It's Okay

I am sorry if my english isn't the best, I really tried :)

Trigger warning: suicide

The bathroom was the only place we shared. I realised this many years ago, the night after his funeral. Between those four walls, he and I had our best memories of each other, which was actually quite strange, because we lived together as long as life was able to keep death from breaking us apart. The little house in the middle of nowhere was for a long time our home, our everything, but home is nothing without the people you love. That is why the only image of him that I still hold on to this day, is his reflexion on the mirror upon the bathroom sink, his grin as our eyes crossed over the silver surface. I do not have the courage to picture any other memory but the echo of his silhouette in my mind, and that single blue sparkle each morning while brushing our teeth together. 

My brother was exceptional, but I never really knew him, as much as I like to pretend that I was the person he used to spend the most time with. As much as I like to think that he and I were actually close. Maybe we were once. But that doesn’t matter anymore. 

It 's Ok. 

Growing up I used to think the world of him. He was… how to describe him. Extraordinary. He was no super-human, don’t get me wrong, but he had just something that made him different from other people, different from me. My first memories of my brother are from when I was two, almost three. Mother told me that I started to cry every time he left the room, so she sent me to preschool with him, although I was too young. I remember his laugh, so innocent, even for a four year-old. He used to take my hand as we walked through the forest on our way to school, carrying my bag when I was too tired. I recall his little fingers pointing at different trees as he taught me the names of every single one of them, even though I would forget everything in a matter of minutes. Sometimes he would get mad about it, he lost his patience and wouldn't talk to me the rest of the way. Sometimes he even started walking faster, leaving me behind, how many times I saw him walk away from me with fast steps, until the last one, when his soul walked out and left me with an empty body. It wasn’t Ok. 

I used to think that those walks were the only reason why the sun would rise every morning, that as our steps would mark their way on the ground, he and I would welcome the sun to join us. I must have felt disappointed when the sun opened its own way behind the mountains even after his death. No, no. This way, those morning walks lost their meaning, and I was only able to remember his movements while brushing his white teeth, his hands trying to comb his hair, useless moments that ended up meaning everything to me. So yes, the bathroom was the only place we actually shared, that until my soul rests in peace and I may join my brother in heaven. 

Why is it that I miss him so much, even after all these years? I remember the fights, all those times he would yell at me over the most insignificant things, angry at me for not being able to be the perfect little sister he wanted. How could I, if I didn’t know who that person was? I remember getting angry at him for not understanding me, for the way he treated me when he was in a bad mood, I remember how I used to scream at my mother about how unfair it was for me having to put up with my annoying brother, when he didn’t even make an effort to be nice. And yet, my strongest memories of him are when he would calm me down after a fight with my parents, how he didn’t try to bring me to my senses, or show me how I was wrong, he would just talk to me as if everything was OK. It wasn’t Ok, It wasn’t Ok! I loved him for doing that. But he wasn’t Ok. He wasn’t Ok, and I never noticed it. Why? 

There were times when we wouldn’t speak to each other in a while, times when we would be too busy to care about the other. Times when we would be embarrassed of being related, others when we just didn’t want to be around, when family turns to be more complicated than it used to be. But then he would offer me a blanket even though I didn’t ask for it, or I would give him a goodnight kiss on his forehead after a long day. Sometimes we watched basketball games together on our parents bed, or we would just play cachos for hours. I remember this one time when he took care of me when I was sick. He joked around saying that he only did it to skip school, but I knew he missed trip day, the best day of the year, and I realised how much he actually cared for me. How much he was willing to sacrifice for his annoying little sister. 

And his little sister grew up, but alone. It’s not Ok. Why did he leave me alone? It is not fair. I was the one who had to put up with everything HIS death left behind. Because of him, I had to watch everything in my life fall apart! He is so selfish! Was. 

Sometimes I ask myself if he knew how much I would miss him. Maybe, if I had shown my love for him, would he still have done it? I moved away, to the beach. The first time I saw the ocean, the waves crashing against a wall of rocks, spume licking the sand and the single fly of a seagull, I didn’t think of him. I fell in love, I got a job as a barista and started painting. I got married, I bought a house and for some reason, I became a teacher. We tend to see death as everything in our life, as the one thing that defines us. But I grew up and other things came along, new feelings and experiences. Everything was Ok. But still, sometimes I saw him on the most mundane things. The smile of a child, an old boat trying its best to stay over the water surface or the sun, landing on the wall of our home, tinging everything with its warmth. Sometimes I forgot about him, and I felt guilty, sometimes I didn't and that made me feel empty. But he was still there somehow, and that was Ok. 

He would have loved the bathroom, that I do know. I didn’t notice how similar it was to the one we used to share until I saw the eyes of my child, blue, on the mirror, and all I could see was him. That day, I found my brother's old teddy bear, with its nose tattered because my brother used to play with it in his sleep. His childhood on my hands, all he left behind with me. 

Because when everything was Ok, his secret came out. Maybe it was my reaction what finally made him choose death over life. Maybe I should have smiled, or hugged him, maybe I should have simply said something other than just: It’s Ok. It’s Ok. Perhaps he thought I was telling that to myself, maybe I was. I just looked him in the eyes, blue against blue, the same color but so different… It’s Ok. Nothing else. I could have said so many things, I could have done so many things differently… I didn’t want to, but I think I started to act differently around him after knowing about his preferences in love. After finding out that he was... gay. Why is it so hard? That is not Ok, that will never be Ok. I tried, I really tried, but it wasn’t enough. Because then came the search in the woods, that feeling that something wasn’t right, the horror of knowing that something might have happened because of the secret I knew, because of me, because I didn’t do enough, because I wasn’t enough. Little orbs of light floating between the trees, looking for a bigger light that had already vanished from this world. All the names my brother had taught me were tangling in the branches and making me dizzy, and then the smell, first the smell and then everything else. His body was hanging from one of the lowest branches of a tree I couldn’t recognize, if I had only paid more attention to him, maybe I would have known. His eyes were staring at me even though a layer of fog separated them from meeting mine, death had taken him away, he had given himself up, I don't know, I don't know, I gave up on him, It’s not Ok. 

But with time it eventually found its way to be Ok. How? Sometimes I wonder how I was able to make it through it, but it doesn’t matter anymore, because I did, and I am here now, still thinking about him, even with death laying on the other side of my bed, the one that belonged to my husband before he was taken away too. And it 's Ok. 

- It 's Ok. You know? I love you so much. You remind me of him. He was extraordinary, just like you. We were so young... - I laugh, a cough lost between my dry lips. My white hair tied in a bun and my skin tanned after hours and hours of walking along the beach. It still feels weird to feel its roughness at touch, so different from the soft skin of my youth -. My sweet child, I would like to find words to tell you everything I want you to know, but I am afraid that it is too late. Life will eventually teach you all I couldn’t. Just… remember that it is Ok, alright?

This time I smile, and hold his hand between my trembling fingers. His husband stays on the back, my granddaughter in his arms. I feel loved, and I wonder if my brother felt loved too. My son stays with me, and in my dreams, I stay with my brother until the end too. It’s Ok, he used to whisper to me whenever I felt afraid. It’s Ok, whenever I was hurt, whenever I was angry or sad. I hear the birds of my childhood singing, feel the smell of the woods, all those trees; Birch, Poplar, Chestnut, Oak, Linden, Cedar... I can see the reflection of the sea, blue, on the mirror over the bathroom sink, hear his laugh, the laugh of a child, and then… It’s Ok.