A Song for Julia

think it was going to happen, but we got the orders last night. They’re saying we’ll probably be gone for at least a year.”
    Sean didn’t say anything. Crank said, “A year? Can they do that?”
    “Yeah, they can do it, Dougal. There’s nothing I can do but salute and follow orders.”
    I stared at Jack aghast. I was trying to imagine what the impact was on this family that I’d somehow gotten intertwined with. Who would take care of Sean? He was seventeen but had the emotional maturity of someone much younger. He wasn’t ready to be on his own.
    Crank shook his head. “I can’t frickin’ believe it. We’re really going to war over there.”
    “I’ve been telling you that, kid.”
    “Who’s going to watch out for Sean?”
    As soon as Crank said the words, Sean stood up and blurted out, “I will not go to Grandfather’s house again. You can’t make me.” And he walked out of the kitchen.
    Jack sighed. “I was afraid of that.”
    “Can you blame him?” Crank asked. “Grandpa treated him like crap when you got called up last year.”
    “What happened last year?” I asked, putting a hand on Crank’s shoulder. Sean had told me a little. I remembered him saying, I hate them.
    “My dad doesn’t get Asperger’s,” Jack said. “He seems to think a shout and a swift kick in the ass is all it will take to get Sean to be normal. And when I got called up after September 11, Sean stayed with him for four weeks. It didn’t go well.”
    Crank spoke, his tone low and almost broken, “It was a disaster.”
    “I’m gonna talk with your moth—”
    Jack stopped, and they both jerked in their seats at the sound of a loud crash from the living room. All three of us jumped up to our feet and ran into the living room.
    Sean had pulled the six-foot high bookcase down, books and pictures and knickknacks scattered across the floor. He stood next to it with his arms flexed, his hands balls into fists and his face tense, brow drawn down in rage. “I won’t go to Grandpa’s! I won’t! He hates me!”
    I almost cried out when Sean took a clenched fist and hit himself in the forehead, and then hit himself again, savagely, with the other fist. He let out an animal cry, and Crank ran to him and put his arms around his brother. “You won’t have to!” Crank said urgently. “I’ll—I’ll move back home. I’ll stay with you, Sean. You’re my brother. I’ll watch out for you.”
    Sean looked up at his brother, his face confused and angry and sad, and he started to wail. “I can’t go to Grandpa’s, I can’t!”
    Crank shook his head. “I’ve got you, Sean, all right? You don’t have to go anywhere. You’ll stay right here, with me, all right? And we’ll wait for Dad to come home. Dad’s going to be all right. Do you hear? He’s going to be all right.”
    Jack slowly walked over to his two sons and put his arms around both of them and held them tight. Sean was calming down now, his breath slowing to a ragged rhythm. I stood watching, marveling at the contrast of my own distant, controlling parents as this strong man held both of his sons in his arms, holding them together with love and a strength I couldn’t comprehend.
    I felt like an intruder, witnessing an intimately private moment that was never meant to be shared. I quietly took a step back, to go sit in the kitchen, but Jack somehow sensed it and said, “Get over here, missy.”
    I wanted to look over my shoulder and point at myself and say, “Me?” But there was no one else he could mean, so I walked over too, avoiding the downed shelves and the debris scattered across the floor. Jack reached out and pulled me by the arm into this family embrace, and I nearly burst into tears. Somehow the moment he pulled me into that embrace, it brought up all the times I’d needed my mother to do the same. All the times I’d spent alone, or in the garage with Barry in Belgium. All the times I’d needed my mother to hold me and say it was going to be okay, and she wasn’t there.
    And so I whispered a promise, one that was too impulsive and committed me to far more than I had ever been willing to give—a promise that meant I was going to be around for a while. I whispered to Jack, “They’ll be all right while you’re gone. I’ll watch out for both of them.”
    Jack responded by pulling me in tighter.
    A few moments later, Jack broke off the embrace. “All right. Let’s fix this shelf.”
    Sean’s eyes were pointed off to the side,