The Disappearance Of Will Black / REWRITING /

⸢ i ⸥

I could only recall bits and pieces of what happened the day my brother disappeared.

To the police, they were fragments of glass. The only person who could see through this glass was me. Yet every time I looked into those shards of evidence I saw my dull self looking back at me. Every little detail mattered - not that I did not disagree.

William was perfect. From the beginning of the letter 'P' to the full stop right at the end, he was perfect all the way through. Some people bullshit that human beings can't be perfect when Will Black was a block of evidence in their way.

When I mean perfect, I mean that he knew everything about everything. Fortunately, William never received a mark under an A+. My brother managed to get those grades without bribing or sucking up to teachers. He was au naturale.

Another example of perfect is his social life. You would think that because he got the cliche straight A's he would be a nerd with thickly rimmed glasses and overly shy senses to communicate with people, but the only true thing about that is the glasses. William was incredibly smooth through any type of conversation, even if it started with a sentence about his day or world war II or if he enjoyed How To Kill a Mockingbird, William had the ability to give the answer they needed without the power of mind reading.

If that wasn't enough, he was great at sports. It was excruciatingly painful to watch all these opportunities for him go by. He was offered to be captain of four different teams but took one position, kindly refusing to all the others but the swimming coach that he had to focus on his studies for the moment. They all nodded their heads quickly, saying that whatever suited him best was okay with them.

Everyone worshiped Will.

I could list one fault that my brother has been accepted into. His stutter. Believe me when I say that even the girls fall under the spell of his repetition. They didn't care - he was a perfect human regardless of his way with words.

Growing up, attention was nowhere but on William's shining halo. It was all Will this, Will that and "hey, can you give me your brother's number 'cause he's so damn cute," my whole life.

I felt unbelievably shitty for saying this, but when Will suddenly disappeared - I felt a twinge of peace and relief growing inside me. It started off as a small tug in my instincts until I could no longer hide how I felt about his disappearance. My jealousy consumed me and I felt horrible about it.

And sitting there in the police station, posed like a statue in distress, going over my feelings just made me realize what a selfish human I was. I was nothing like William.

"How old was your brother?" Officer Hanes asked me, lifting his chin up so that his thin glasses slid up his nose.

Was.

I wiped the sweat off my palms onto the hem of my dress and cleared my throat so that I faced him squarely. "He turned seventeen yesterday."

Hanes looked surprised. "So he disappeared on his birthday? And New years?"

Another perfectly annoying thing about him. "Yes," I said, struggling to control a balanced tone.

"Where did you last see your brother?"

"At the bonfire in Central Park. I told you this already. Just thirty minutes before the fireworks."

"Who was with you?"

I gritted my teeth. "Friends. It was a party."

"What friends?"

"Like, my friends. Plus Will's, of course."