Before the Dawn (6 page)

My brother's coming home today.  I've been waiting for this day for a long time. There are three of us, my older sister, Susan, Rob, and then me, Natalie.

If you believe what they say about birth order, we all fell naturally into our roles. Susan is the perfect mother hen, responsible, serious, bustling about and organizing us.  As the youngest, I admit I lived up to the expectations... a bit spoiled, needing to be the centre of attention, and rather sensitive. Still, now that I'm twenty-five, I hope I've grown out of some of that.

Rob is the classic middle child, lost in the mix and determined to be different.  Even when he was little, he did things the hard way.  Tried to get noticed. 

Every Christmas the stories come out, although the years have blunted the pain and worry, and turned them into sentimental humor.  'Remember the time Rob nearly set the school on fire?' 'How about when he told the head teacher he could teach the class better than she could… and then walked out?'

Mum would shake her head, one hand lightly touching the grey streaks in her hair.  “He's the reason I have grey hair now,” she'd say.  “It's a miracle I've any left at all!” It was said with a smile, though, a sad one, because of course Rob wasn't there to defend himself.

He dropped out of school after his GCSE's.  He didn't even bother taking them, although he could've got A stars if he'd tried.  That's what Dad always said.  'Why don't you just apply yourself, Robert? You've so much potential...' 

It was true, Rob was brilliant. Still is.  But he never cared a bit for what people wanted, or thought, or hoped.  It was cruel of him, in a way, because we all cared so much.

I remember the day he left. I was only eleven, five years younger than him. I stood in the doorway of his room, watching as he stuffed random dirty clothes into a holdall. “Where are you going?”

“Nowhere. Anywhere.”  He flashed me a quick grin.  “Out of here, at any rate. This place can't keep me, Nat. I need to see the world.  Live.”

“Will you come back?”  My voice wobbled and I blinked back tears. This was my big brother, who teased me mercilessly yet whom I secretly adored.  How could he be leaving home… how could he be leaving me?

“Sure.  I'm not going to forget you, am I?” 

“Promise?  Promise you'll come back, Rob.”

He stood in front of me, typical wild grin and teasing eyes, but there was a hesitation there and even at eleven I saw it, and knew what it meant.  He couldn't promise.  He didn't want to tie himself to anything or anyone, not even me.

“Sure, Nat.  I promise.”

But I didn't believe it.

So he left, and none of us could hold him.  Threats, tears, pleas, supplications.  My brother was indifferent to them all.  When he'd made up his mind, that was it.  I think my parents probably recognized that by the time he was six.

We lived on postcards.  I remember jumping out of bed when I heard the thump of post on the doormat, running downstairs to see if one had come today.  They were from all over. First France, where he worked as a waiter, then somewhere in Eastern Europe where he picked beans during harvest time.  The places became more exotic: China, Turkey, Africa. He always seemed to find a job, land on his feet.

I'd stare at the pictures, glossy photographs of distant lands.  A white sand beach or the Great Wall of China, the Indian Ocean, the Sahara Desert.  Places you read about, point to on a map.  It seemed incredible to me that Rob had actually been there, tasted life there.  Even then I felt a stirring of envy, like an ache.

Those breezy messages, a few scrawled words, held a secret meaning.  Look, I've landed on my feet.  Don't worry about me.  Don't care. Of course, we did anyway.  How could we not?

Then the postcards slowed to a trickle, and finally stopped.  By that time I was doing A-levels, and I hadn't seen my brother for six years.

He came back to England once, to sort out his passport. He stayed for an afternoon.  My parents were ready to throw a party, welcome home the prodigal son and kill the fatted calf.  But Rob was gone before they could get out the knives.

I'd just come home from school, as he was leaving.  I hurled myself into his arms, eleven years old again.  “Rob, you're back, you're back, tell me everything!”  I was like a puppy dog, jumping around him, licking his boots.

“Easy, Nat.”

“Do you realize I haven't seen you for six years?” I demanded, playfully, because I thought he was staying.  “What are you doing?  Are you going to live at home?  Get a job or something?”

Looking back, I realize the look of discomfort in Rob's eyes was both guilt and annoyance.  He didn't ask us to love him. He didn't even want us to.

“Look, Nat… I've got to go.”

“Where?  Will you be here for dinner?”

“No.”  Suddenly he grabbed my arms and held me so I was looking straight at him.  “I'm catching a plane tonight, for Greece.  I've got a job lined up for a few months.”

“Greece?  Tonight?”  Realization dawned and I twisted out of his grasp.  “You're leaving again?  Already?  Don't you care about us at
all
?”

“Of course I do.  But I need to do my own thing.   I'd die here, Nat, in this boring suburb… if I lived like Mum and Dad, I'd shrivel up and die.”

“So that means you can waltz around the world for as long as you like?  It's not fair!”

“It's my life.”  Rob's face hardened.  “I can do what I want.”  He saw my tears and reached out a hand.  “You can come visit me if you want, during your hols.”

For a brief moment visions of a summer in Greece, drinking ouzo and eating souvlaki passed before me.  Time, days, even months with Rob.  Then I shook my head.  “No thanks.”  I don't know why, but I wouldn't go.  I was too angry, perhaps, to make the effort. I felt too betrayed.

He continued to travel, and I think he got into trouble more than once.  An abrupt departure from a country he'd planned to stay in for awhile, sudden silences.  He never asked for money or help.  He never made promises of coming home, or seeing us again. I wonder sometimes if he wanted to, if he thought about us at all.  It hurts to think that he didn't.  Somewhere, deep inside, he must have.  I have to believe that.

Yet I felt I hardly knew him.  Sometimes I had trouble picturing him, as if he'd died.  I hadn't had a real conversation with him, besides that doorway argument, in ten years, and then I'd been a child. How could we not grieve for a brother we felt we'd never really known?  It was a loss, a different kind of one.

We stopped talking about him, by silent agreement.  It was easier that way.  Much easier than explaining all the time, 'I have a brother, but...'  Sometimes, in my darker moments, I wondered if I really did have a brother.  Weren't brothers supposed to tease you and tell your dates rude things about you and make your life a misery? Rob never did that, and I knew he never would.  I would've welcomed it. 

Later, weren't big brothers meant to become friends, the very best kind?  Rob was a stranger.  A stranger I never even saw. I thought about the summer we could've had in Greece, but I didn't regret it.  It was a fantasy.  Rob had moved on by the summer, anyway.

Sometimes I would stand in front of his photograph on the mantle and stare at him, try to remember his voice, his teasing laughter.  The mocking glint in his eye that made me giggle. As the years passed, the sounds grew fainter. The glint disappeared. It was almost like the Natalie who had a brother was a different person, a different version of myself. 

I went to university, graduated, and got a job teaching music to primary students.  Rob didn't know any of it.  His postcards never left an address or a phone number.  There was never any way to get in touch. I wondered if a time would come when the postcards stopped altogether, when we never saw him again, or even had a hope of seeing him again.  I could see the same secret fear in my mother's eyes, like a silent cry.

Yet I couldn't help but wonder if it would be easier that way, if letting go completely would ease the pain, the hurt.  It was impossible to let go, though. Impossible to stop hoping that one day he'd appear, knock on the door with an insouciant grin and a declaration that he was home, this time for good.

Then he did exactly that.

Last year he showed up on my parents' doorstep.  And instead of feeling the relief and warm rush of love I expected, I was angry.  Bitterness washed over me in a hot tide.  How dare he come back, after all these years?  How dare he expect us to welcome him back into our lives, as if we've been waiting for the last decade with empty, open arms?

For days I refused to see him, and just the thought of him, arrogantly expecting us to take him back with grateful urgency, made me choke. 

Rob finally approached me, came to the school where I taught.  Children streamed past in an unruly wave and they suddenly reminded me of myself, years ago, when Rob had left.  I stood there, watching him.  Waiting.

“You said you'd come back.” I hadn't meant to say it.

“I know.” Rob shrugged, smiling faintly.  I expected him to make a joke, laugh it off as he always did.  Perhaps even tease me for caring so much. Instead he said what I longed to hear.  “I'm sorry.”

“So am I,” I snapped.  “That doesn't change things.”

“I wouldn't expect it to.” He looked tired then, and old.

Tears crowded my eyes and I blinked them away. “Why are you so selfish?” I cried.

Rob sighed, rubbed a hand across his eyes. “I don’t know. I didn’t want to be selfish. I just wanted to be free.”

“Free!  From what, us?”

“Everything. I could never do the expected thing, go to uni, get a job, live a life out doing the nine to five.  I know it's what everyone wanted, and it would've been easier, but I couldn't do it.  I just couldn't. It would have suffocated me.”

I believed him, but it didn't make it easier. “You could've visited, called,” I insisted.  “Stayed in touch!  Instead you cut us out of your life completely.”  As if he'd had a pair of scissors.

“It was easier that way.” Rob took a step towards me. “I was afraid, if I stayed too long, I wouldn't leave again.  You'd all… make me stay.” 

“We never had that kind of power!”

“Yes, you did,” Rob said quietly.  “By loving me. The times I came home, there was a part of me that wanted to stay. And that scared me.”

“Scared you? Because we loved you?”

“That’s just the way I’m made.” Rob shrugged.

“That’s an excuse,” I snapped, and Rob nodded.

“Maybe it is.” He took a deep breath. “Nat, I know you were young, you probably felt it more than Susan, and I'm sorry for that. I haven't been the best brother to you.”

“You haven't been a brother at all.”  I took a steadying breath.  “Why are you back this time?  Need a passport, clean clothes?”

“No, I have cancer.”

I felt as if I'd been slapped.  Yet even then I couldn't give in.  “Oh, I see, so now we're supposed to say sorry, all's forgiven, let's hold your hand, right?”

For once I'd penetrated his armor, and at the look of naked hurt in his eyes I felt both savage triumph and hopeless regret.  Now you know what it feels like. Except I didn't want him to know.  No one deserves that.

“Never mind.”  He turned away, shoulders slumped.

I almost watched him go. Then I remembered before he had left. I remembered being ten years old, sitting on his bed while he showed me how to strum guitar chords. I remember him taking me to films instead of his friends, and sharing a huge tub of popcorn. He had loved me, even if he’d gone. I wasn’t going to throw it away because of own hurt.

“Rob, wait.”  Tears trickled down my cheeks.  “I'm sorry, too.” 

He turned, and there was a look of hope, even of love on his face. I don’t know who moved first, but suddenly we were hugging fiercely.

It's taken awhile, of course, to come to terms with it all.  To heal, to trust, to love again. And it hasn't been an easy road.  But at last, now, I think we can begin to hope.  We can begin to be a whole family again.

Today Rob is coming home from the hospital. A few weeks ago the doctors said it looked like the chemotherapy worked, and he's a free man.  For now. 

Of course, there are no promises.  No guarantees. But there is forgiveness. There are second chances… if we take them. If we live them.

I see the car pull in the drive and I watch as my mum and dad help Rob out of the car.  That's why I'm going to enjoy this moment, and every moment we have together, no matter how many or few there are, and I know Rob is too.

He's here now.  That's all that matters. Smiling, I walk out the door to go and greet my brother.

DADDY’S GIRL

“Daddy!”

The giggling shriek causes me to turn my head.  A little red headed girl, about eight years old and wearing a duffle coat and wellies, is laughing, her head thrown back, as her father swings her around on the beach.  The one word--Daddy--is said in mock protest and deep delight, the sign of true affection, abiding love. Daddy.  What a wonderful word.

Annabel never called me Daddy. 

The fresh sea air buffets my face, making me pull my coat tighter around me.  Although it is a brisk day in February, the promenade is surprisingly crowded, the beach full of families, children bundled up in coats and scarves, dogs racing madly across the cold, wet sand.