His grandmother broke down into violent fits of sobbing, head thrust into her hands and wailing, piercing into each wall and shaking his teeth. He was not particularly moved by his mother's passing. If anything, he felt indifference toward it. He knew that nothing in his life would change. She seldom visited her only living son, only evidence being postcards sent from overseas to him, all haphazardly stuffed in a shoebox underneath his bed. In the years of prolonged absence, it was as if he had already grieved and mourned her passing. Now only thinking of her from time to time, already in the past tense.

Despite the callousness toward his mother's death, his heart still longed for a time when his parents were still together. And more importantly, still under the same roof. His older brother passed away when he was six years old in a freak accident while on holiday on the Outer Banks. Despite warnings of metal debris in the aftermath of a hurricane still contaminating the beaches, his father and brother swam out into the water. Remaining on the white sand littered with empty aluminum cans, he watched from afar as they got smaller and smaller in the water.

His brother stepped on a broken bottle underneath the waves, cutting open his foot and profusely bleeding. In a panic, his father carried him to shore in his arms as he watched his brother turn several shades more pale.

Inevitably, it led to their divorce. His mother blamed his father for ignoring the warnings and still going out to swim. But prior to the final signings for custody, his father vanished. Even now he was still unsure of his whereabouts, he truthfully did not really care. His brother was buried next to his grandfather in the church's cemetery, a small black plaque with his full name and years he lived, 14 years.

When he turned the same age of his brother's passing, he spent it having a picnic alone at the headstone, talking to him.

"Am I still your little brother? I'm now older than when you were at that beach. Does that make me your older brother? Also, tell dad I say hi If he's there with you, if not I'll try to say hi to him."

From an unfinished short story, written in November 2023

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