Confession, Submission 1 by Michelle Mathews

"You are a boil on the butt of humanity and a cancer cell to this family!” Those were the last words she would ever say to him. For 22 years they had shared most everything, a bathroom, a house, parents, one older brother, several dogs, and for a brief period in time a high school. In 22 years they moved together with their family 4 times, buried 2 grandparents, and got in more fist fights than she cared to think about. He was her big brother, one of few links to her past and the only sibling close enough in age to fully understand the angst of what seemed like a never ending power struggle for parental affection. This is her confession. She didn't feel guilty after she uttered that last statement to him and to date she still doesn't. She knows that despite the tantrums, the anger, and the fights there was always something underneath it all. She knew that if she really needed him although he may take his sweet time, he would be there. He knew that if there was some obstacle he could not take on himself he could find some way of "ordering" her to help him. The only fight she got into in the 6th grade was because of him. Someone was picking on him and God knew that she could wail on him all she wanted but if anyone dared hurt him she would be out for blood. They didn't mess with him again after that. Although there was 22 months in-between them (he the older) she had always been the more mature. This is not a "girls mature faster than boys" thing either. He was ADD and ADHD with a touch of autism. He could function alone or with very few people in the room but if you threw anymore than that he would go nuts.

It was a cold day, she remembered that fairly well. Her boyfriend and her had been shopping for Christmas stockings and had been having a great time. When they got back to the car she saw that she had missed a phone call from her dad. "Hi dad, guess what I just got."
"Princess, something's happened." Immediately, something's wrong. He hadn't called her princess since she was about five years old.
"What's wrong dad?"
"John's gone." There was no need to ask where, she could tell by his tone.
"Daddy, no." she whimpered. After that the conversation goes blurry - something about his heart just stopped and there was nothing anyone could do.
The immediate pain she feels isn't hers; it belongs to the voice of the man on the other end of the phone. A man whom she had never seen flinch so much as cry whose voice had a deep somber pain behind it. It belonged to her mother a woman who had already buried one son and would now have to bury another. Her pain wasn't until later.

The nightmares started nightly. The brief hours during an insominiatic sleep had been over run with dreams of him dying over and over again. Within a month she was dreaming him alive only to relive the pain of reality every time she awoke.

It has been months now. She still drives every few days for hours at a time at night. She fights so hard not to lose the sound of his voice and his huge smile. She fights hard to keep a list of reasons for not killing herself fresh in her mind. After all, her mother shouldn't have to bury 3 children. She also can't bear to think of hurting her boyfriend like that. He less than her mother, still the only thing that keeps her from harming herself is the knowledge of the pain she would be causing others. The knowledge of the pain that her brother's death has caused her. She knows that one day she will be able to feel the sun and not tear up knowing that he can not. Until then she clings tight to the memory of the last thing she said to him. It sounds odd but she knows that the harsh criticism of him was who they were as siblings. Him introverted and afraid, her extroverted and fiercely independent. They were two sides of the same coin. They knew that the anger that flared up between them stemmed from a hidden jealousy of the other. He was jealous of her ability to start conversations with anyone, she jealous of his unconditional (if misguided) affection for those he cared for.

This has been my confession.
I miss him.