~*~My Brittle Brother Mikey~*~
by Hatter of Madness

I was only two years old when I saw Mikey for the first time.

My baby brother was small and wrinkled, and he liked to sleep a lot. My parents assured that that was what all babies did. They slept a lot because they didn't know how to do much else. Mikey was too young to play with me and my toy trains, and he couldn't sit up on his own, regardless. I also knew that babies cried a lot too because they didn't know how to talk, and that my parents doted on him hand and foot, but they never called him by name.

"Does the baby need something?" they would say, as though that was his name and as if he could even respond to them or understand. "Is the baby tired? Is the baby hungry?"

But my parents noticed that my brother, or 'the baby' as they called him, was a little bit different. He didn't just cry when he needed something or was hungry. He cried when he was picked up or when he was held for a long time and he just cried and cried and cried.

After a while, they started being more gentle with him, and the crying stopped. All that I knew was that he didn't cry as much anymore, but I didn't understand why because I was too young. And probably, the worst thing that would ever happen to him happened because I didn't understand.

I was learning how to climb, so I would climb inside his crib with him and look at him a lot and just sit there and play with the things in his crib. I liked his mobile, and the bear that was tied to the bars that made noise when you pressed a button on its back. I liked to make silly faces at Mikey and make him giggle and smile. He would kick his feet and put his entire fist in his mouth and hold onto one of my fingers with his entire hand.

My parents warned me not to climb up the bars, because, "Lo vas a lastimar." You will hurt him. My parents spoke two languages to me, English and Spanish, but always Spanish when talking about my brother. I didn't know why, but I had grown used to it. Regardless how 'used to it' I was, though, I hated hearing that phrase: "Los vas a lastimar."

That was always what it came down to. When Mikey was bigger and I wanted him to play with me and my toy trains, I was told that I couldn't do that. And when I asked why? "Lo vas a lastimar." I wanted to help him climb out of his crib? I couldn't do that because, "Lo vas a lastimar." I wanted to help him stand up on his own? I couldn't do that because, "Lo vas a lastimar."

But I will never forget the day that 'lo vas a lastimar', you will hurt him, changed into 'lo estas lastimando', you are hurting him.

It had been a little over a year since he was born. Mom was on the phone with my grandmother, and they were talking about Mikey and I; I could tell from the words my mother was using. The topic turned to Mikey, and that I knew because she always had the same grim expression on her face. She spoke quietly and quickly, I think so that I couldn't hear what was being said. I caught a few words and phrases, though: "Él se está recuperando." He is recovering. "Él es tan frágil." He is so fragile. "Carlos no entiende." Carlos doesn't understand. "Él es tan descuidado." He is so careless.

It upset me to hear my mom say those things about me, but what she was saying made very little sense. Mikey was recovering? Recovering from what? Why was he fragile? What didn't I understand?

I wanted to show my mother that I wasn't careless and that I did understand (though I didn't know what it was that I didn't understand, however), so I went to go find Mikey, who was sitting in his playpen. He started to laugh and coo upon seeing me.

"Hi, Mikey," I said when I saw him. He smiled at me with that gummy smile of his (not his fault, though; he only had a few teeth at this point). I was not supposed to let him out of the playpen, but I had seen my parents be extremely careful and hold onto his hands and help him walk, so I picked him up over the bar and did the same. I held his hands and walked backwards, thinking that if my mother was in the room she'd be so proud of me.

I didn't think that he would lose his balance and topple over, though.

But he did, and he landed on his legs, and hard. He started to scream at the top of his lungs. I was trying to get him to stand up again so I wouldn't get in trouble, but I could hear Mom running into the room and as soon as she saw him, red faced, on the floor, and me standing in front of him looking like a deer caught in the headlights, she panicked.

She picked him up in a swift move and turned to me, snapping, "Por que no me escuchas? Lo estas lastimando!" Why don't you listen to me? You are hurting him!

I didn't understand what had just happened. All he did was fall. Babies fell when they learned to walk. Little kids fell when they played with other kids. Older kids fell when they were learning to ride a bike. Why was it so bad that Mikey fell?

But apparently it was a very big deal, because my mom called up the stairs, "Esteban! El bebé!" Esteban, the baby.

Dad came running down the stairs quickly, taking him from my mother gently but swiftly and asking her, "Que paso? Laura? Que paso?" What happened?

Mom just said one word: "Carlos."

Whenever my classmates said that later, when I tried to be funny (but failed) and they said just my name in disgust, I thought back to this moment, when something was wrong with Mikey, and it was all my fault. I didn't know what was wrong, but I knew it was not anything good, and it was most definitely my fault.

"I was just trying to help," I said in a quiet voice, wishing I could just disappear.

They ignored me, my mom telling my dad to, "Llame al hospital!" Call the hospital.

He picked up the phone without another word, dialing the number and speaking very quickly in a hushed tone to the person on the other end. He gave information, such as how old Mikey was and the fact that he was crying and screaming, but he just couldn't answer the most important question: "What happened?"

Both of my parents set their eyes on me. I stood there, stock still, and started to explain in a wavering voice, but my dad stopped me. "Say it to the hospital," he said, then to the person on the phone, "Here, my son Carlos will explain," and then he handed the phone to me.

I took the phone and said, "I took Mikey out of his playpen and I was helping him walk and he fell."

If looks could kill, there would be no question that my parents would have to start planning my funeral. "Just like that?" the person on the other end asked.

I nodded. "Yeah."

"Can I speak to your dad again, please, Carlos?"

I handed him the phone, wondering what was going on. He talked to the person on the other end for a long time, and then he hung up, saying, "We're going to the hospital."

I didn't know much about the hospital except that it was where sick people went to get better and sometimes where weak people went to die quietly. I sincerely hoped at the time that it was the first one in the case of my brother. I still didn't understand why he had been screaming so much, but now, he was just crying, so I knew something had to be wrong if there were still tears in his eyes after so long.

We went outside to the car after getting shoes and things, and my mom started to carefully strap Mikey into his car seat. I offered to help, but she told me, "Lo vas a lastimar," the same words I had been hearing the duration of my brother's life. He was already hurt, though; what other damage could I do?

Just to try to rebuild my reputation, I climbed into my own car seat by myself and even buckled the seat belt. My mother did not seem to notice.

Immediately upon arrival, he was put onto a stretcher, just his tiny little self on that big bed, and they wheeled him away. My father went with them, but my mother sat me down in a chair in the waiting room and started to talk to me about my brother in English for the first time in my life. I will never understand why conversations about him always occurred in Spanish, but they did...except that one. "Carlos, haven't I told you to be careful with Mikey?" she asked.

"I was just..."

"I know, Carlos. You were just trying to help. I know. But I also know that you know that we have rules for a reason."

"Uh huh. Like I have to clean up my toys when I'm done with them."

"Exactly. And we have that rule about your brother for a reason. We've never told you why, because we didn't think you would be old enough to understand it, but you're three years old now, Carlos. I think you'll get it now."

"Get what?"

She took on a very somber look. "Carlos, do you remember when your cousin Angelo fell off his bike and he broke his arm and had to wear a cast?"

"Uh huh..." I said, already wondering what that had to do with my brother.

"Your brother...you see, we've known since he was born that something was wrong. We would hold him too tight and he would cry and we had to be extra careful with him. Most babies aren't like that. Well, as it turns out...your brother has a disease called osteogenesis imperfecta."

"What?" The words flew right over my head. I hadn't the slightest idea what that was supposed to mean.

"It's just a special way of saying that Mikey has brittle bone disease. His bones are brittle, which means that they can break very easily. That's why we have to be careful with him, because we don't want him to be hurt. He might have broke a leg when you were playing with him earlier."

When she said that, I started to cry. I hadn't meant to break his leg. My mom just patted my arm and waited for some news from my dad or a doctor.

We took him home that day with him wearing a blue cast on his leg. My parents had to be extra careful when giving him baths and putting him down to sleep, and I was not supposed to come near him. I had learned my lesson the first time; I did not want him to get another cast.

After that, I started keeping an eye on him all the time. I did not ever let him out of my sight for an instant. When I started school especially, I worried. I thought it was clever to stop calling him my 'little brother' and instead called him my 'brittle brother'. Nobody understood the pun, but I thought I was just a genius child for thinking of it in the first place.

I was in kindergarten when the next big break happened.

I had come home from school and had a drawing in my hand for Mikey and was going to give it to him, when I heard a scream coming from the stairs.

"Mom!" I screamed, running to find him. He was crumpled in a heap at the bottom of the stairs. It looked like he had just fallen down the last few steps. "Mikey!" I said when I saw him, trying to help him sit up but at the same time trying not to hurt him. "What happened?" He couldn't talk because of how much pain he was in.

My mom came running in at that moment, and I braced myself for what was to come next: "Lo estas lastimando!" You are hurting him.

I tried to explain that I hadn't done anything, but I knew that we were just looking at another trip to the hospital. That time was different, however; the doctors said that they wanted my parents to look into two things. Firstly, there was a surgery that they had performed on other kids with brittle bone disease that prevented them from breaking bones. They would insert sticks of metal into his legs that would protect the bone and would essentially improve his life. But of course, the surgery wasn't perfect. Even with the metal, breaks could happen. They also suggested that my parents look into getting him in a wheelchair. The two changes would happen simultaneously.

They agreed to do it, simply because anything that could help my brother or myself would be done to make sure we had the best lives possible. After the surgery, he was in great pain for a long time, and I couldn't help but feel guilty. If I had gotten home only a minute earlier, I could have helped him down the stairs, and none of this would have happened.

When I saw him for the first time after the surgery, I tried to smile and act like nothing was wrong. Mikey frowned and asked, "Is this funny to you?"

I panicked, mainly thinking that I was upsetting him when I had already hurt him so much, so I said the first thing that came to mind. "Actually, I find this humerus."

He thought about it and then started to laugh, completely forgetting about what upset him. That was what started me on my jokes that made my classmates and parents alike groan; every subsequent time that Mikey had a break, I would pull out lame jokes to keep him happy. I was constantly thinking on my feet, trying to come up with a clever pun.

We had to be trained to accommodate his wheelchair, so I asked my parents, "Is it hard?"

"Very," my mother said, trying to sound optimistic for his sake.

Quickly, since he was in the room, I said, "It's sad that he's in a wheelchair. I find it hard to stand."

Mikey started to laugh, as well as my dad, but my mother sighed and shook her head, muttering, "Carlos..."

But things were okay, until I was at the end of the fifth grade and Mikey had another bad break. Even though he had rods in his legs and usually used his wheelchair, he could walk when he wanted. Unfortunately, that also meant possible damage to himself if he did something wrong. And unfortunately, he had a slight stumble and ended up breaking his foot. He was then confined to his wheelchair until after it healed.

I was angry at myself for not having a tighter watch on him, so on the first day of school, when I was in the sixth grade and he was in the fourth, I let him stay with his friends and I went to the office to find out what teacher he had. To my surprise, he was under the watch of my own teacher from the fourth grade, the most amazing teacher I had ever had: Ms. Valerie Frizzle. But at the same time, this was a curse, because Ms. Frizzle liked to go on field trips pretty much every day of the school year; her catch phrase was, "Take chances, make mistakes, and get messy." If she wasn't careful, there would definitely be mistakes made.

I went to Ms. Frizzle's classroom, a room I had not been in for over a year, and walked in to find it in utter chaos. But Ms. Frizzle was there, holding a large cardboard box that said "art supplies" on the side, looking scarcely different from how I remembered her, and she broke into a wide grin upon seeing me.

"Fancy seeing you here, Carlos," she said. "How is sixth grade treating you?"

The school day hadn't started, so I just said, "Fine. I was actually wanting to talk to you about something."

"Of course!" she said, setting down the heavy box in her arms and giving me her undivided attention.

"I talked to the office this morning, and you're going to have my little brother, Mikey, in your class this year," I said.

"Oh, that's wonderful," she said, waiting for me to get to the point.

"Right. Well, he's a great kid, you know, and he's in a wheelchair."

"Right..."

"He has brittle bone disease, Ms. Frizzle, and he's broken more bones in his life than I can count on both of my hands. I just wanted to ask you to be careful this year, because I know that you like to go on crazy field trips and stuff."

She was quiet, and then said, "I'll be sure to keep an eye on him, Carlos. You have my word." And she smiled at me again and said, "Tell your teacher I said hello. Have a great school year!"

"Thanks, Ms. Frizzle," I said, feeling a weight lifted off my chest.

"Remember to take chances," she said, going off on her usual banter. "Make mistakes..."

"And get messy," I finished with a smile, and then I turned out of the classroom and went to room 10 with Mr. Green, my mind at ease. I knew that Ms. Frizzle meant well, just the same that I did, and that accidents happened, but she was going to be careful, and that was all I could ever ask of her.

Okay I'm sitting here thinking what the heck did I just write? But yeah, I got this idea because I was thinking yesterday that it was never explained why Mikey was in a chair. I also know that it's said that he's paralyzed, and brittle bone disease does not suggest paralysis, but it seems like we arrived at that conclusion through the fact that he is in a wheelchair. So I just wrote this, because that was one scenario that I thought of; there are two others, too, so if there's enough demand I might write the others and add them onto this story as second and third chapters. As for now though, this story is finished. This is also supposed to be told when Carlos is older (obviously), which is why there's the use of higher level vocab from him.

- Hatter of Madness