After My Brother’s Surgery

by Richard Bower

At five, my brother went blind. I remember the bleached sheets stiff as cardboard. I scraped my fingerprints along the contours. Little skin shedding onto the bedding, my brother’s blindness lasted the morning until they pulled the gauze from his eyes. Dusty Egypt in our noses, his body dried from long storage in the sand. We unwrapped him, hoping his flesh still underneath, the skin supple and spongy under our fingers. Mom held him down by the shoulders. I held his hand but looked away, imagining his eyes behind the cloth, staring at us and what we did. The conditioned air fresh as the ceramic tile covering the floor, the grout chipped away more than it held the squares together. Balkan states like the way we lived in our own separate rooms in the house.

His outpatient surgery promised 80% likelihood of success. One retina detached after being kicked in the head on the bus ride home. They covered both eyes before operating, so he didn't wake and strain his eyes trying to focus. Dad held his feet from kicking the kick of can-can dancers. Sister Marie pulled threaded cloth from his face. The doctor promised in a voice that reminded me of a tree falling in the woods with no one to hear.

Facebook showed me the memories, and I fingered the screen. Without thinking. The smooth glass gripped my touch like sandpaper. Glued grit and paper, dyes staining me rusty. I remembered the moment Sister Marie pulled the silk cloth from his bridge and temple like a ceremony to honor the bride before her kiss.

Richard Bower

Richard Bower lives in Central New York with his wife, daughter, and cats. He teaches writing for Cayuga’s School of Media and the Arts (SOMA). He has previously published flash in Fiction Kitchen Berlin, Ghost Parachute, Enchanted Conversation Magazine, Gingerbread House Literary Magazine, and The Cabinet of Heed.

More: https://tinyurl.com/richardbower