Rollo Shea leaves his bedroom window and ambles through the hallway to visit his brother, Tom. He does this in silence because his mother, who is sitting downstairs, has told him to leave Tom alone. She doesn't want Tom bothered in this heat, Rollo should be sleeping, and she must have it quiet because she is not feeling well. In a few months another baby will come, but only if the house is quiet and Rollo and his brothers behave. They have been promised a sister if they say their prayers before bed each night.

Rollo remembers his prayers. Last night he didn't say them. He remained in bed, listening, while Pete, Stewart and Philly perspired through mumbled versions of the Our Father, the Hail Mary, and the prayer Dad thought up: the Shea Family Prayer For A Sister.

Slack, surly and sweating through insomnia, Rollo had come upon his own idea: Would God come if you didn't ask at all? If God was everywhere, at all times, then shouldn't he wait for a sister and not beg?

In the morning, the heat still cloying, Rollo was certain that God would never come. He had told this to his father while they ate breakfast. His father had grimaced, cursing the heat, while his mother explained that God had never left, that His powers were never felt twice in the same way.

His mother's words had puzzled him, made him so edgy he'd spilled his cereal and was sent to his room to suffer in the heat.

Now, as he creeps next to Tom's crib the puzzlement and edginess returns. He knows he shouldn't disturb Tom's crib, yet he is drawn to it. It makes him think of God.
Tom is inside and he must touch Tom's hot soft skin. No, that would mean he is touching God.

Frightened, he ambles quickly out of the room and inches down the stairs and peers into the kitchen to see if Mother is okay. After spilling his cereal he had pulled a tantrum, telling Mother he didn't care about her sickness and another baby, and that it was too hot and he should be allowed to go out and play because he really did care and Mother should know that and not punish him.

***

A buttery light through a window shade. The third day of heat. Rollo lingers, holding the sill, woozy and restless in a prickly sweat. Behind him, curled and wheezing, sleep Philly and Stewart. Pete is downstairs on the couch. Tom is in his crib across the hallway, at the foot of his parent's bed.

Rollo scratches at his chest, leaving red welts across the slick dough of his stomach. Scratching helps him to think. He feels edgy again. Things are certainly wrong with Mother and he must do something to help. He can tell by her clothes. She's worn the same sleeveless blouse for the last five days. Sweat has stained the seams under her arms. And worse, she smells.

Earlier, he had spied on her from his lookout on the stairs. She was sitting; heavy and sweating as she massaged her bloated legs, her feet soaking in a plastic pail of steaming water. Rollo knows about one of her legs, though he's seen it only once. A long scar like a zipper runs up one side from ankle to knee. It happened when she was carrying Tom. It was winter. She slipped on the black iron steps that angle up to their front door. For three weeks they had not seen their mother. They prayed, even Lorraine the babysitter, each night at dinner. His father had expressed fears of Tom being born a cripple, warned them not to question Mom about her scar, calling it a traumatic experience, too deep for words.

Rollo thinks of Tom in the crib. His eyes are brown, his hair jet-black. Tom is different. Rollo needs to touch his hot skin, make this edgy feeling go away for good.

Stealthily, Rollo visits his lookout on the stairs. His mother is still in the kitchen, soaking her feet.

He hustles quietly up the stairs and heads for Tom's crib.

'Is that you Tom? Really you Tom?'� he asks, gripping the sticky bars of the crib. 'You brought this Tom. Mom was crying. I seen her. You make her cry, Tom.'�

He presses his face against the bars, eyeing his youngest brother. A strange feeling, stronger than his edginess, grips him. He frantically scratches at his stomach, leaving welt after welt as a thick sweat breaks from his forehead and like paste washes over his cheeks. The scar, the crying, the smell, God; they are all Tom's fault. Rollo stops scratching, grabs the crib bars and begins shaking the crib. He pulls himself up over the crib rail and grabs Tom, lifting and dropping him and covering his mouth so he won't cry. A squeak of air leaks from the plastic-coated mattress each time Tom falls. Rollo smells the piss of Tom's diaper.

'Tom you smell.'�

Rollo continues toying with him, pulling on each one of his slippery hot fingers, chanting, 'Tom tom tommo. Tom tommo tom tom.'�

Tom's flesh reddens, greasy with sweat. Rollo, sitting now inside the crib, chants louder, pulls harder at each finger. He feels no edginess and he shouts gleefully, throwing his body from side to side to make the crib skid on its casters.

Tom is giggling now. This excites Rollo. He gets out of the crib and begins to shake it violently, laughing at the sight of Tom's slick spineless mass lolling to and fro the way a boat might rock upon water.

'Tom tom tommo tom tom. Tom tommo tom tom.'�

Blistering odors blend at once, imbuing the tiny room with a pall of piss, sweat and paint. Rollo hears his mother, shouting, 'Rollo, get down here.'�

Rollo screams out of the room, arms spread, crying, 'Tom, I'm tickling Tom."

"Get down here, Rollo Shea, so help me God."

"Tickling Tom, Mommy. Tickling Tom.'�

He is a bird, flapping his hot wings as he screeches down the stairs and into the kitchen, bringing his good news: Tom is ticklish; He needs to be tickled and then everything will be all right.

"Tickling Tom, tickling Tom, Mommy."

His stubby legs pump up and down, thumping the floor in time to the flaps of his beating arms. He flies full speed at Mother, shrieking his explanation.

'Tickling Tom, tickling Tom, Mommy. It's Tom, tickling Tom.'�

His mother, forgetting her condition, thrusts herself out of the chair. One foot, as she lurches it from the pail, catches the pail's upper lip, throwing her off-balance, the weight of her swollen body pulling her down, the pail spilling a steamy mist across the floor. Rollo slips as the water slides beneath his feet. He skids forward. His mother's arm strikes his ribs. In the act of falling she has twisted her body, bringing her arm around to grab him and lift him off his feet.

Rollo cries, 'Tickling Tom, Mommy'� as he spins with his mother, the room humming a hushed whirlwind that ends with a rapid smacking of flesh against water, followed by the explosion of a glass pane.

Rollo is still spinning. He does not realize his body is inert. Follicles and thin shards of glass shine against his seething legs and stomach. His fleshy back sticks to the kitchen door. He pants with the quick pulsing in his breast. He does not know he has been thrown backwards against the door, hitting it with enough impact to shatter its large square window. Slumped on the wet floor, he tries to see beyond the legs of a chair, blurry, beyond the gaps between chair legs, blurry, his mother's back rising in great heaves from out of the floor. Blurry. A plastic pail on its side. Blurry.
Only her back is moving. He can see her hair, but her face is turned away. He can hear her. She is moaning. A moan each time her back heaves up and then down. Up and then down. Heavy pained moans cleaving the blaze of kitchen air.

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