The Brother

4

I sent Kristen away. I sat in my car crying in the parking lot. I wanted to be left alone. How dare he say that to me? I was still coping with the fact that my boyfriend was dead. He had to make a rude comment like that to make things a lot worse.

He was impolite and selfish. No wonder at the funeral after party nobody talked to him. He sat alone with his flask and cellphone. He was a disgrace to the Chambers. He gave them a bad name.

A loud knock on my window awoke me from my crying daze. I could only make out hazy red and yellow dots. My eyes were puffed up red and my tears were frozen with tears. I hastily rubbed them away.

I could finally see the cloudy figure. Seth.

I rolled my eyes and pushed the key into the ignition. He kept knocking on the door, and then tried the door handle. I accidently forgot to lock the door. He came in and sat in the passenger’s seat.

I quickly rummaged through my bag. I then found my pepper spray. I held it out in front of me. It’s one the perks to being a sexy eighteen year old girl. You had lots of creepers. “If you don’t get out right now I swear I will spray you.” I scowled with my lips curled back.

He put his hands up in surrender. “Look! I’m sorry,” he was trying hard not to laugh. His frosty blue eyes were glinting with enjoyment. The corners of his lips were starting to move upward.

“It’s not funny!” I growled. “I actually really want to spray you.”

“Let me apologize.” He asked and started to put his hands down slowly. He was trying to keep a straight face, but it broke right away. He exploded out in a heavy laugh.

“Stop laughing!” right when I was about to spray him he smacked the can out of my hand. It fell in between us. We both looked at each other. He mouth was puffed up ready to crack up in even more laughter. Then we both lunged for the can. We clawed our way through each other, but he finally got it.

“Audrey, let me talk.” He put the can out of my reach. I tried to touch for it, but he kept pulling it back. “I didn’t mean what I said, it just slipped out. You seem like a really nice girl, and you don’t want me in your life. I could screw it up.” He was struggling to say while I continued to tear at him.

“How could you screw it up?” I sniffled and wiped my wet nose. It was disgusting but I really didn’t care right now.

“You don’t want to know.” He shook his head and let out a small chuckle. “So please forgive me, I promise to never to run into you again.”

The truth was I wanted to see him again. He looked so much like Ray that I felt a little happy around him. But I couldn’t say that to him. It would boost his obnoxious boy ego then get the hots for me

“Er…” should I forgive him? Or should I leave his sorry butt on the road. I decided today was not his day to be forgiven.

“Fine you don’t have to forgive me, just tolerate me.” He pleaded.

“That’s almost as hard as forgiving.” I groaned and looked out the window. “Can you please get out now? I feel uncomfortable with you here.”

We both knew he was going to give some inappropriate joke, but he held it back. “Fine,” he snickered. He was about to push the door handle but then he stopped.

“What?”

“Did Ray ever talk about me?” he turned back in his seat. He didn’t look at me, but stared out in front of him.

“Did Ray-“ I repeated. I was worried that the truth would hurt him. “No,” I admitted.

He just nodded. “You were really good to him, he always talked about you.”

I slumped back in my chair. “Thanks,” I whispered under my breath.

“I was even jealous sometimes. The girls I dated usually used me for the money and other stuff.” He grunted.

He wasn’t out of the car yet. I didn’t want him to leave. His presence made me comfortable, I finally admit. “Sorry, I’m not going to bore you with my love life.” He again went to the door.

“Wait!” I grabbed his hand. We both looked down and I moved my hand to his forearm. “I- I’m sorry that Ray never talked about you. You just never popped up in our conversations.”

He frowned and jerked his arm away from my touch. “Audrey, the thing is he didn’t like talking about me, but whatever.”

He banged the door open furiously and stormed out of the car. I get that he was the dishonored brother, but what did Ray have against him?

When I got home my parents were sitting around the table reading and drinking tea. My mother almost choked when she saw me come in.

“Audrey! How was therapy with Dr. Hunter?” she asked.

“Weird,” I raised my eyebrows.

“Ready for the next one next week?” she enthused.

“God no.” I shook my head and took a seat next to them.

“I remember when my brother died. I also went to therapy at your age.” My father crossed his legs and held his knee. “It was crazy. I would scream, a lot. In the beginning it was misery. I hated going. I was always upset. Overtime it got better though. I was excited to talk to someone.”

“To this day I still am sad that my brother is dead.” My father continued. “I accepted the fact though, I can’t change the past. I don’t get as emotional anymore, it’s been thirty years! I love talking about him still though.”

I listened attentively to my father. He was right about everything. It was going to get better overtime. I would always love talking about Ray.

The next day I volunteered to help Mrs. Chambers clean out Ray’s stuff. She was more vulnerable than I was to Ray’s death. I think she really needed someone who also cared about him, almost as much as she did to be with her.

Ray had a bunch of stuff. Too much stuff actually. He had many posters on sports and bands, and almost twenty boxes filled with pictures. Mrs. Chambers also needed help with that.

“Oh, Audrey, you’re here.” Mrs. Chambers gave me a warming hug. She smelled like tears and shampoo. A good mix when you are sad and depressed.

“Thanks for letting me come.” I murmured gently.

She was very fragile, Mrs. Chambers. She was a small skinny woman with pointed features and sensitive emotions. Ray was good to her. He almost never disobeyed her, so she wasn’t very good at discipline when he actually got grounded. I don’t know about Seth though.

Ray’s death was breaking her every day. Her fragile self wasn’t going to last long without the help of her of her husband. They loved me like the daughter they never had.

We had to fold all his clothes to give away to the poor. We had to store away all his little knick-knacks that sat on his desk. And we had to rip down all the posters covering his painted wall that I barely saw. Apparently it was navy.

The hardest part was the pictures. None of the boxes had covers so we had to see each and every one of them. He was smiling in all of them. He was either a toddler or a teenager. I was in a lot of them too.

I saw this one picture of us in Junior High. We both had a crush on each other, but we didn’t start dating till freshman year. We both had braces. My hair was a bit longer and his hair was cropped shorter. We both looked uncomfortable, because we were teenagers going through puberty standing next to our crush. The happy embarrassing memory brought tears to my eyes.

I lay down on his bed and started to sob. Mrs. Chambers came to sit down next to. I could see she was trying hard not to cry, but it was all too much for her. I had to stop first.

“Mrs. Chambers, Mrs. Chamber, it’s all going to be alright.” I held her wrists with both my hand and hushed her. I felt like the adult. “He’s in a better place.” She wrapped me in a hug and slowed down her weeps.

“Oh Audrey, thank you so much.” She finally had stopped crying. She pushed her hair behind her ears and stood up trying to act confident. “Okay, let’s get these boxes to the donation shelter. Shall we?”