla heard only happy accounts. There was no mention of the incident on the log from either son, and both she and Simon were happy not to bring it to light once more. The boys excitedly relayed the story of the small deer, appearing in front of them through the trees as if by magic. The creature had paused to gaze upon them before slowly continuing out of sight. They shared their confusion at the strange rustling in the tall trees which turned out to be a pair of birds, hawks they thought, making a great noise building a nest. They had seen fish in the river, and Rory had almost caught one in his bare hands. Both laughed as they described how it had flapped about manically, as if being pulled by invisible strings.
Soon the boys were yawning, and off to bed. Marla kissed them goodnight, and turned out their bedside lights.
‘See you in the morning, my little men,’ she whispered as she closed the bedroom door, darkness wrapping around the sleepy figures.
In the middle of the night, Tom woke suddenly. The bedroom was icy. A slight wave of curtain movement by his brother’s bed indicated that the window was open. Tom half sat up and leaned on his elbows, ready to call out to Rory to close it, but he could see then that his brother’s bed was empty. His focus shifted to the floor, where Rory kept a flashlight, and it was gone too. His moccasins as well. What was he doing? Curious, Tom climbed out of his own bed, and onto his brother’s, to shut the window. It was gently snowing outside. He thought he could trace a set of footprints leading away from the house to the barn. When he looked towards the barn, he could just make out a faint light inside, flickering as if in a draught, sometimes disappearing altogether. Was that where Rory had gone?
Tom grabbed his own torch, quietly descended the stairs to the mudroom, and collected his boots and hooded jacket. He was not going to miss out on the fun.
Inside the barn, Rory played with the cigarette lighter. He was careful with it, aware of all the things that could burn so easily here. He wondered what it was like to smoke. He had one mate who did already, and he knew that the older brothers of several other friends smoked. It was a bad thing he knew, but he could imagine in a few years’ time trying it for himself. His thoughts turned to the clues he’d left behind for Tom, and he wondered if they had been too obscure. He decided he’d flick the lighter three more times, then return to bed if nothing happened. With that thought, the barn door rattled softly, and there stood his little brother, sleepy-eyed, and slightly panting with the effort of opening the heavy door.
When Tom recognised Rory sitting on a hay bale, he turned off his torch, the darkness enveloping him. He didn’t feel afraid. A flutter of hope rippled inside him in anticipation of being included in his big brother’s secret.
‘What are you up to?’ Tom murmured, more yawn than words.
Rory did not speak in response. With slow, careful movements, he placed the lighter in his pocket, and took out the gun he had been concealing beneath his jacket, aiming it at the small figure framed in the doorway.
He fired.