Sister’s First
Buy Issue for $25 at JHUP- Sister’s First
A Gene Tierney lookalike, his motherwaited tables downtown. His father hedidn’t know. In fourth grade he gained fame by
sticking a sixth-grade bully square on thenose. Although never a Boy Scout he waspolite to most grownups & kind to us
younger kids. His thirteenth summer you mighthave seen him standing out on the curb tosurvey his day’s work, the mowed & trimmed lawns
of widows & the recently divorced.Dogs trotted up to him; passers-by honked,waved. By sixteen he’d learned to sip lemonade
& converse on the porches of certainhomes. He’d come to appreciate girls &caddied for their daddies at the club. At
seventeen he bought a ‘56Chevy & frequented the drive-intheater on the edge of town. My sister
insisted it was true love & told ourparents how good he was to his mom.He would sit with that tired beauty to
watch fireflies dance in the field behindtheir house. Weekends he fished for perch at thelake, trout in the run. I liked him a lot [End Page 390]
myself. He taught me to smoke & how toheel & toe. When Sis flew off to collegehe went to Vietnam. Half a century
gone & no, he didn’t return. [End Page 391]
JOHN MEREDITH HILL lives in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and Provincetown, Massachusetts, with his wife and their large dog. He teaches at the University of Scranton.
