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  “I have a plan,” Devin said.

  It perked my ears up, but our names were already being shouted in mashed syllables in my mother’s ear ravaging howl, “Kris-evin! Dev-ristin!”

  “She’s mad. That stupid no good liar Jenny. You know she lied. All she does is lie-lie-lie.”

  We sulked back up the hill towards the house. My mother waited with her arms pinned to her hips and her elbows pointed out like two open car doors. Her high beams were on though, and they burned through us. I lowered my head and tried to find the most innocent looking face I had in my catalog.

  Once I had it, I flung it forward.

  My mother didn’t buy it for a second. I’d be a fool to believe otherwise.

  She raised one finger and said, “Don’t even.”

  “But, Mom!” I said, eloquently I might add. There was more to that statement, but it never came out. Somehow I didn’t have the proper link from my mind to my lips and so I just repeated, “But! But! But!”

  “No buts. You know better, Kristen. And Devin, you need to leave your sisters alone. You just wait until your father hears about this.”

  There was snickering from behind glass. Even my mother heard it, but her eyes never left Devin and I.

  “I’m sorry, Mom,” Devin said. He hung his head low. “I wanted to play with them.”

  If it was just an act, then Devin had a career ahead of him. My mother bent over and whipped a dark lock of wet hair off his brow.

  If it wasn’t an act then I felt truly sorry for him.

  He had no friends, not even at school. He didn’t seem different. I didn’t understand why others didn’t like him. He even smelled better than most the boys I’d met. He just kept quiet. But he listened. He remembered if you said you liked something.

  “Get inside, and take a bath before your father gets home. When you’re finished, you better clean whatever mud you tracked into my house. Not a speck!”

  Mom’s eyes went to me too quickly. She missed the look of love Devin added as she pushed him up past her and into the house. He was grateful that she hadn’t said that father would be speaking with him. Sometimes my mom did not rat him out. Sometimes she kept it between us—but it always felt like it was blackmail for later.

  “You wait out here, Kristen Ann. When your father gets in, you help him bring in the groceries for our trip tomorrow.”

  She waited for me to nod or say ‘yes, ma’am.’ I just stared at her hoping she knew I was right and that Jenny and Rebecca had lied to her. They were the bad children. Why couldn’t she see that?

  Her stare ended. She left me out on the porch and went back inside. I heard her yell for my sisters. Then it went quiet. I can only assume my mom had scolded them to some degree because they didn’t laugh or smile the rest of the night. It was a cheap justice. They still deserved our revenge, but when dad came home that was out of the question.

  Dad’s pickup truck sounded like it hated doing its job. It even whined when it stopped. It was a wussy piece of metal even though it looked tough and manly. My father didn’t say hello yet, or he hadn’t noticed me sitting on the porch. He just went to the back of truck and yanked a big red cooler all the way down to the tailgate. He groaned as he lifted it and set it on the ground next to Mom’s station wagon.

  Without looking, my father said, “What’d you do?”

  We both let his words hang in the air as I slowly walked over to him. When I reached him again, he was already opening the bags of ice he’d had in the cooler and began emptying them back on top of soda cans.

  “Today wasn’t such a good day for me,” I said, then I added, “or Devin.”

  My dad always waited to hear our best excuses before he revealed his allegiance. It almost made it seem possible to appease him with the right set of words or phrasing. But tried as I might, I hadn’t been successful.

  “Jenny was picking on us. She wouldn’t stop, so I threw the leaves off the bottom of the pond at her.”

  “What were you doing in the pond?”

  I hesitated. I’d screwed up already. Under no circumstances were we to ever go into the pond because of germs, snakes, snapping turtles, and the fact that despite having all had swim lessons every summer, we might drown because no adult was there to use their magic anti-drowning spells.

  “Jenny and Rebecca pushed Devin in.” I lied. I lied about both Rebecca and Jenny because I knew they would’ve defended the other had I left them out of the guilty party and it didn’t matter. Whatever truth my parents believed was also a lie. Devin might go along with my lie or at least appear too scared to tattle on Jenny and Rebecca so it really didn’t matter what I said.

  “Uh huh,” My father said, trying to crush the ice under the lid enough to close the cooler lid shut again. He struck it hard. I jumped back at the sound, but he swung around and smiled. “Darn thing. I think you’ll just have to help me make room for all this ice.” He reached down inside the cooler and pulled a soda can. “Grape or Orange?”

  My eyes must’ve lit up, because my father laughed.

  “Orange,” I said.

  “Don’t tell your mother,” he added, as he opened the can and handed it to me. He yanked the cooler up above his shoulders and staggered for a moment as he slid it onto the roof of the station wagon.

  “You girls need to learn to play nice with each other.”

  I nodded with the soda can still against my lips. My father must’ve had eyes in the back of his head because he seemed to know I agreed without ever looking at me.

  “Good. I will talk with Jenny and Rebecca, but I’m getting real tired this bickering. It’s not right. Family is family.”

  He had a smaller cooler in the back of his truck and from it he pulled a brown bottle with beer in it. He popped the cap with his pocketknife and lifted me up into the bed of the truck, and then sat down on the tailgate with me.

  “I love you kids. And you’ll need each other. It may not seem like it now, but friends come and go, but family you’re stuck with. That’s why we had the four of you, so that you all would have help in life. Right now, Rebecca and Jenny help each other, and I guess you’ve been looking out for… Devin.”

  My father always said ‘Devin’ the same way he said things when he wasn’t really listening. I didn’t understand it. I guess my brother was a mistake. He looked enough like my father not to be the milkman’s. I wiped the soda from my lips. My father helped with his thumb.

  “Can’t let your mother know that I spoiled your dinner.”

  “Do you love Devin like you love Jenny and Rebecca?” I asked. For a second there I saw a frown in my father’s lips, but then they shot up into smile.

  “We love all of you equally,” My father said with a laugh. “There’s different things we love about each one of you, but a parent’s love, the love that is right here.” He thumped his chest. “The love that can’t go away if we tried—it’s equal.”

  “I love Devin more than Jenny and Rebecca.”

  My father didn’t argue with me. He pulled me off the truck and we went inside for dinner.

  Dinner took everything from me. I knew two things. First off, my dad was not upset with me yet. He understood and he was secretly on my side, I think. He’d had to be blind to think Rebecca and Jenny weren’t always the instigator. The second was if I made a scene and called Jenny and Rebecca liars, even as they sat there and complained how Devin and I ruined their day, I would be in a whole heap of a lot of trouble.

  Somehow, Devin knew to keep his mouth shut as well. He didn’t even look up from his plate.

  Then Jenny said, “Kristen isn’t eating her peas.”

  I let out a soft, but defiant, “Yet.”

  “Eat your peas,” Mom ordered.

  All the effort in the world failed me.

  If my father was still on my side, it was only enough that he didn’t bruise my backside as he walloped me over his knee.

  I shouldn’t have flung the peas at Jenny. I should’ve dipped them in mash p
otatoes first, so that they actually stuck to her, rather than littering the floor behind her. Plus, then I wouldn’t have had to clean up the mess after everyone else finished eating.

  I could’ve found ways of bathing Jenny that would’ve humored me. But I doubt they would’ve given me the pleasure. I made an effort to remember to use the mash potatoes next time.

  “You’re dead,” Jenny said later. She’d been wearing a pretty ugly looking grin since dinner. I tried to stay calm and remember that if she kept making that face it would stick and then everyone would know she was smug and mean. She followed me into the bathroom to brush her teeth. She stood too close. So I put an elbow in her rib.

  She didn’t tattle.

  And that’s what worried me. She just said, “You’re really dead now.”

  Like all family trips, this one started out with a bit of yelling, some pouting children and everyone being told to stay on their side of the station wagon and keep their hands to themselves.

  Two hours was spent wisely. We bickered and racked up enough warnings from both parents that any further act was likely to give one of them an ulcer. If anything, they’d realize that we were better left at home, watching cartoons, than trying to create memories for us by taking us camping.

  Old people forget things. That must be my parents’ problem. They forgot that when they were kids they would rather have just stayed home and played.

  We arrived at the river with our mouths unlatched, a truly miraculous occasion. We begrudgingly unpacked the station wagon. My mother’s eyes told us not to argue that chore. The way she held herself next to my father clued me into the idea that he might snap at any moment—and then we really would have some life-long memories. He had a beer as soon as he parked the car. He downed it like it was the only thing he’d drank in a week. He crunched the can to announce his success and then went about fiddling with the tent.

  My mother sent Devin to assist him. Which meant standing at attention and holding whatever object my father needed next, while never holding it the way he wished you would. My father’s displeasure was marked by soft grunts, loud sighs, and the way his head shook.

  “Mind your own business and get back to helping, Kristen!” Jenny yelled at me for watching my father and Devin. “You have to help too. Mom said so.”

  I looked at her like I would kill her. At least that’s what I wanted her to think. She flashed her patented ugly smile and raised her chin, begging for my best right hook. I often thought of grabbing her bottom jaw and ripping it right off. If I had super strength that’s the first thing I’d do. I’d put the whole thing under my pillow and wait for the tooth fairy to bring me some money.

  “You’re lucky Mom and Dad are here,” I said.

  “So are you. You have to unload the car. You have to do everything I say, not just because I’m the oldest, but also because one day I’m going to be the boss of you and everybody. And you’re all going to have to do exactly what I say. If I tell you to jump off a bridge, you’re going to jump off a bridge. So you better start being nice to me.”

  I laughed at her and that made her angrier. I took my time unloading the car too. So she went to mother, who told her to mind her own. It was a moment of justice that caused me great delight.

  Then the tent collapsed.

  “Jesus, Devin,” said my father. “What are you doing? Just go help your sisters.”

  Devin ran off elsewhere.

  I thought I could hear him crying, but it could’ve just been the river.

  My mother didn’t chase after her son. She walked to her husband.

  “Can I help?” she asked.

  My father nodded. “It’s just that boy. I swear you cursed him when you named him Devin.”

  Once the tents were erected, things calmed down. We were given snacks and explored the river’s edge. Devin acted as if nothing had happened, but he didn’t seem keen to return to our campsite, especially when my father came and got him.

  I was told to keep playing, but with Jenny and Rebecca I didn’t feel like there was much I could do that wouldn’t lead to a punishment.

  Instead, I watched my father teach Devin how to make a campfire until my mother spotted me.

  “Isn’t it just serene here, Kristen?” she asked.

  I nodded.

  “Why does dad hate Devin?”

  “Kristen, why would you think that? Of course your father doesn’t hate Devin,” she said. She cleared her throat. “Boys need to be raised differently than girls. I suppose you all are a bad influence on him.”

  “All the boys at school that I know are trouble,” I said.

  “All boys are always trouble, that’s for sure. Never forget that.”

  “But not Devin. He’s nice and Jenny and Rebecca pick on him all the time. You and dad don’t do anything. That’s wrong.”

  “That’s not true,” she said. “Your sisters get the punishments that they deserve quite frequently. You can’t keep thinking your life is unfair. We love you all the same.”

  I shook my head.

  My mother groaned or sighed; whichever was more unpleasant.

  “Dad said you cursed Devin when you named him that,” I said.

  “Oh,” my mother said. “Is that what this is about? Look, your father wanted to name Devin: Benjamin.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, it was his family name. Your father is named Benjamin, and so was his father and his father and so on. Your father was the sixth. There was no way I wanted to name our son Benjamin the Seventh!” My mother laughed. “I almost didn’t marry your father when I found out he was Benjamin the Sixth. Your father insisted, and we were going to, but at the last moment I just knew I couldn’t do that to my son. When he was born I switched it up. I held him up and knew he was not going to be Benjamin the Seventh. So I named him Devin. He’ll thank me one day.”

  Our evening was almost picture perfect.

  Bickering was kept to a minimum as we roasted hot dogs on the fire that Devin helped make and maintain. Every now and then, my father would impart some secret knowledge to Devin about fire. The attention was what Devin needed.

  Just before we were ushered to bed, Devin began talking like I had never seen him talk to my father before. There was enthusiasm in his voice. Not just a ‘yes, sir’, but a real conversation, like he would only ever have with me.

  In return, my father smiled and laughed and whispered.

  Across the fire, Jenny grew resentful. She was cooking up some evil plan to ruin it all. I just knew it. Rebecca on the other hand looked too stupid to plot anything, but it would only be a matter of time when Jenny brought her into the fold.

  I had to stop them.

  We didn’t go right to bed. As soon as we got into our sleeping bags, Jenny said something awful like she’d kill us in our sleep.

  Devin growled at her, and I told her I’d kill her first.

  Then she said, “You all owe your lives to me. If I hadn’t been such a good child your parents never would’ve had you. They would’ve got neutered like the MacGregor’s cats. But I told them they could have you. I probably shouldn’t have. But I was such a young child then. Children make mistakes, that’s why you all are such screw ups. I should probably make them kill you now.”

  “Yeah right,” I said. “Mom and Dad had us because they figured they couldn’t screw up a second time.”

  “But they did. And worse. So they had another and another.”

  “I’d have stopped after Rebecca too,” I said.

  “No, Rebecca is perfect like me,” Jenny said.

  “Yeah right.”

  “Go to bed!” mother said.

  Jenny dropped down to a whisper. “We’ll play a game tomorrow. See who mom and dad love the most.”

  “And then we’ll put you up for adoption.”

  “Girls! Do not make me get out of this tent. It is bedtime!”

  We agreed it would be best to stop talking in the tent. But Jenny kept taunting us. She moved her lips,
mouthing, “I’ll kill you.”

  “Try,” I mouthed back.

  In the morning, my father took us all fishing. It took forever and we weren’t catching anything, so boredom showed up pretty vigilantly. Rebecca and Jenny gave up and walked upstream. They laughed and threw rocks at the river, probably intentionally scaring away any fish Devin and I might’ve caught.

  Devin struggled with his fishing rod. My father tried to show him how to use it, but the motion of casting wasn’t easily learned. My father settled on letting Devin dangle his bait over the water.

  He certainly wouldn’t have had better luck doing what I was doing.

  “Does it normally take this long,” I asked my father.

  “It’s... Well, it’s not about how long it takes. It’s about being out in nature and enjoying it,” he said. “It’s relaxing.”

  “Killing fish?”

  “I don’t want to eat them,” Devin said.

  “Don’t they have scales all over them? The ones at the store don’t and they come in little sticks. How do we make them into the little sticks?” I asked.

  “That isn’t real fish. Trust me, what we cook up will be delicious. We’ll peal the scales off before we cook them,” my father said.

  “It’ll be tomorrow,” I said. “Anything will be delicious then.”

  My father cleared his throat. “Devin, why don’t you try down that ways a little? I think I saw something over there.”

  “A fish?”

  “Yes.”

  Devin scampered away. He almost made it to where my father had pointed, but his line got caught in a branch. My father shook his head as Devin fought to untangle himself.

  I checked upstream, and thankfully, Jenny and Rebecca had not noticed Devin’s folly.

  Once free he reached the spot and asked, “Here?”