Brother

My name is Janeth. I had lived with my family for 15 years until the Child Protection Services of Oregon took me away. My father, Manuel and his wife Miranda (she never spoke of her maiden name) raised me from the age of 11. My mother, Arefia, divorced my father when I was 8 and moved out of the state. Before the divorce, my mother gave birth to my brother, Anthony. I remember how excited my older sisters, Maria, Eileen, and I were. We stayed at my grandmother's place in California, dancing and hopping around her expensive lake house. It was then that I first overheard of the divorce. Looking back now I should have not been so nosey growing up it, as it could have saved me a whole lot of trouble.

My father won custody over my infant brother, Anthony. I don't know much about the judicial system but from what I do know this case was most likely won by bribery. My grandma was pretty wealthy and she would pamper my father with cash every week. My father was outlandishly selfish and completely self absorbed, only I never saw that before. That's why when he sent my brother to an anonymous babysitter while my sisters and I were at school. I thought it was completely normal. Not only did Anthony just turn 2, but my father didn't even have a job at the time. He was actually picking up escorts. My sister, Eileen, and I had after school programs; her music class at the local middle school and my after school sessions with my math tutor. Maria did not have an after school program to go to, so she would have to go to the babysitter that watched my brother. My father would pick everyone up at either 5 or 6pm.

This babysitter had a weird foreign name (I believe it was Haitian) and only had 2 other clients that dropped their preteens off at her house once in a while. My sister, brother, and the woman's 4 kids were the only ones in the house. The home itself was a 2 family home, but I don't ever remember seeing anyone from the second floor. I also don't remember where my father found this woman, but I DO know that he could have gotten a professional with the money he had. But he didn't.

It had been exactly 2 months that this had been going on. One day I began to see something different about my baby brother. He was quiet and his eyes were frequently darting about. Sometimes his eyes would fixate on a certain part of the ceiling, the floor, the corner of the room, anywhere. By now he was supposed to be a well situated toddler, but to me he looked more like a paranoid animal; almost like the way our dog looked during a thunderstorm. When I tried to talk to my father about it he barely understood what I was talking about. He said his silence and awareness of his surroundings was a good thing.

A few days after our "talk", I didn't have tutoring after school and for the first time I went to the babysitter's house. It was half a mile from me and Maria's elementary school and a block away from Eileen's middle school. Although it was conveniently close to all of us it still felt like another world when I stepped on her porch. Her porch light was broken beyond repair and her front yard was desolate of any life. It was all just dirt. The woman's home seemed out of shape as well, broken windows and rusted paneling along with streaks of filth marking where the rain pipe use to be. I remember how scared I was to knock but I knew I had nowhere else to go. She opened the door, looked down at me, and smiled warmly. The only thing I ever remember her saying to me was "You're one of his, please come inside." My heart skipped a few beats when I did.

Her home was completely vacant of any furniture, any décor, excluding a few metal chairs, a stool, a small glass coffee table, a television set with a VHS, and a lot of crosses.

Her kitchen and bathroom had the usual commodities but nothing more; just a fridge, a stove, a sink, a toilet and a shower.

I didn't know about her bedroom because I didn't dare venture any further. The woman already had the bedroom, kitchen, and bathroom blocked off by small gates usually used for pets.

My eyes searched for my sister in the 4 small children silently sitting on the floor. My sister was sitting there focused on doing her school work, which explained why she never bothered to notice the disturbing home herself.

Sitting next to my sister was Anthony, staring passively at the TV, drinking strawberry milk (or what I thought was strawberry milk). When he saw me he smiled a grin that went from cheek to cheek and clumsily started to crawl my way.

"Janny!" He yelled.

When I was about to pick him up, the woman grabbed him by the wrist and dragged him back to his spot on the floor. He immediately started crying, but she began to scold him in another language. He stopped and drank his milk between sobs.

I had no idea what she said, but it wasn't a shout or a command, it sounded menacing and cruel. I stared in horror first at the woman, but then at my sister for being oblivious to this.

Things got a lot more twisted when all of the woman's children, including my brother, began to undress, leaving only their underwear on. My brother only had his diaper on. The woman collected the clothing and walked into her bedroom. At this point I didn't know what to do, so I turned to face the door. Out of my peripheral sight I saw something at the corner of the room as I was facing the door. A few feet away from the door was what appeared to be a shrine.

I saw words and symbols I've never heard of before with spices in jars, rotten fruit, Victorian jewelry and old doll heads. And on the back of the door was a drawn image of needles poking at various human organs.

Frightened out of my mind, I walked back to the kids and sat on the cold tiled floor. The woman didn't even have cable or satellite. They were watching an old VHS movie about Noah's Arc. Hours droned on and I refused to move a muscle even as everyone else began to eat whatever she was passing on as food.

I also knew now why Anthony seemed to have a rash every time father changed him- he was forced to sit in his own filth for the entire day.

When father picked us up I quickly got Anthony, his clothing and belongings, and ran outside to the car. Maria carelessly took her time packing up and leaving while father paid the woman who was beaming with generosity. I held Anthony in my arms and cried. He remained silent and ignorant to my affection. Eileen couldn't hear me because she was blasting Britney Spears on the radio. When Maria got into the car I stopped crying to look at her in confusion and anger. I begged to know why she has let this go on for so long and she calmly stated,

"That woman is from a different place and she barely knows American language [my sister wasn't very bright]. Besides, she made Anthony better! So stop being a baby."

I started to yell at her again, begging to know how he is better.

"Dad told me Anthony would cry nonstop when he tried to drop him off and would cling to dad and scream 'No, please, no!' With her, he shuts up."

As time went on Anthony became more and more restless at home. He saw things that spooked him often and he would have nightmares every single night. I know this because all we heard when he slept were yells and whimpers. Eventually he stopped sleeping, began to vomit a lot, and he would go to the bathroom less. My father thought he was getting ill and no one listened to me when I brought up the babysitter, so close to the end of the school year I spoke to my counselor about my siblings and me being neglected at home. They spoke to my father and I don't know what they said but it made him stop his hours of picking up hookers instead of being with us.

When Anthony turned 5 and went to Kindergarten, he changed even more. He became very quick tempered and ill mannered. He would frequently insult any of us and he even became disobedient. With all of that time of no one listening to my warnings of how Anthony will grow up I didn't feel the need to say I told you so, but instead became quick tempered back at Anthony. I can't explain what children do so I can't explain why every time he would outburst I would hit him. I regret it now though. He needed someone, anyone.

Anthony, like the rest of us, was good in school, but in the middle of 1st grade his grades began to drop. His awful behavior got him in trouble daily. The teacher would always call my father and Miranda about Anthony; it became routine. Anthony would be sent to his room and that was that. One day I was babysitting him while my sisters, Miranda, and my father went out. At the time I was about to turn fourteen, but I had the attitude of an 18 year old. I spent most of my time bitching about Anthony's ways that I never stopped to think what on Earth is going through his head after that babysitter, who moved to God knows where, screwed him up. That night I decided to check up on him in his room but he wasn't there. I assumed he was in the bathroom but before I walked out I noticed he had papers scattered everywhere. I cursed at him under my breath and picked each one up, only to stop when I saw a picture of human organs being punctured by needles.

"Anthony! Anthony come here!" I yelled to him.

This time, I didn't hear his usual obnoxious footsteps stomp my way. I cautiously looked through the horrifyingly detailed pictures. A picture of my father having sex with our mother, who he has never met, was drawn perfectly and it made me sick. Dozen of pictures of organs and gore with dozens of other pictures that at first looked like disturbed nonsense, but thinking back now I think he drew religious cult scenarios and various demon/hellish looking things. I started to feel the same fear I felt at the babysitter's house. I ran all over our home looking for Anthony and when I did find him, he was butt naked drawing X's all over his body with a black marker. I yelled at him with my usual frustration and impatience, but also with fear. He just stared at me and laughed.

One year went by, and he was getting worse and worse. Miranda and my father thought that their methods of isolating him were working, but that made him so much worse. He grew a creepy disposition and became very violent and sometimes sexual with his actions, hitting everyone, throwing objects, and making crude remarks about his genitalia.

My father refused to "waste money on a coco doctor." So all I was able to do was sit and watch my brother die away inside like I was always forced to do. It breaks my heart to say it now but it's the truth. The friends he made from kindergarten quickly isolated him in school too. They all ignored him because he was becoming more and more annoying and mean. Even our dog began to growl at him daily. Usually my brother would just kick the poor thing in the rib and it would just run and hide. He eventually died from internal bleeding. I think Anthony actually fed it sharp objects. Even though I was also indifferent to him I knew that it was only a matter of time before he decided to hurt a person instead of a dog.

I woke up one night in May of that year to the yell Anthony did when he had his nightmares as a baby. I shot up waiting for another sound, but oddly there were none. But to my bewilderment, I saw a small silhouette in my door way. I tried looking closer but as I got up, the smell of urine and vomit hit my nose and I flinched. When I closed my eyes trying to adjust to the darkness, the silhouette was already in my face. I realized it was Anthony, but his eyes were bulging and red. Tears were streaming down his face and onto his lips which had dried curdled vomit on them. His chin was also covered in vomit. The smell of urine came from his drenched pajamas. Before I had the chance to react, Anthony jumped onto my body and held me down as his knees jabbed into my sides. He stared for a while longer, studying me as I was frozen in my fear. He quickly grabbed my face with both hands and brought it to his. He then let out screech that sounded more animal then human. It was the worst sound I had ever heard, so horrible I can't even put it into words. All of those images of the gore and demons from my brother's pictures ran through my mind and that babysitter's voice echoed with them.

Last thing I remember was Child Services waking me from my sleep and asking if I was alright. I was on a stretcher instead of my bed. I was confused, until I remembered Anthony's heart wrenching cry. I hoarsely asked them what happened to my brother.

"Brother?"

The man had no idea what I was talking about. He bent down to my level, which startled me because of what Anthony did, and whispered,

"Honey, your mother and father...your mother and father were killed last night. You and your sisters are fine, thankfully....wait, you said you have a brother? We don't recall finding...finding anyone else except your sisters and your parents. Was he...was he kidnapped by chance?"

Knots built in my stomach. I don't know what the hell came over me but I stumbled off the stretcher, pushed cops out of the way, and ran to my father's room only to find both him and Miranda staring at me lifeless and naked. They must have been having sex before they were killed because my father was on top of her while semen was all over Miranda. Weird symbols were drawn on them both and they had needles in all of their orifices. Child Services dragged me away as I screamed and thrashed. As they took my sisters and me away from the house, I quickly glanced at the door. I found characters messily written on the front door in a language similar to to the one that was on the shrine.

"Ki sa ki frè?"

I am 20 years old now, and my sisters and I lost contact with each other after ending up in different foster homes. At 18, I moved out of Oregon because I couldn't take the memories. All I ever wanted when I was 8 was for our family to grow bigger.

Evil lives in this world with us, but you people can't let that destroy your families...selfishness...lust...cruel people...demons. You kids these days are too focused on yourselves, for once just try to focus on your family and your siblings! You could end up hearing them scream in agony every night...like I did. The screams are even louder for me because I learned what that Haitian Creole quote on the door meant.

"What brother?"

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