(image from mentalfloss.com)
A few nights ago, the kids and I were in the living room
after dinner. It was a rare night when
the oldest two were home, and all three of them were talking and teasing each other. I was engrossed
in the book I was reading until their banter suddenly caught my attention.
“Well, at
least I didn’t give you toilet water to drink when you were sick, Matt!” This protest from my youngest son toward his
older brother was the first time I’d heard such a thing. I mean, sure, we discuss toilet water like
every other normal family, but it’s usually in the context of “the cat is
drinking it,” or “it’s overflowing all over the place.”
“Wait…toilet
water? Matt, you gave your brother toilet water to drink?”
“Evan,
aren’t you ever gonna forget that? I was
EIGHT!”
“So you did
give your brother toilet water to drink.
Matt, how could you?”
Evan, happy to now have an audience, proceeded to tell the
story of how he asked Matt for a drink of water while he was sick on the couch
and Matt gave him toilet water instead.
“How did
you know it was toilet water?” I asked
Evan, hoping that this story was just one big exaggeration. I mean, my kids get along great, don’t
they? They’re decent and respectful to
one another when I'm not around, right?
Evan was more than happy to shatter my cozy image of sibling
harmony. “I knew it was toilet water
because it was warm. Also, because Matt
told me it was after I drank it.”
Matt, knowing he was snagged, simply had to report on a
misdeed of Evan's. “Well, at least I didn’t lock you in your room all the time like
you used to do to me.”
I did know about this particular infraction. Our house is old, and the door to Matt’s
bedroom has a skeleton-key lock on the outside of the door rather than on the
inside. Whenever Evan and Matt would
play together in Matt’s room and have a disagreement, Evan would storm out,
slam Matt’s door, and then lock it from the outside. Matt would be trapped in his room, pounding
on the door and yelling, until someone freed him.
Evan, anxious to return the attention to his own
mistreatment, said, “That’s nothing like giving someone toilet water to
drink. Toilet. Water. When they’re SICK.” Evan was clearly going for maximum sympathy.
“It’s not
like I peed in it first or anything.
Geez, Evan!”
That’s true. If Matt
wanted to be truly evil and malicious, he could have peed in the toilet
first. I briefly wondered why Matt
hadn't thought of that because if he had, he surely would have upped the gross-out
factor.
They continued to tell tales of sibling pranks on one
another, each trying to secure the title of Most Tormented Brother. Apparently, they only behave like civil human
beings when I'm around.
At least something good came from these confessions: I now know to not ever ask any of them for a
drink of water when I'm sick.
