Crazy storms last night.

I don’t like storms so much. Oh, I like the way they look enough, but there’s something about the way they feel that unsettles me. I get antsy. Sometimes I clean. Sometimes I make elaborate soups that require much fine hand chopping of vegetables. Sometimes I call Cassidy.

I should probably take up scrapbooking. But no way is it more fun than Cassidy during a storm.

Last night I called Cassidy.

The store is a hotspot. Over the years it has drawn our sort and other sorts to this area. I wish Stephen and Alex would have come up with this idea when Anthony and I were kids, instead of just, you know, forcing us to blend into what was available. I wish Jenit had stuck around long enough to see Anthony stand out among those who might be considered unusual.

Shit, though- he probably knew it all along. I wish he’d been stronger, then. He was so damn likeable.

But my fathers chose what they chose, and so I am fairly adaptable. I can make a hat and bag out of anything, and when the components are good, well, everyone wants one or both.

I waited what I felt to be an appropriate amount of time to try and hook Anthony up with someone. I did. I waited years. Jenit is a hard act to follow. I understand that.

Also, I admit that the first few guys I threw into his path were not perfect for him. Yes, they were pretty boho wannabes. Okay, I apologize to the world. They were pretty, though. Fascinating is never easy, right? To my credit, not one of them looked a bit like Jenit. I did try that hard.

And I admit that it might be a bit twisted to try so hard to throw your brother into a relationship. Fuck it, no I don’t. Anthony is happier when he’s with someone. That’s my theory.

When Jenit was around Anthony actually engaged with the people around him. He grinned like a fool. His voice was louder. He occasionally got up to mischief. He neglected to police me as hardcore as Stephen has always expected. I miss that.

I’m trying to build a really good motherfucking hat here. A better hat, when the old hat was just fanfuckingtastic.

Anyway, I liked Ben as a component from the first time he walked into the store.

I think I'll say, "Definitely having my supplement in the morning. Even if blueberry is all I have left."

I think I'll say, "Even if I have to gag to keep that shit down."

I think I'll say, "This is how it has been for us."

I think I'll say, "You know, I'm kind of tired."

I think I'll say, "I think I just need to sleep for a while."

Now I’m carrying this fucking laptop everywhere. Seriously, I only have a phone because Anthony and Stephen teamed up and decided that I needed one for my birthday. I only have the laptop because Ben decided he needed a new one… And now I hardly have room for a book or a wallet in my bag.

Fuck the phone, but I carry it just in case. They panic if they can’t find me these days.

I skipped my supplement this morning. Couldn’t face it. I feel a bit tired, but I’m okay. Hopefully I’ll be able to sleep tonight.

I think I'll say, "Look at us. I could be your mom."

I think I'll say, "Who the fuck are you?"

I think I'll say, "Thank you for allowing my fathers to dismiss you so easily."

I think I'll say, "Thank you for teaching me to cut and run."

I think I'll say, "I need a drink. Maybe a pill. Got any pills?"

I think I'll say, "So you're where these came from."

I think I'll say, "Thanks, I guess. People seem to like them."

I think I’m pretty normal looking. My hair is pretty long, but that’s not uncommon. It might look odd to some that, at forty-three, I look old enough to be Anthony’s mother. No one ever says anything about it, though. They’ll tell me I need to grow up, blithely ignoring the fact that I look twice his age, knowing that he is my brother.

Stephen says we’re lucky to get to make this sort of choice. Stephen also tells me that I am beautiful, even though I look so much like Alan.

But I know he thought Alan was beautiful. He put away all of the photographs only last year. After that, I couldn’t compare my reflection to them anymore. Trying to compare from memory is just too frustrating.

Dark hair and dark eyes, skimpy lips.

It has just been so many years since Alan lit himself up, and nothing looks the same as it did when I was nineteen. Not even the backyard. Looking back is a bark of a laugh.

Eventually I’ll probably meet my mother. They didn’t keep pictures, though Stephen did manage, quite drunkenly, to describe her to me once. Seems there was a whisky voice, and tits out to there. Seems my father liked these things for a little while, so Stephen had learned to like them as well. For a while.

Three years later a blonde one came along. Seems they liked me enough that they thought Anthony would be a good idea. Eventually maybe Anthony will meet his mother as well.

Even after what must have been a couple dozen jack and cokes, Stephen said, “Christ, don’t say it like that.”

I shrugged and said it didn’t mean I was mad about it.

Ben gave me this laptop. He got a new one. “Take this,” he said. “Maybe you’ll actually write this way.”

So I took it, and I’m probably writing a bit more these days. Still, I have my favorite journal and pen beside me. Just past the edge of Anthony’s desk blotter, close to my right hand. As though I might actually use them, ever.

The journal is really nice, hardbound, has good paper. It is the best of the twelve or so that I’ve collected over the years, and I really do love holding it. Sometimes pressing the cover against my face calms my thoughts. The pen is lovely, ordered from a website that specializes in expensive, beautiful things. I’m sure it writes flowing and true.

Ben calls these things my teddy bears. I often call him my kitty cat, so there’s a certain balance to us.

Right now Ben is upstairs in his room, most likely sleeping. Tuesday is his ban on social activity night, and we did tear up some wine with dinner. Also after dinner, while ignoring a movie.

Also, there’s the bottle at my left hand. This one has been mine alone, and I have actually used it. Honestly, though, it takes more for me. Nature. Even now I’m hardly fuzzy.

Sitting on what is probably the only new item in the room. It’s a pretty nice desk chair. Comfy. Hopefully built to last. The previous desk chair somehow divided itself sometime last month. Possibly at around three in the morning as a medium sized woman tried to perch upon it.

“What, I’m not allowed nice new things?” was all Anthony said when I commented on the shiny and sturdy of it all.

It in no way matches the heavy, dented metal desk. Actually, nothing in here matches if I look too closely. It’s all just Anthony, from the dust on the concrete floor to the cobbled together shelves filled with the things he loves too much to think about selling. Even the second hand love seat, which is where I’m supposed to sit, was his choice of a thing to do for my benefit.

I added the pillows. I do sit there when he’s here. I do realize that this is his office. Why else would I come here to feel safe?

I need to find him a nice old rug for in here.

 

Because of what we are, we slip by. Anthony first opened the store, just slightly right of center in tiny downtown Dogwood, about fifteen years ago. Anthony has looked twenty years old for about that long.

He and Jenit had originally planned to use only the front part of the deep old building as a comic shop, but now that Jenit is long lost the place has become something else. A bit of this and that. Side openings lead to rooms full of vintage clothing, records and old paperbacks. Paintings and photographs by local artists share space in the front with the pretty junk that Anthony pulls from dumpsters or buys at yard sales. He has a knack for good junk. He’ll even sell it to you if you press the issue.

There’s coffee. Anthony restored the old Bunn restaurant monster himself, and most of the time it does work.

Last month Ben and I moved into the apartment above the place. Local zoning says no, but we slip by because of what we are. It's much less hassle breaking in now.

Anthony moved back in with Stephen, our surviving father, after Jenit. Just after Jenit. A few years back. When I ask him about it, he just says that the old place is too big. No need for Stephen to ramble around in there alone.

I probably agree with him.

I was just thinking about how I used to sometimes sneak out of that little house I lived in on Merry Street. Usually the urge would hit me at around two in the morning, and I’d creep around in the dark, avoiding creaky floorboards and pretending like I had a real process for gathering my shit together. My intent was to get to Anthony’s shop, break in, and relax in the back office. This is one of the few things I actually accomplished in those days, and I’d come to think of it as a required prequel to sleep. Six months ago was ridiculous, really.

I always spent more effort sneaking out of my empty house quietly than I did breaking into the store.