IV

When my brother was about nine years-old he began to be bullied. It was nothing so serious that he told our parents or anyone at the school about it. To be totally truthful, it was more of a playground squabble than bullying proper. Being the elder of us, the duty fell to me to back him up. As we walked home for lunch one day, we were jeered at by my brother’s tormentors. I never knew the cause of their teasing on that day, but thinking back now, I realise that it was because of the boots. He was wearing mother’s boots. They were pink, rubber, and came almost to his knees, but what was he to do? Walk to school and back in sodden feet? It only occurs to me now that it had been raining all that week. Surely if Fate jokes, then Memory is a trickster.

I’ve always thought that it must have been something brother had done, but it wasn’t. How many times in one’s life does Memory pull the wool over our eyes? We go through life with our feet on the firm cobble of our memories--memories big on equal level with memories small. But how firm is our footing? How many stones are illusions created by our minds so we don’t have to trip over our faults?