Sean thought it was odd when he first saw the fly that morning.
It had been a cold winter. Thanksgiving had brought an unseasonable blizzard, December had been pelted with ice storms, and as the dark, bleak days of January dragged on, the temperatures had hovered around zero.
So it was unusual that there would be a fly.
Sean had just shut off his car and stepped outside - the cold air stinging like a slap to the face, the clouds heavy gunmetal above him - when he noticed it.
A housefly. It was fat and black and perched on his side mirror. At first he stopped and stared, balancing keys and thermos in his hands as he studied it. The fly seemed to be studying him as well; its globular head was cocked to one side and its thin wings shivered thoughtfully as it looked him up and down. A slight breeze passed by, and Sean shut his eyes against the cold. When he opened them again, the fly was gone.
Maybe it hadn't been there at all, he thought with a shake of his head as he mounted the steps to the print shop. Maybe he was seeing things; he had heard that stress could do that to a person.
And Marco was coming home today.
No. He didn't want to think about it. He'd spent every minute since last Tuesday trying not to think about it.
I wish you'd at least try to get along, his mom had pleaded over the phone, It's been so long, Sean, it's been five years since you even spoke to him.
Yeah, five years. It wasn't enough. Five years wasn't long enough to forget.
The little bell over the doorway rang a cheerful welcome as he stepped inside the shop. A second cheerful welcome came from Jenny, who sat behind the counter, sorting files.
"Good morning," she smiled, pushing her thick-rimmed glasses up her nose.
"Morning," he replied, "I thought you weren't coming in today."
Jenny shrugged.
"The storm isn't coming 'til afternoon," she said, "I thought I might as well get some things in order here."
"Well, I appreciate the help," he said as he put his things away. He did need help. He hadn't been able to keep his mind on work all week.
Amazing how one person could monopolize his thoughts that way. As the day of Marco's arrival had approached, Sean could almost feel him drawing nearer, advancing with that same electric-pressure dread of the gathering storm.
He had tried to push Marco out, to banish him to the dark hinterlands of his mind where he belonged; but try as he might, he couldn't keep the memories from floating to the surface. He still saw him when he closed his eyes; Marco drawing a knife across arm, blood oozing from the wound, Marco screaming as he slammed his head against the wall, Marco standing in the doorway of his bedroom with the blue feathers of a parakeet dripping between his fingers -
Sean shook his head, clearing his mind as well as he could as he began working on emails. He was just about to send the last when Jenny interrupted him.
"What?" he asked, looking up, "Sorry, I wasn't listening."
"I said, 'darn, we're out of coffee'," Jenny repeated, holding up the empty pot.
"Oh, right," Sean said, "I can run over to Ed's and pick some up."
"You don't have to, it's fine."
"It's no problem," Sean said, getting up and grabbing his coat, "it's right across the street; I'll be back in ten minutes."
"Ok, if you want."
He did want. Not the coffee - his mind was racing quickly enough without the caffeine - he just wanted to go. It was this nervous, restless feeling that he couldn't shake, this mounting storm-clouds sense of doom.
"Back in a bit," he called to Jenny, as he stepped out.
The cold took his breath away as he made his way to the car, watching his step on the hard sidewalk to avoid the wicked slicks of ice that had been missed by the scattered handfuls of blue salt. Slowly, he made it to his car.
And there, once again, was the fly.
It was bigger, somehow. At least it seemed bigger. Sean hadn't noted it as being an especially large fly before, but now, as it sat perched atop his sedan like an unsightly hood ornament, he was sure it must have grown since the last time he had seen it.
He approached it slowly, as if afraid it might attack. For some reason, he imagined it would go for his eyes.
"Scram," he muttered in its direction as he reached the car door, "go on, get oughtta here. Buzz off."
The fly didn't seem to appreciate the pun. It cocked its mobile head to get a better view of him. It had to be bigger, those eyes…Sean could almost see himself reflected in the shiny surface. Before he could ponder it any longer, the fly again took off into the sky.
*****
Sean returned to the office a few minutes later, flinging his keys on his desk and starting a pot of coffee in the back room. He took a deep breath and leaned against the counter as the coffeemaker began its low, gurgling drip.
"Are you ok, Sean?"
He looked up to see Jenny standing there, her head cocked to the side in concern.
"Yeah; yeah, I'm fine," he said, rubbing his forehead.
"You look pale," she said, "I mean, like, really pale. Are you sure you're not sick or something?"
"Really, I feel fine," he answered, "I'm just stressed, is all. My brother's coming tonight, and I - "
He trailed off, as Jenny's brow knitted in confusion.
"Brother? You never told me you had any siblings."
"Adopted brother," he said quickly, "my parents adopted Marco when he was eight."
Jenny nodded and started to pour herself a cup of coffee as she carefully pried,
"So…I guess you two didn't get along so great?"
Sean let out a heavy sigh and rubbed his hands together distractedly.
"It's more complicated than that," he explained, "my mom and dad were great parents - I mean, they were amazing parents - but they weren't ready for a kid like Marco. He came from this screwed-up situation, he'd been bouncing around all these different foster homes but nobody knew how to deal with him - "
He paused, wishing he hadn't started this conversation. Jenny was patiently waiting for him to continue, and he felt that now he had to finish the story. He went on,
"My parents thought they could help him. But Marco was too messed up. He did these bizarre things to get attention. He'd hurt himself, bang his head against the wall, threaten to kill himself if he didn't get his way. I remember him throwing a fit in the kitchen, screaming curse words at my mom - you wouldn't believe an eight-year-old could even cuss like that - and he did things like that all the time. But there were always the excuses, you know? Like it wasn't his fault, like all the bad shit he'd been through made it ok."
He took a deep breath, steadying himself against the emotion that swelled in his chest and pressed against the backs of his eyes.
"It was never on him, you know?" he said, "No matter what he did, my parents always blamed it on his past. Me, on the other hand - I couldn't do anything right. I was the older brother, I was supposed to be a good example, I was held accountable for everything. And Marco, he knew it. He knew how to play my parents, how to get me in trouble. I remember one day we were playing outside - "
He stopped, suddenly self-conscious. Maybe he shouldn't be saying this much. He and Jenny were pretty close, for co-workers, and they'd shared plenty of personal stories on those long, boring days when business was slow. This felt too personal. But Jenny was still waiting, her eyes wide behind her glasses as she warmed her hands around her coffee mug. He continued.
"We had this old shed behind the house. We didn't really use it for anything, it was just an eyesore. My dad was planning to fix the leaky roof, and he had propped an old ladder up against it. We got the idea to climb up on the roof - I know it was dumb, but we were kids, you know - and anyway, we got up there and Marco; he just got this look on his face, and I knew he was plotting something. And then, all of a sudden he - he just - jumped."
Jenny stared at him dumbly for a moment, the murmuring of the coffee pot filling the silence.
"He jumped off the roof?" She finally said in disbelief.
"Yeah," Sean answered, "he jumped off the roof. He ended up in the hospital with a bunch of broken bones, and guess whose fault that was? Mine, because I should have been keeping a better eye on him. Marco knew I'd get blamed for it. He almost killed himself just to get my parents mad at me - that's how sick he was, Jenny."
She was staring into her coffee cup, her expression pained.
"I'm so sorry, Sean," she said, "that's - that's so much more than any kid should have to deal with. Do you feel a little better now, though? I mean, after talking about it?"
"Yeah," he said, giving her a weak smile, "a little bit."
Only he didn't really feel any better.