Greg loved him like a father, in the good sense and in the bad. He spoiled Joe and put up with too much of his crap. At the same time he was always preaching to him wherever they’d happen to be as if he were a kid. I remember the craziness that came over Greg as we returned from Mass one Sunday and found Sleepy Joe seated at the kitchen table and playing with the meat knife, holding it with his right hand and stabbing the spaces between the fingers of his left hand, faster, faster, pricking holes in the table, and right when Greg said to stop the fucking game, Joe misjudged a move and stabbed one of his fingers. Not badly, but enough so that blood splattered on the table. And Greg screamed out, “You idiot, you moron.” What didn’t he call Joe? “You’ve ruined my kitchen table, you asshole,” he said. “Look what you’ve done, it’s full of marks.” But Joe took it and remained silent, sucking on the wound between his ring finger and pinkie.
They fought a lot because they’re a lot alike, I used to think and still think; I imagine that Greg became a cop just as simply as he could have become a criminal. And that Joe became a good-for-nothing just as simply as he could have become a cop. But perhaps I’m not being fair to Greg, who was a peaceful sort of guy, whereas Sleepy Joe had a rage inside him that was eating him alive and making steam come out of his ears. I have always thought that he never became a serial killer simply because he was too lazy. He told us he was a truck driver, and although I had never seen a truck, there was no reason to doubt his word, except for the sleepiness. If it were true that he was a truck driver, he’d have long before wrecked a vehicle by falling asleep at the steering wheel. After we were married and Greg moved into my place, Sleepy Joe began to visit us frequently, dining with us and sleeping on the sofa in the living room. He usually slept straight through the day. He had his beers, burped loudly and resoundingly, like a sated baby, lay spread-eagled on the sofa to watch TV, and fell asleep so deeply and for so long that it seemed he had died. An amazing corpse, if the truth be told. I took advantage of this to watch him, his face half-hidden by his folded arm and his powerful body on display, barely stirred by a breath. A young lion in docile rest. Greg, of course, saw it differently. He thought that since childhood Joe was in a rage and cursing the world, fast asleep, or silently hatching some malicious plan. Deep down, I knew the truth about Sleepy Joe. It would be a lie to say I didn’t, but I never put it in words, and if I had, Greg would have jumped to his brother’s defense.