Oh, Brother

NB: This is the first assignment / challenge / task, which I've been sitting on since the first deadline.  Apologies. -- JN

“I don’t care, Henry, your little sister was upset.”
“Mom, you weren’t there.  You would have laughed too!”
“How would you feel if you were scared and upset and I just stood there laughing at you?”
“But I’m not scared of the ducks in the park!”
“Well, your sister is, and you need to be sensitive to that.  I think she’s more upset that you were laughing at her than she is about the ducks.”
“Well I’m glad her fear of ducks has some limits.”
“Henry.”
“Sorry. But it’s not like I knew she was afraid of the ducks!  She wanted to feed them.  That’s why we were there.”
“Well, now we know.  The important thing is that she’s your little sister and you need to be there for her.”
“I am there for her on stuff that matters, but mom, you should have seen her.”
“Henry, support your sister.”
“I mean, she must have dropped three crumbs and all these ducks came waddling over all quick and she freaked.”
“Henry, that’s not important.”
“No, but mom, she freaked.  She threw the bag and burst into tears and started running across the park.  The ducks all just stood there with their heads sideways.  I think they wanted to laugh too.”
“Henry, I mean it.”
“Then she wanted the bag back, but of course all the ducks were all over it eating the bread.  So then she starts wailing about that.  Her nose was all snotty and her face was all red and these ducks were all like, ‘What’s with that kid over there?  I don’t know.  Let’s just eat this bread.’ It was hilarious.”
“Henry.”
“For a minute, I thought she got stung by a bee.  When I figured out she hadn’t, I tried to walk her back over to get the bag back and she just screamed and pulled away from me.  Mom, it was like she was possessed.  Over some stupid ducks that weren’t even interested in her.  It was the funniest thing.”
“Henry.  That may be the case, but to your sister, this was a very scary thing, and her big brother just laughed at her.”
“Okay!  I’m sorry!  Jeez.”
“To her, not to me.”
With a sigh, Henry pushed himself away from the table and marched up the stairs to Samantha’s room.  He stopped at her door, trying to think of what to say.  As he did, he could hear her softly whimpering inside.  He knocked.  “Sam?” he asked.  “Sam?  I’m coming in.”  As he walked in, he saw his sister sitting in the middle of the room, arms and legs wrapped around her stuffed walrus, still snotty and teary-eyed and red in the face.  “Look Sam, I’m sorry.  I didn’t mean to laugh.  I’m sorry you were afraid.”  She just stared at him.
“Wanna get something to eat?”
“Tell me a joke,” she demanded.
“A joke?  Uh. . . okay.”  He thought a moment before saying, “Why did the duck cross the road?”