The Martlet

My little brother Tyler was a still lump under a pile of light baby blankets. He was six weeks old and weighed less than five pounds — about the same as a small cat. He lay motionless in his crib. Only his quiet, trembling breaths gave any indication that he was alive. Upstairs in the foster home, his three older siblings played on the floor of the bright living room while he slept in darkness.

I stood in the bedroom doorway and looked at this tiny, alien human being. His pale features were unusually delicate, as though he were a porcelain doll. I wanted to cradle him gently, close to my chest, in case he broke.

Tyler was born prematurely in the early morning of January 12, 1996. His mother, an addict from the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver, was high on cocaine while she was in labour. Tyler was her fourth child in less than five years. All of her kids had been taken from her custody by the government.

The doctors rescued Tyler from her body before she could do any more damage, before she could continue poisoning him with street drugs and despair. She never saw him, never held him, never knew him. By the time she woke up he was gone, hooked up to machines and being monitored by medical professionals.

The first time I held Tyler in my arms I was surprised by his moist warmth. He gazed up at me with sleepy blue eyes. I kissed him lightly on the forehead. He had been living with his older brother and two older sisters in a foster home in Ladner, B.C., since his birth. Their social workers had been struggling to place the kids, as they hoped to keep the four siblings together. My parents, already with their own four children, had originally been considering adopting a sibling group of two. But upon meeting Ashley, Cody, Amanda and Tyler, their plans instantly changed.

Tyler was ten months old when my family finalized the adoption. We brought him home to our house in Tsawwassen. He was a quiet, wide-eyed baby. With time his jowls started to round, his legs grew into doughy folds, his tiny fingers fattened. He would gum my pinkie finger and gurgle at the world around him. He had a burbling, innocent laugh.

Tyler liked to toss food from his high chair, liked to smear goop into his white-blond hair and onto his face. He tried to form words. When he learned to walk we would prop him up in our living room and send him toddling across the floor to a family member’s outstretched hands. We have pictures of his first steps, his hands reaching out as he wobbles across the carpet in his baby blue jumper.

Tyler was, without a doubt, the baby of the family. Everyone doted on him, fought over him, competed for his attention. But though he found a comfortable perch on his older siblings’ hips and often fell asleep on my Dad’s chest, he also liked to venture out into the house alone. He crawled onto counters to prepare his own cereal and learned how to use my Dad’s stereo system, making a mess of our CD collection in the process.

It was a lazy afternoon and Tyler had been crawling around the house for a few hours while the rest of the family did chores and watched TV. He was two years old. No one noticed him crawl into my sister’s room, lug himself on to a chair and reach up for the windowsill. He looked out at our front yard. Then, as he tried to pull himself higher, he lost his balance and toppled out of the second-storey window.

Tyler’s wail was a familiar sound in our house. At first, no one took special notice. “Where’s Tyler?” someone asked.

My sisters, my parents, everyone ran up and down the hallways trying to find the source of his screams. We searched from room to room, but he was nowhere to be seen. Finally, one of my sisters found him tangled upside down in our front yard hedge, just below the window. My Dad reached down, searched around, and took Tyler by the ankle. He lifted Tyler back inside.

I loved being an older brother. I loaded Tyler into a little blue trailer behind my bicycle, along with his older brother Cody. I strapped them into their seats, with one of them facing backwards while the other watched me struggle to pump them up hills. We would coast through the lush suburban streets, down to the Dairy Queen across town. We sat in the grass and ate dilly bars, or bought candy from 7-Eleven. I biked them to Centennial Beach, sweat soaking through the back of my t-shirt.

Then came training wheels. My parents had to buy new bikes every year or two as the boys grew. When they were old enough we cruised around the streets together, exploring hiking trails in the woods and the endless cul-de-sacs and side streets, many crowded with sprawling mansions. Both the boys started to learn how to do wheelies or ride without hands, cutting through parks and hurling their bikes off jumps. Pretty soon they were both more comfortable on their bikes than I ever was.

Tyler is such a product of the Tsawwassen suburbs, it’s hard for me to imagine the life he almost lived — maybe bouncing around foster homes or ending up on the streets of Vancouver. When I see homeless teenagers I wonder if that would be what Tyler would look like if the Ministry of Children and Families hadn’t taken him into their custody. He’s never known poverty or hunger. He’s never had to deal with abusive and neglectful parents. His older siblings, Ashley and Cody, lived with their parents for the first few years of their lives, but both Amanda and Tyler were taken away at birth. Tyler doesn’t know any other life.

Tyler inherited my penchant for dangerous outdoor sports. He is always looking for that adrenaline kick, whether he’s cliff-jumping or swimming through rapids. Our backyard trampoline was one his favourite spots to play. He loved to put the sprinkler on during humid summer days, then run and bounce through the spray. The kids would crowd on the tramp to play “Crack the Egg” or to attempt new tricks. Tyler got bounced clear off one evening and landed on his head, breaking his collarbone. My sister Kathryn cradled him in her arms, but he never cried — he just turned pale and gazed up at the sky with glassy, distant eyes.

These days Tyler likes to play video games in his bedroom or drive out to Surrey to visit his girlfriend Brooke. He hangs out at the mall and plays soccer with his friends. He’s the goalie, and late into the evening he’ll be playing at Winskill Park in Tsawwassen, blocking shots and booting the ball back into the field after a save. A couple years ago he flew to California for a soccer camp and got to meet David Beckham. He keeps his hair long, sticking in every direction from under his $50 baseball cap.

In the summer of 2009, our family headed up to Davis Lake, a remote camping spot in the interior of B.C. My uncle took the boys fishing, and we lazed around in our tents, read books and went for long leisurely swims.

I’d moved to Victoria for university a few years earlier, so the few days with my family were a welcome break. Tyler had grown lanky and athletic, his 13-year-old body starting to pick up the normal muscular armour of adolescence. His soft voice was getting gravelly. I was surprised to find he could keep up with me when we swam across the lake. He didn’t need me anymore.

I took pictures of my brothers while they swung over the water on two rope swings suspended from a looming tree branch. After getting bored of solo jumps, the boys decided to swing together. Tyler would jump off the platform with Cody following close behind. They swooped over the water and let go, trying to flail into creative poses for the camera.

They successfully completed their tandem jumps a couple times, and I have pictures of them suspended miraculously in mid-air, just before they plopped into the lake. In one Tyler smiles excitedly, his eyes bulged, his hat swiveled sideways on his head. The sun illuminates the smooth surface of the water as a swath of evergreen trees reaches out behind him. Cody is suspended above him, his back to the camera, falling in Tyler’s direction.

On the fourth or fifth attempt, the boys decided to switch the order. While Cody jumped first, Tyler followed close behind. The tree creaked as the ropes pulled tight and my brothers flew away from me. Cody reached the apex of the swing, but hesitated a moment before letting go. Tyler came rushing up behind him and crashed into his back. While Cody plummeted into the water, Tyler forgot to let go. I watched, the camera still up to my eye, as Tyler swung back towards the unforgiving bark of the tree. There wasn’t enough time to panic, to yell, to do anything. With a sickening thwunk he crashed into the trunk and crumpled into the shallow water below. Curled in the fetal position half-submerged, surrounded by the murky tendrils of the tree roots, he didn’t move.

Cody scooped Tyler from the water, held his limp body in his arms, tried to get him to wake up. Tyler’s mouth hung open, his head lolling to one side. His eyes were closed. “Tyler, Tyler. Can you hear me?”

His eyes fluttered open after about twenty seconds. Cody and I squatted in the shallows, our hands holding Tyler’s little body. I was only afraid for a moment. I asked him to move his arms, his legs. I wanted to make sure he hadn’t broken his spine. He seemed sleepy and drugged, mumbling and dazed, but he was okay.

Swinging my camera around my back, I hauled Tyler up in my arms and cradled him like he was a baby again. I felt his warm, sun-baked skin against mine. His head slumped against my neck, his wet hair dripped down my chest. I whispered in his ear, “Don’t worry, you’re okay. I’ve got you, Tyler. I’ve got you.”

Will Johnson is a Vancouver writer. To read more about his adopted family, check out Somebody’s Child, a non-fiction anthology published by Touchwood Editions. The Victoria book launch is at 7:00 on Nov. 29, at Choices Adoption and Counselling (850 Blanshard St.).