In the Woods

"Oh, nice shot," Franklin said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

For a moment, Donald just stood there as quiet and as motionless as a statue, holding the smoking shotgun in his suddenly numb hands. He stared blankly at the lifeless body sprawled on the ground before him. After an interminable silence, he finally managed to whisper, "It was an accident."

"Oh, now doesn't that just change everything!" Franklin exclaimed waving his arms in the air expansively. Addressing the body, he called, "It was just an accident, George! He didn't really mean to shoot you right in the middle of your chest with that twelve-gauge! You can just get up any time you get ready now and we can all pretend that this never happened!"

"It's not funny," Donald answered weakly, swallowing hard. "He' s dead."

"You don't say? Move over, Sherlock Holmes, Donald Raymond has just taken over! So tell me, Mr. Brilliant, exactly what was George thinking when he agreed to take you hunting?"

For a moment Donald looked as if he were about to burst into tears, and then an uncharacteristically angry glare crossed his boyish face. He spun around on his heel and pointed the shotgun directly at his older brother's chest. "Hey, knock it off," he said, the intended threat diluted considerably by his inability to keep his voice from shaking. "I've already killed one man just now, so another won't make that big a difference. They can only execute me once."

Franklin looked at Donald incredulously for a moment, then threw his head back and laughed uncontrollably, much to his younger sibling's consternation. At last Franklin recovered enough of his composure to say, "That' s a single-shot, genius, as in only one shot at a time, do you follow? You've already put your one shot into George. By the time you dig around for another shot, fumble with it for five minutes like I know you would, and finally get that thing loaded again, you will have given me more than enough time to either run away or kick your butt. Do you really think that you intimidate me at all?"

Donald could do nothing but stand there in silence, his lip quivering in his anger and fear. In a distant corner of his mind, he contemplated how this moment was so typical of what their relationship had been throughout their entire lives. Franklin, the older of the two siblings, had always been labeled "the smart one," while the adjectives used to describe Donald had always been far less complementary. He was frequently referred to by such titles as "the slower one," "the clumsier one," or "the challenged one," among other less tactful labels. Franklin had been the valedictorian of his high school class, whereas Donald had been held back twice and even then had only graduated by the slimmest of margins. Franklin whizzed through college and was now a junior partner in a real estate agency; on the other hand, Donald never set foot on a college campus and had drifted laterally from one minimum wage, benefit-free occupation to another. Franklin seemingly never did anything wrong; conversely, Donald seemingly never did anything right. None of this had ever been lost on Franklin, who took sadistic pleasure in reminding Donald of the disparity between them at every opportunity. Now here they were, standing in the middle of the woods at night, their cousin lying in a lifeless heap at their feet, and all because of Donald.

"I didn't think so," Franklin sneered, bringing Donald out of his revere.