"Jack"

A grown man's account of the death of his little brother Jack many years before.

 

My five-year old brother Jack came running down the steps of our old Alexandria rowhouse that summer morning, where we lived with a mix of siblings and odd relatives.

 

“Bobby, where’s Mama?” he asked me. I didn’t even look up from my book.

“She’s already gone to work, Jack,” I answered in a monotone, far away in Jack London’s frozen Yukon territory.

 

Hard times had fallen on our family. My dad, David, had been having an Irish love affair with the bottle for years now, and we hadn’t seen him in weeks. Often on he would visit, usually resulting in another mouth to feed, and then disappear when the responsibilities of normal life and steady work grew too much for his weak character.

 

My mother Catherine, only thirty but overweight and already prone to bouts of depression, went out looking for work, an unsavory business for any woman in those days, and had found a job as a typist. Despite her excellent typing skills, she constantly suffered from paranoia that her work wasn’t good enough, and shuffled off to work reluctantly each morning, dressed as best as we could afford.

 

“I didn’t get a chance to say bye!” Jack screamed. He was the youngest of us, and still very much attached to Mama. “Maybe I can catch her!” he called out to me as he banged open the wooden screen door and ran to the sidewalk.

 

“Mmmhmm,” I mumbled. We kids always ran around freely back then, especially in the summer, and I sure wasn’t too concerned about my little brother running out to the front yard to wave bye to Mama. It would probably make her day anyway.

 

I had no idea I would never see my little brother alive again.

 

Witnesses told us later that Jack, looking for Mama on the street where she would’ve been walking, stopped at the intersection to look for cars. We had been told in no uncertain terms that we were never and I mean never to cross the street without looking both ways, and although cars were still relatively new-fangled at that time, they could still do a lot of damage to your body if you were hit.

 

Jack thought he was safe. He did what he had been told, just like the obedient little boy he was. All he wanted to do was say bye to his Mama, to feel her hug and give her a kiss so he could run back home and play. I suppose what happened next is, was and forever will be every mama’s nightmare.

 

Finally, Jack must’ve thought. I can cross after this truck goes by. He waited, then ran out into the street. He had no idea that the truck was carrying telephone poles, ten of them in a thick bundle which stuck out the back of the truck, just at a five-year old boy’s height.

 

He darted out into the street, straight on into that bundle of poles, which snapped his head back, instantly breaking his thin neck. He collapsed on the street to the horror of onlookers, who rushed to his side. One of our neighbors, Mrs. O’Donnell, a friend of Mama’s, screamed and fainted. It was too late. There was no pulse, nothing  but his ragged little body slumped on the street, neck twisted back at an unnatural angle. In that moment, lives and generations were changed and lost.

 

Meanwhile, Mama must have just walked through the doors of her employer, an insurance company a few blocks down from us on King Street. She settled heavily in her chair to begin another tedious day of typing letters and memos from the insurance salesmen. The call came into the main switchboard of the company.

 

“Yes, is there a Catherine Jacobs working there?” the policeman asked. He must’ve hated this part of his job, especially when it involved children. I have often wondered how one works up the courage to make a call like that, or pull up in front of someone’s house with nothing left of a loved one but maybe a coat and wallet.

 

“Just a minute,” the head secretary said as she transferred the call.

 

“Yes, this is Catherine Jacobs. How can I help you?” Mama asked, no doubt politely, in the manner of the day.

 

After a few seconds, coworkers said, her face went ashen, just like that.

 

“Oh my God!” she screamed, jumping out of her chair and heading for the door. She looked sick and faint and sweaty all at the same time, saying please God no, let it be a mistake, even though she knew it wasn’t.

 

In spite of her weight, Mama ran down the street, oblivious to the stares of onlookers, businessmen starting their day, women gossiping. Sweat pouring down her face, she rounded the corner and came upon the crowd of onlookers gathered around the small body in the street. Traffic had stopped, and police were doing their best to keep people back. Pushing her way through, she screamed and screamed and screamed.

 

“Ma’am, stop, stop, don’t look!” ordered the policeman, knowing it was futile. She had already seen him.

 

“Jack, sweetie-pie, get up, get up for Mama. Jack! Jack! Jack, everything’s gonna be ok, you hear me?” she screamed in desperation.

 

Our neighbor told me the policemen literally had to pull her off of Jack’s little body, so desperate was she to bring him back to consciousness, her sweet little boy.

 

 

 

The next few days passed in a haze of neighbors stopping by to offer their condolences in hushed whispers. Tears flowed for everyone but Mama, who sat silent in a rocking chair by the window. She talked to no one and didn’t eat. The old grandfather clock tick-tocked interminably, days masquerading as mere minutes.   The doctor told us later she’d had a nervous breakdown.

 

My Granny kept us other children quiet or turned us out into the yard, ordering us to stay there and only there. The last thing we needed, she admonished us, was another accident.

 

I remember little Jack’s funeral. It was held at St. Mary’s Catholic Church. Uncle Frank and Uncle Bernard, along with the undertaker and his assistant, carried the small casket tenderly up the aisle. Rustling paper fans and faint sobs punctuated the oppressive silence in the church, and the air was heavy with sorrow and humidity. Daddy couldn’t separate himself from the bottle long enough to attend, just one more broken promise in a litany of them. Father O’Brien said the Mass. For some reason, he stopped every so often and looked down at the cool marble floor of the altar. It was hot that day, and he kept wiping the sweat from his eyes.

 

Mama sat there like a statue, her face gray in spite of the heat. She wouldn’t talk to anyone. A black veil covered her face, and Granny sat beside her, her big body convulsing with sobs, head bowed. I sat there somberly, knowing I would never see Jack again, not really understanding why. How had it happened that one moment he was alive, lifeless the next?

 

We had decided to bury Jack in St. Mary’s cemetery. It was fitting, after all, for that little soul to rest with others of his faith. The air was still, birds singing with contradictory cheerfulness on that sad day. We were all sweating, black gloves and hats closing us in with the heat. Finally, the old priest gave the closing rites and Jack was lowered into the cool dark earth. Mama shrieked as the first shovelfuls of dirt were tossed onto the casket, and with force tried to jump into the grave with him.

 

I imagine it broke her heart to think of her little boy, once so full of life and afraid of the dark, to be left alone in perpetual darkness. Women turned away and bowed their heads, sobbing at the scene, while the men grabbed Mama and physically held her back.

 

“Jack, my baby boy! No, let me go, I want to die, he’s afraid of the dark, I have to stay with him! Let me go, please, please, I’m so sorry Jack, Mama’s here!” she cried bitterly.

 

I had never seen her like this before, and it frightened me as I stood there. Granny took me, my older brother Eddie and my younger sister Doris away. Other family members joined us in the procession out. I looked back one more time to see Mama still struggling with those trying to restrain her, and she slumped to the ground, fainting from the heat, emotion and exhaustion of it all.

 

Mama never quite recovered from Jack’s death, and the rest of the family was tainted as well. There was always an unspoken pall over the house, and sorrows came and went like the flickering of shadows. Over the years, she periodically sank into deep depressions with which we couldn’t help her. She had lost a husband to drink and a son to death, and her life was marred by the tragedies.

 

Mama died of a sudden heart attack at the age of seventy-six. She was living with my sister Doris, herself a victim of an abusive alcoholic marriage. Doris had just come in with a load of groceries and said hi to Mama, who was watching Jeopardy in her favorite chair. Doris went out to get the second bag and when she returned, Mama sat slumped in the chair, already gone to meet her Maker.

 

I always wondered if she was greeted with the smile of love and recognition by a little five-year-old boy named Jack.

 

 

 

 

 

Author's Note

Please critique honestly and with civility. Too emotional? Too mushy? Open to feedback.