Bruises
My sister texted me with the news. Bruce died.
Bruce and I knew each other from the time we were babies. I think our moms knew each other before we were born. Bruce’s mom, Laura, was the nicest lady in the world. She made pies and sold them at my dad’s gas station. Bruce’s dad - Curtis - was a real character. He was almost like a mascot in our little town. Everyone knew him and loved him. He had a signature way of waving when he drove by in his truck and he coined a thousand memorable expressions. He had the hardest, strongest hands in the world. He’d grab you by the knee or shoulder and send lightning through your entire body.
As I laid in bed the other night - unable to sleep - my mind catalogued memories of Bruce. I thought of his dogs. There were two of them. In my insomniac ultra-lucidity, their names came to me easily. Now, in the artificial lights of daytime, I can’t remember the names at all. I was allergic to the small rambunctious one. The bigger one was the world’s all-time greatest fetch artist. I remember hitting superballs a mile into the woods with a baseball bat. 15 minutes later, the dog would be back with the ball, thoroughly slobbered and half-way chewed to death. Was her name Penny? It started with a P, I think.
Bruce and I bonded over all kinds of things. Bikes. Weapons. Eddie Murphy. Music. We were a two-man b-boy unit. We worked out routines to “Scorpio” by Grandmaster Flash, “Electric Kingdom” by Twilight 22 and “I Feel For You” by Chaka Khan. On the weekends, we’d go to the rollerskating rink in town and battle.
Bruce always loved animals and had a bunch of exotic pets through the years. I remember once he talked his parents into buying him a giant snake. He tried to take good care of it but it died. He was afraid to tell his parents so it laid hidden and dead under his bed for a long time.
In junior high, Bruce learned how to play the drums and he got good fast. Then he taught me. We played along to tapes. Around this time, Bruce started getting into other kinds of music like Blue Oyster Cult.
When Bruce and I hung out, it was mostly about laughs. There were a million things that only me and him thought were funny. But once in a while, he’d have a bad day. On one such day, he went around shooting everyone with his pellet gun. On a few other occasions, he came over to the park where a group of us would be playing pickup baseball or football. He had his hunting bow with him. He’d shoot an arrow straight up into the air and then run away. The rest of us scrambled for shelter, wondering if an arrow might be able to penetrate a picnic table.
After junior high, I went off to high school (there was no high school in my town). Bruce chose instead to go to vocational school and learned how to weld. We started seeing less of each other.
As we drifted apart, I’d hear stories about Bruce - that he was getting mixed up with some of the wrong people. But whenever we caught up, he seemed like the same old Bruce to me.
In later years, the stories I heard got wilder and scarier. We’d talk on the phone once every blue moon and he still seemed to be the same guy - mostly. Sometimes a crack would show it would leave me thinking maybe the stories were true.
Then, in 1996, Bruce and I ran into each other in a town far from the one we grew up in. I hadn’t seen him in years and he looked different. The night unfolded in a very strange way and after that I was scared of him. He seemed to be trapped in the version of himself that threatened people with pellets and arrows when we were kids.
After the advent of social media, I’d hear from Bruce once in a while and he always seemed to have a new life. At one point he was living on a reptile farm in Florida. At another point, he had devoted himself to falconry and would send photos with magnificent birds perched on his forearm. If there was danger or darkness in his life, he kept it hidden from me.
When I heard from Bruce in those later years, I always felt a weight bearing down on me. It felt like a ton. So many feelings. He was always the guy I rode bikes with, the guy I caught frogs with, the guy I b-boyed with. His specialty was uprocking and popping. I was more floor work and power-moves. He was Laura and Curtis’s son. We were babies. But I was afraid of him. I couldn’t shake it. And I was sad. There were questions I didn’t have the heart to ask. Did he have any friends? Was he all alone? Was he in trouble?
And then he died. After not seeing him or speaking to him in years. He was Laura and Curtis’s boy. He was a really good drummer. “Lemonade… that cool, refreshing drink…”. Snake under the bed. Brucie.
I tried to find details about the funeral, knowing I wouldn’t be able to go. I didn’t go and I’m having trouble forgiving myself. But I honor him. I’ve been thinking about him every day. I’ve been re-living memories. I see myself walking through the back entrance of his childhood home over and over again. I can smell it. He had that little red pedal car I was always so jealous of. His mom’s hugs. His dad’s laugh. The way the floor upstairs creaked. The child fire rescue sticker on his bedroom window…
Patches! That was the dog’s name! Patches. And Benji! Benji was the small one.