A Pale Summer

Once upon a time, a long time ago, when I was a carefree college student, I took a few summer classes. Summer classes are great if you want to get your schooling done quickly, but that's about all they are good for. While taking summer classes I ended up with a week long summer vacation. So I went home.

While I was home I did the usual summer things: hang around the house with my younger brothers and eat ice cream, take an hour to walk somewhere I could drive to in five minutes or less, and go to the neighbors house at night to play games if I got excessively bored.

One night while my brothers and I were over at the neighbors house playing games, I looked across the room at Brother S because he was talking loudly, as usual; but I noticed his skin looked awfully pale even though it was the middle of July. Maybe he has spent too much time playing video games this summer and hasn't gotten much sun. I am cursed with a red and freckled complexion. I wished my skin was that pale.

I noticed several odd things that week; Brother S who is usually loud, boisterous and willing to play ultimate frisbee at any given time of day or night, spent most of his time sleeping on the brown couch in his room, or laying on the couch in the living room. I often stopped outside his bedroom to listen for snoring. With all that sleeping it seemed he would fade into death. And each passing day he seemed paler, his lips lost color, his face lost life, and he continued sleeping more and more.

One day when I caught him awake, I told him there was something wrong with him.

"It is just allergies," he responded. "I just need my allergy medicine." And he laid his head back down and fell asleep.

It didn't seem like allergies to me, and I didn't know what to do. So I told my mom there was something wrong with Brother S.

"He is pale, and he sleeps all the time, and he is not getting better," I looked up at her from the foyer, as she stood in the upstairs hall, holding the banister.

"Well, I'll take him to the doctor," she answered absently, and went into her room. My mother, who is usually very attentive and responsive, had just started working full time for the first time in thirty years. Later I found this to be the basis of her reaction, but at the time I figured if my mom was not concerned than it must not be significant. So I continued furrowing my brow, and listening at the door for Brother S's snoring, until I went back to school.

Two days later, as I set my bookbag down in the kitchen, I found a note on the table saying my brother was in the hospital.

I called home. My mother said Brother S had passed out and cut his eye open and when they took him to the hospital they found him in serious condition. She didn't want to talk much, she felt guilty and upset. She would sent Brother B to drive the two hours and pick me up. As I waited in the living room, a little dazed and a little confused, Roommate R proceeded to tell me how her brother got t-boned in a car by a diesel truck and he was in a coma for three months, and the only thing that saved him was his awesomeness. I really wasn't in the mood to hear all this, and heald my breath until Brother B arrived.

On the drive home Brother B explained that Brother S had a part of his umbilical cord that usually shrivels up and dies in most people, still attatched to his large intestine. Not only did it not shrivel up and die, but it had grown and was producing stomach acid until it burned a hole in the intestine and all of Brother S's blood and bodily fluids were escaping into the toilet. Whoa! No wonder he was pale.

So after surgery, and several days in the hospital Brother S was back to normal, only after that he started eating a lot less, and he lost tons of weight. I always figure this was because he was no longer feeding a second stomach.