Authors: Carine McCandless
Chris couldn’t have cared less about trophies or honors, and yet he was still so good at everything. He set high goals for himself and achieved them all without the pressure of knowing that others were depending on him. Whereas I didn’t want to disappoint anyone else, his concern was to not disappoint himself. He was more of a solo act, while I enjoyed being part of a team. He was an improviser, while I was a rule follower. He would tease me about my conformity, telling me I was band teacher Mr. Casagrande’s favorite, but he would quickly follow it up with a wink. “But I’m proud of you, Carine,” he would say. “You really did a good job.”
Our different approaches played out at home, too. Chris would say he wished he could see my parents more like I did—like they were a problem that could be solved if everyone just sat down and talked rationally. Now that we were both in high school, the physical violence had slowed—we were too big to be forced over Dad’s knee, too fast for him to catch, and more willing to defend ourselves. Likewise, because we could now come to Mom’s aid, Dad’s hands-on approach to bullying her took a backseat to his constant verbal abuse, which she still accepted.
Now every time Mom and Dad fought, Chris would listen only long enough to confirm it was the same old scene, just with new dialogue. Then he’d throw up his arms, tell them they were both idiots, and take his exit. I, on the other hand, would encourage my parents to calm down, have a seat, and discuss things rationally, to try to get to the basis of the argument and solve it. If Dad’s bullying included any physical threats, I would demand to know what he expected that to accomplish. I was the marriage counselor. Chris was the divorce attorney.
Dad’s need for control still resulted in violence on occasion, though, as it did one day when he sensed he was losing an argument to Chris. Summer was drawing near, as was the end of Chris’s high school years. I was sitting on the living room couch, looking through the yearbooks we had received in school that day. Mom was ironing Dad’s dress shirts. My trip down memory lane of the 1985–86 school year was interrupted as the most recent cause of dispute surfaced once again: Chris’s summer plans. Chris was eager to hit the road with the Datsun immediately after graduation, and Dad was incensed that he didn’t see the logic in having a predetermined travel plan to submit for our parents’ approval.
“Why can’t you just understand that not having a plan
is
my plan?” Chris implored. “I don’t know exactly where I’ll be. That’s the whole point, the freedom of it. I’ve been so structured with school and sports and work—everything has been scheduled and laid out for me. I just want to get out of that mundane existence and purely enjoy life for a while. I’ll decide on the fly where I want to go next.”
“You will not leave this house without giving us an itinerary for where you’ll be, week by week!” Dad demanded. “You’re being completely irresponsible! How do we even know you’ll return for college?”
“What? How can you call me irresponsible?” Chris challenged. “Was it irresponsible of me to study hard and get good grades? Was I being irresponsible to work two jobs to make money for college and save up for this trip? How about how hard I trained for these last cross-country meets? And of course I’m going to Emory. Why would I go through all of that if I had no intention of going? What I have no intention of doing is laying out my entire summer on paper, making everything predictable and destroying my chance for adventure.” He continued, “If I’d made you a list, it would’ve been a fake one just to appease you, and you wouldn’t have known any better. I’d simply throw it out the minute I walked out the door.”
It was hard to deny Chris’s logic. He waited patiently for a response. Dad stood there staring at him, at a loss for words, his eyes and nostrils flared. The red on his face spread until even his bald spot was completely flushed. Knowing he had won the debate, Chris turned his back to Dad and began to walk away. Dad’s reaction to the defeat was so swift that I couldn’t even bark out a warning as I saw him wind up his right arm like a baseball pitcher preparing to unleash the final strike of a perfect game. He lurched forward and slammed his fist into the center of Chris’s spine, as if he were expecting to level Chris to the ground immediately.
Chris, not at all diminished, simply stopped moving away. Though shorter and slimmer, he was in impressive shape. His superior strength was more than physical. He saw the panic in Dad’s expression as he slowly turned to face him. But Chris just looked at him with little emotion. A single puff of disgust passed over his lips and then he turned again and slowly walked upstairs. I understood. To Chris, Dad and Mom weren’t worth the effort of rebellion anymore. Rather than feed the beast of turmoil, Chris just separated himself from it.
I sat to the side, wide-eyed as he walked off. I had to tell myself to start breathing again. His reaction—or lack thereof—to Dad’s behavior was a victory for both of us that day. Dad looked over at me and then narrowed his eyes, a silent warning that I’d best not ever repeat my brother’s mistake of being bold. I rolled my eyes back at him and returned my attention to the pages of the yearbook. I don’t know why I didn’t jump up to defend Chris. I guess I didn’t feel that he needed my help, even though I often needed his. If it had been me in the argument, he would never have allowed it to escalate.
CHRIS
’
S PRESENCE IN MY LIFE
felt enormous. I was surrounded by the powerful perfect pitch of his singing voice as he belted out lyrics and played the piano, by him debating politics eloquently with his friends, and by him fighting battles for the both of us when it came to my parents. I knew he wanted to protect me while also giving me enough space to learn to do that for myself. But he was a constant that I couldn’t imagine life at home without. Chris was not only my buffer and my co-conspirator. He was my best friend.
My parents never seemed to read Chris accurately, the way others could. It was clear to all who knew my big brother that there was nothing typical about him. His intensity was legendary. Of the handful of Chris’s closest friends, perhaps no one besides Andy understood the delicate balance between Chris’s serious side and his sense of humor well enough to feel comfortable testing the boundary. Once when he was driving Andy and a bunch of others back from cross-country practice, Andy teased him about how as soon as Chris left for Emory, he was going to pursue me. At first Chris simply smiled and tried to shrug off the ribbing. Whenever Andy was at our house, he was quick to chat me up just to get a rise out of Chris, but now Andy persisted with a few renditions of how the chase would unfold. This time, even to Andy’s surprise, he pushed a little too far. Chris slammed on the brakes and kicked him out of the truck. “Don’t talk about my sister like that!” were his parting words. It took several minutes for the others in the car to convince Chris that it was all in good fun and to return to pick up Andy as he strolled down the street, his smirk now well under control.
People would tell me “Your brother is intense,” but they would never say anything like “He’s weird.” They knew that just as he was protective of me, I was protective of him. But the plain truth was that he didn’t react softly to things. Whenever we went bowling, he’d get so pissed off if he rolled a gutter ball, he’d stomp his way back from the lane, then throw himself down on the plastic booth so hard I expected to hear it crack beneath his slim build. I would laugh at him and say, “Geez, bro. It’s just a
game
! Don’t punish the booth!” He used to say, “I don’t take my frustrations out on people, so I get angry at things instead.” He was harder on himself than anyone else. He intensified the air around him, and people picked up on that, even if they didn’t understand it.
He was the same way in his romantic life. He didn’t discuss these things openly with anyone but Julie, but his feelings for her grew to be years ahead of most of his friends’ feelings for their girlfriends. His emotions were years ahead of where they should have been, probably.
Julie Carnes was a year younger than Chris, petite, and remarkably pretty. Her identical twin sister, Carrie, had dated my boyfriend Jimmy before me, and they had all remained good friends. Still the immature freshman, I sometimes failed to contain my jealousy about Carrie, and Julie was polite but firm whenever she needed to remind me not to engage in juvenile chitchat. I liked her a lot. She was very smart, had beautiful blue eyes and an amazing figure—everything a girl wanted to emulate.
Chris was shy and reluctant to ask Julie out, but she could tell he liked her. Julie was attracted to Chris’s intellect and the depth she saw behind his eyes. She told a mutual friend that she thought he was cute, knowing he would be informed shortly thereafter. But their palpable crush just lingered until he finally made his move. Saying nothing at all, he simply took her hand into his one day as their group of friends sat talking on the bleachers. And they were officially an item.
On their first date, they skipped over the typical movie-and-mini-golf ritual, and instead Chris took her on a long bike ride through the state park trails and into downtown D.C., where he led her to the grassy carpet of the Mall. Overlooking the Washington Monument and surrounded by fragrant cherry blossom trees in full bloom, he removed from his backpack a full-on picnic. They dined on cheeses, fruit, and sandwiches. He brought her a cookie for dessert. He didn’t try to kiss her that day, but later she told me she could tell he wanted to. They talked—about transcendentalism, existentialism, the concept of nonlinear time, which he discussed incessantly. They didn’t talk about movies or sports or who was dating whom at school.
They also didn’t talk about our parents, nor would they. Chris never talked to Julie about our family life, and he never invited her over for dinner. The only time she met our parents was when my mom insisted on taking pictures of the two of them before prom. If Julie pressed him at all about our parents, he became aloof and sullen. So, she stopped asking about them.
With Julie, Chris let in our parents’ influence only once. On prom night, he picked her up in our father’s “fancy boat” Cadillac, labeled as such because Chris hated it. He also bought her a much-too-expensive, gorgeous orchid corsage and almost broke the petals off as he fumbled to put it on her arm. He took her to The Black Orchid, one of the area’s nicest restaurants, gently held her hand throughout the night, and ordered veal for them both. He had worked hard to earn money to cover the dinner and flowers. But it was the first time he, wearing an expensive suit and arriving in the Cadillac, had been willing to acknowledge to Julie that our family was well off.
Shortly after prom, Chris’s attachment to Julie was even stronger. He started talking seriously with her about the future, about all the things he wanted to share with her, including traveling to Alaska—a fascination of his ever since he’d read Jack London’s books as a kid. He encouraged her to read
Call of the Wild
and described the adventures he wanted them to embark on together. He told her he loved her and missed her whenever they were apart.
It turned out to be too much, too soon, and Julie broke things off. Sitting in Chris’s yellow Datsun outside her parents’ house, she told him that she wanted to date other people, that she just wasn’t ready to be as serious as he was. He flew off the handle at her. “You really
are
just like all the other girls, Julie!” he told her angrily. “I can’t believe I thought you were different!”
But as soon as his rant subsided, he pulled her close and held on in an intense hug. For as long as five minutes he kept her wrapped in his arms. Then he let her go and never talked to her again.
I didn’t find out about this until years later, when Julie told me the whole story. I never asked Chris questions about their relationship—it would have been too weird. But I did notice that he was different with her than most guys were with their girlfriends. He had no strut in his step when he walked around with her; he just looked confident and content.
So, I found out that Chris and Julie had broken up the same way everyone else did—through the grapevine. It never occurred to me to ask him if he was upset. He was my big brother, my strength, and of course he was okay. He was always okay. The only time I ever saw frailty in him was when we were kids after a long day on the beach. He was maybe ten years old and had just finished a long run. Racing now against the sunset, he was so determined to finish a sand mountain by himself—sandcastles were far too formal for his taste—that even though he was getting cold, he stayed there, shivering, piling the sand higher and higher until he was satisfied with its stature. The image of him shaking remains so vivid: He wore a navy-blue bathing suit with white trim and a puka shell necklace. He didn’t complain about being cold, but I saw his teeth chattering and the ache in his eyes. It made me uneasy to see any weakness in him. I hated it. I hated knowing that he was uncomfortable, and that I couldn’t fix it for him.
I
’
D STARTED A COUNTDOWN.
Three more weeks of Chris, then two, then graduation and a final family trip to Colorado, this time for Stacy’s wedding.
When our siblings were older and stopped coming to Virginia as often, my parents would take Chris and me out to Colorado for visits and often took several of us to the mountains for weeklong stays at upscale ski resorts. For a couple of seasons, Shawna and Shelly lived and worked in a ski town called Keystone, cleaning condos and time-shares in between guests. Shawna was dating a minister’s son named Jim, whom I thought was cute with his short sun-bleached blond hair and dark mustache. One day Shannon, Chris, Quinn, and I hit the slopes with Jim. My brothers and I had all learned to ski at an early age and had spent enough time on these particular slopes to let our overconfidence get us into trouble, and Chris liked having brothers around to be rowdy with for a change. The boys loved to find fresh powder by cutting through the wider expanses of trees from one trail to another, and although it felt like my heart jumped into my throat when I tried to keep up with them, I wanted to hang tough, so I followed behind, always holding my breath until I popped out to find them waiting for me on the other side of a tall line of pine and aspen. Jim came up behind after making sure we had all made it through okay. He moved like an expert skier, and I loved to watch the rhythm of his effortless movements carving the snow. At one point when we were all stopped and discussing where to go next, Jim noticed a new rise in the slope at a steep edge where we all knew the trail wound back around beneath it. There weren’t a lot of people on the mountain, and Jim bet us that he could make the jump.