by Rosanne Scott
So, I have myself tested and believe you me, they check you over! They must have taken a gallon of blood and while I sat there with the needle jammed in my arm, there were a zillion questions, questions like how much do I drink and how often do I have sex and with how many partners. Had I ever been hospitalized? For what? Do I get thirsty a lot? How often do I pee? Do I use drugs? No, I said, I do not use drugs, though I admit that I fudged on the alcohol—I love my wine! The other questions were even more insulting and I said so, but the doctor, one of those lab-coat deals looking over his spectacles at me, said that there was no point in putting in a new kidney if the new kidney was already on its way to being shot. This isn’t personal, he said. Like how is this not personal?
It took about a week to get all the test results back and it turned out I was good to go, so I go over to Randy’s thinking I’ll surprise him. The first thing he wants to know is why I didn’t call before coming over. The game’s on. Well, that puts me off, but I ignore him and go ahead and pour myself a glass from that box he keeps in the fridge. Not great, the stuff in the box, but there’s Randy for you.
I make him turn off the TV. Then I lift my glass like you do when you’re celebrating. I say, “Have I got news for you!” and tell him we’re a match, that he can have one of my kidneys. And do you know what he says to me, what my own brother says to me?
He says, Ah, Christ, now I’ll be beholding to you for the rest of my life. And I say, well, that’s a shit thing to say, and he gives me a look. And I say when was the last time I bugged you about the loan? Or about that other loan? Or. . . .
And he interrupts, because he always interrupts, and he says yesterday. Just yesterday, he says, you told me that I am, as you put it, in arrears. And I’ll admit that’s a word I use a lot when it comes to Randy but I say, now Randy, let us be reasonable, reasonable being another one of my words because if he doesn’t get my kidney, if he dies because he refuses my kidney, it’s for sure I’ll never get my money back. Randy, I say, be reasonable, and he looks at me and he says, you go to hell Sister Baby. He calls me Sister Baby, though I am the oldest. You go to hell and you take with you both your goddamn kidneys, you hear?
That’s the thanks I get. So I go pounding back to the kitchen, swing open the fridge, pour myself another from that box. And that’s when I let go. I stick my head inside next to the tub of mayonnaise and that old iceberg and those wieners he eats all the time and I just let go. Oh, Gawd! What will I do without my brother? I howl and I cry like there’s no tomorrow. Because there might not be so many left.
He lets me go on like this. As per usual. As per Randy. And then he yells, “Sister Baby, get your head out of that Frigidaire! I can hear you over the TV!”
When I finally collect myself he shouts for me to make him a wiener sandwich. He shouts that I’ll get my money. My damn money. He shouts, “Come on, Sister Baby, you don’t want to miss this! Saints ahead, seven nothin’.”
Later, when the game’s over, we’ll take up the kidney business again and shout at each other, but right now I wipe my eyes, get out a spoon so I can heap on the mayonnaise. This is the way my brother likes it.
Rosanne Scott has published short stories in the Threepenny Review, SmokeLong, Vestal Review and elsewhere. She lives in Alexandria, VA.
Emerge Literary Journal 