"Grow up"

Lucia was perfect. She did everything a perfect human being should do. She was pretty, smart, praised and adored by all. She sang like an angel, read by age five. When she entered the room everyone was marvelled by this child. One time, she performed a Shakespeare sonnet by heart to some of our mother's friends. I felt so lucky having her as a sister.

I, being one year younger than Lucia, was always expected to become like her. A Prodigy Child. Instead, I was only but a shadow of her. I couldn't sing, or read by age five, or even learn by heart a Shakespeare sonnet! A disappointment to all. To all except her. She protected me, played with me, made me feel included and, especially, she made me feel wanted when I was not.

This came with a catch. A good one. I had the superpower to become invisible. To activate it she needed to be exactly thirty centimetres in front of me and talking to someone about something they liked. Then, I slipped away, no one noticing. We did that a lot. It was fun for me and for her. I believe it was because she liked the control of capturing someone's mind for a bit, and I liked the relief of not being with people.

We liked playing with action figures and dolls. We created magical worlds where she was almost always playing the villain, and I the hero. Our most repeated scenario was the villain losing spectacularly by jumping off a "bridge" (the end of my bed) and the hero celebrating with the other dolls. She let me win, she was that kind and caring.

I wasn't bullied at school, thanks to my superpower, but she was. Even though she had many friends, there were always kids who were jealous and couldn't fathom not being perfect like her. And so to deal with that, they tried and failed, to break her. Lucia would respond with the kindest comebacks ever. She wasn't looking for some cathartic feeling of revenge, she wanted to turn them into friends. That did not always pan out, and she learnt from that. She knew how to choose her battles.

One day, at school, she left class early. She was radiant. She had just won first place in the spelling bee. Nationals would be the logical next step, and she looked forward to it. I did not because that meant she was going away. I had never thrown such a tantrum, I blew her eardrums out no doubt. That day she saw who I was becoming, someone so dependent on her that she couldn't leave me unattended for more than a few hours. She took my face in her hands and said: "Grow up". That was the last thing I wanted to do.

On her twelfth birthday, mum took her out for ice cream. They were crossing a street. She, Lucia, was perfect, and because, or despite, of that she made it unscathed to the other side. Mum and the ice cream did not.

In the beginning, she kept up the façade that she was the same Lucia that she had always been, but not for long. The stress of having to take care of herself was too much. She could handle me, but not herself. Things started going downhill.

Even though we had lost all the family we had, mum had lots of friends so we were never homeless. But it was deeply uncomfortable. Lucia felt as if we were overstaying our welcome in every house we were in. But what choice did she have? It is not like we could use my superpower anymore, and disappear.

Getting a part-time job wasn't an option, she was much too young, so she started doing kids' homework, one buck a page, just to make up for the money the people we were staying with were spending with us. Always so selfless, Lucia started being less and less with me. I did not understand why. I was being left alone more than I had ever been in my whole life.

She stopped playing with me. "Not now, later", "I would love to, but I have other things to do", she would say. She told me to find some friends, knowing all too well I couldn't do that. Other people did not understand me and never would. She was the only person who did.

I was upset. How could she do this to me? It had always been me and her, how could she bear being separated from me? I spent days trying to get her attention, being mischievous, getting into trouble just to get a snippet of her time. Lucia was exhausted by my actions, she was only a year older after all. I never noticed though, she was, in my mind, much older and wiser than me.

But I was her brother, she needed to protect me, play with me, make me feel included. It was her duty as my sister to want me. To make me feel wanted when I was not.

One day she did not come back to me. Lucia was never found. She had left me. I was alone, growing up, and she was gone. She had betrayed me.

I wanted to believe that she went on to live a fulfilling life, like the one we had before her thirteenth birthday. But probably she just became a low life like me, roaming the world directionless. Or maybe she just died after a lot of suffering. I never knew what happened to her.

Against my nature, I grew up. Never did anything remarkable with my life, never made a difference. I'm sure she would have changed the world if she hadn't decided to leave. Meanwhile, I had no direction, no goals, I even gave up on finding her. Why waste my time on a traitor, on a stupid girl unconscious of the consequences of her actions? She knew exactly that, by leaving me alone, she was dooming me. I became an insignificant person, how could I be someone of value without her? And still, she left.

She betrayed me.

I don't believe he ever understood. It wasn't his fault, he was a child, I left because I thought he didn't benefit from my overprotection. I hindered him, his growth. That day I decided that I couldn't hurt him anymore. That was the right decision.

But after I left, everything depended on his actions, on taking his life into his own hands. He had so much potential, but it seemed that I was the only one who could see it. He certainly couldn't see it.

I found out that he did not do any of those things. He let bitterness and revenge get the better of him. 

I was so proud to be his sister. A person so kind as he shouldn't have fallen so far. How could he? I gave him a fresh start, he had his whole life in front of him, and still, he threw it all away.

He betrayed me.