mself by literally turning his back. Possibly recognizing his error, the narrator attempts to rationalize with his brother asking, "Doesn't all this take a lot of time?" (85). The emotional damage, however, has been done.Sonny responds: "He stopped at the kitchen table and picked up my cigarettes" (86), ironically not with just any cigarettes but the very ones which the narrator uses to create his own impenetrable veil of smoke. Testing his "courage to smoke in front of [the narrator]," he questions the very integrity of his supposed guardian (86). Sonny turns the tide of the conversation, inquiring about his older brother's youthful activities, "Come on, now. I bet you was smoking at my age, tell the truth" (86). Grinning defensively at having his dreams of Jazz discounted, he jabs his elder where he is most sensitive. He threatens to join the army, which is his brother's worst fear. When the narrator is able to ground him with the mention of school, the honesty returns, as Sonny relinquishes his cigarette and begins to reveal what is happening to him there.There is a notable change in Sonny's and the conversation's tone at this point. Sonny's mood becomes remarkably somber, and through his uncharacteristically serious comments, he reveals the very root of his problem. He implies that he feels trapped and helpless, accented by his discarding of the cigarette. The narrator remembers: "I ain't learning nothing in school," he said. "Even when I go."He turned away from me and opened the window and threw his cigarette out into the narrow alley. I watched his back. "At least, I ain't learning nothing you'd want me to learn." He slammed the window so hard I thought the glass would fly out, and turned back to me. "And I'm sick of the stink of these garbage cans!" (86)Sonny's desperation and awareness of his fate surface as he flicks his cigarette symbolically into the alley below. Landing amid the "stink of [the] garbage cans", the fading sour...
