Kayla Henn
Personal essay, 2727 words.
Nowadays my brothers and I are spread out, but I know we all look up at the same sky. Even combined, we have only seen a miniscule portion, an infinitesimal fraction; we only know the beauty that has been afforded to us. And I also know the decision would be unanimous: all of us would trade the whole goddamn universe to have our older brother back. There is only one consolation—and it is not different gods whispering the same promises about the preservation of souls after one is gone, because that doesn’t help the ache while we are still alive. No, it is the undisputed fact that stars are dead and can still be seen from lightyears away; sometimes I have to remember that even shadows are brought on by light, creating a perfect umbra in the absence it leaves behind. Without darkness we would not know light, and dead light is brighter than both. Dead light guides our eyes to see shapes in the sky and tell us bedtime stories. I heard once that fireflies borrow starlight, and the ones in Alex’s backyard seemed to glow especially bright.
I don’t remember the last time all five of us siblings were alive and in the same room, but I know it’s been too long, and it forever will be. But I remember fragments and snatches—pieces of memories that flow in and out of consciousness—of loud laughter and dirty jokes. We are together in those memories, always.
Oh Madre, there are things from when we were in high school you would be surprised to hear about.
Yeah, like that time Alex and his girlfriend went—
—or when Michael snuck a girl into—
—well, Greg hid this bottle of—
—and Thomas probably did that too—
I couldn’t help but be in awe of these four people who were openly—almost proudly—sharing their stupidity, a silent plea for me not to make the same mistakes. And as I continued to listen to their stories and memorize the sound of each person’s happiness, I remember constantly thinking they don’t make maps this big—maps that can chart the affection flowing from my bone marrow because I keep filling up and falling over the curled edges—but I’m alright. These four boys, these men, will be there to help me pick up the pieces when nobody else is.
The five of us together was almost too much: we are the epitome of nostalgia. We are the smell of sweat because we were outside too long; we played early 2000s hip-hop music loudly in the car on the way home from school; we scratched countless limbs on the pavement of our driveway even when it rained because bad weather is no excuse to not go throw a football around; our hunger filled two grocery carts and filled gas stations with laughter in the middle of the evening on road trips; we are the yells of Alexander! Michael! Gregory! Thomas! and Kayla! as our parents found some new wrong to convict us of.
Maybe if we had thought to combine our five lifespans together, we could have created our own type of infinity. Unfortunately, beginnings and endings are siblings fixed on the same linear line of time—the before always comes first and the hardest part about endings is beginning again. If there is one thing I have learned as I try to come to terms with the idea that I get farther away from the little girl within me every passing second, it is that the antithesis of childhood is not adulthood, it is loss. It is losing. It is giving up. It is learning to be okay with losing things you never thought you would have to say goodbye to and figuring out how to be okay with the rest of life still ahead of you. It is the melancholy knowledge of yesterday and the bitter promise of tomorrow. It is knowing the things you love will eventually become the things you miss.
As my childhood filled to the brim with memories I would never remember, a small part of me recognized I would also never get those experiences again. I only get a bittersweet sort of nostalgia that smells like a sweaty home and reminds me I was younger once—and I fear I might be forever searching for that feeling of vibrancy as the seasons continue to come and go. I fear I might be forever searching for the little girl who had four older brothers and a house to always come home to.
Thomas is the smell of rebirth while everything blooms once again; he is constantly trying to reinvent everything he does in order to be the best version of himself. He smells pure and laughs like rain—embodying everything it means to become new. He has taught me that for one to be born again, one has to die. I have seen him shed so many skins over the years, trying to find one that fits every expectation. He is green and he is new as he tries to leave barren waste behind, year after year.
I’ll always offer my advice and give my opinion when I think it’s necessary, but outside of that, it’s your life to live and learn and grow.
Love you big bro, thanks for your wisdom.
There were many a spring day I watched my brothers play sports outside—kicking and throwing and catching—while afternoons turned from chilly to lukewarm. Over the years as I grew in stature, their numbers dwindled. I watched as four became three, and three became two. Eventually, Thomas had nowhere to turn except for me, and sometimes I think he resented being the youngest brother. There has always been a soft storm within him, raging quietly.
Okay. When you tackle somebody, you wanna go for the knees.
The knees?
The knees.
Why?
Because if those go down, so does the rest.
He would let me charge him with all the strength I could muster, and it never seemed to matter how little I had because he was right—if the knees go down, so does the rest. Sometimes I think he carries his heart in his kneecaps because I have seen it wither away from the lightest of brushes, infecting him with a cruel sort of flavor. Everything within me wants to protect the protector from such merciless beings, but I know that isn’t how this goes. His front is ice, but so is spring’s: they crave discovery and revelation.
When we were younger, winter was a prison for the likes of him, but the moment Thomas smelled the slightest bit of warmth in the air it didn’t matter if I was his baby sister. He would turn to me with a smile on his face while devotion fell from his lips: wanna toss the football?
Greg is the touch of glacial air that bites at skin and stings the blood. Everyone says his heart is on his sleeve, plain for everyone to see, but I know better. He is the crispness of a winter morning with snow crunching underfoot and the reflection of icicles. Those are him—his heart and soul are knives of ice that freeze to you and refuse to melt until they know you’re ready. Safe when you see them and deadly if they fall too soon. I always welcomed his silent support to avoid my bones freezing from the inside out.
You good? Do you need anything?
I’m okay, don’t worry. I’ll come to you if I need something. I swear.
Despite his frostbite, Greg has always been warmest in winter. He is the frozen ground, but he is also the sun that thaws it out to help make way for new things that will come after. Whenever he picked me up from school, our three-minute walks home served confessions as cold wind hit the trees—and yet his smile was always kind as he created the very chill we felt in the air. It was those confessions that built an arctic foundation for the older versions of us to always come back to, especially as I learned more and more about the older version of me I was becoming. A quiet, icy night was the setting for our first conversation about her.
Does that make sense?
I think so. I wonder how old I’ll be when I get it.
Everyone gets it at a different time, so who knows. But will you promise to tell me when it happens?
Ew, why do you want to know when I get my period?
Because I’m your older brother and I care about you. It’s a big deal and you can always talk to me about these things. So, do you promise?
…yeah, I promise.
He sat with me in silence for a few more minutes as I thought about the day my body would start to make the differences between my brothers and I more apparent. He knew the realization of growth was hard for someone like me.
Everything may be gray in winter, but Greg has the sharpest eyes. He has always been a soft flurry until he’s not—sometimes he is a blizzard, wild for all the world to see—but mostly he is a flurry, because he’s a hugger and a lover by his very blood and bones. The whites of his knuckles scream ice and caress frost. That has always harbored a certain sort of strength within him, even when others perceive it as a weakness. How could it be anything other than beautiful when his frigid sky contains the particles needed to create the aurora borealis?
Michael is the sight of twilight entering the leaves as they began to change, producing something different but not altogether new. He is a transition, always bringing in the next round of laughs or drinks with the hazy fade of warmth that surrounds his smile. He is the familiar feeling of a strong gust that rattles leaves and makes you pull your jacket a little tighter. He has always held things close to him—maybe a little too close—because he doesn’t want them to leave.
We may have our issues, but I’ll always want you around, Sis.
That means a lot to me, thank you.
He is also the season that never seems to last, but he always comes back without fail. His hugs have always felt best when the trees are dying, twins to the hues of every dusk and dawn. He has always been the farthest away from me, and yet he made it to the only dance recital I was ever in, crossing desolate leagues of land to appear in the audience. Afterwards, his soft-spoken words were the burgundies and burnt oranges of the world outside, his breeze serene as he said the very most in the very least.
You did good up there.
Really?
Really.
Being six never felt so good as it did then and I found myself thinking: maybe I want it to be fall forever so he never has to leave, and I can stay on the stage forever. But Michael is not fixed, and he is not permanent—he is almost like spring in that way. Non-linear and always evolving. And yet he is something entirely different from that world of green; he is something all on his own. He is the shortening of the day and the lengthening of the night. He is shifting, creating wonders to behold.
Michael has always felt kindred—like I knew him before I even existed—a soft amber glow that permeates through layers of clothing. He is often adrift, trying to find roots in the very things he changes. I have always wanted to be one, a firm anchor not always seen but always there. A tendril that curls and folds over and never leaves. Things are not allowed to grow in autumn, but I was born in October and he always made that an exception.
Alex is the sound of the sun that comes with the realization everything is going to be better now because it’s all encased in a tender kind of warmth. A comfort provided by the feeling of freedom. His laughter is a scorching day by the pool as his soul clings to you like humidity on the back of your neck. He smells like smoke from cookfires that follows you around, leaving a trail to always find your way back home. He may have come into this world in the winter, but I’ve never seen anybody thrive in the warmth more than him.
There were regular get-togethers at his house once he sensed the world was alive and charged as hibernation officially ended. He would call our landline once a week and his voice cut like air conditioning on a blistering day.
We’re grilling ribs tonight. Be here at six.
What?
I’m sorry, did I stutter?
I don’t know if we’re doing anything, but I’ll tell Mom when she gets home from work.
Tell her to get her skinny ass over here once she’s off. You and Thomas and Greg can come too if you want.
Gee, thanks.
He would start a fire to keep warm in the cool shade of nighttime, and as conversations quieted down with the day, he would point to the open air of his realm where there was a sky full of stars in the middle of his backyard. Fireflies. I always looked back at him with a smile on my face and he always returned it in the shadow of a pale, green glow.
But I think the most memorable summer with Alex was the one when he died, because the Greeks are not the only ones who write tragedies. That summer smelled like smoke as we witnessed our childhood finally burn down with the oldest of us.
Burn my ass.
What did he say?
He said to burn his ass. He doesn’t want to be buried.
Flames licked our throats and ashes laid on our fingertips as we lit a match and kissed our brother goodbye; it was the first time all five us had been in the same room in years. In that moment I think we all wanted to go back to that duplex from 2002.
Nostalgia tends to smell like the sweat of seven bodies cramped into one duplex in the heat of a southern summer—heavy and unstoppable. Other times, it smells like the rubber of footballs and two full carts at the grocery store. Maybe rain on pavement on a cool evening, dryer sheets stuck to worn out jeans, or a CD playing loudly in a cluttered car on the way home from school. And sometimes, in the dead of night, it will even smell like laughter on a beach in the Gulf of Mexico, and a small gas station in Tennessee late at night on the way home from Grandma and Grandpa’s. But mostly, it smells like sweat.
When I was growing up I was acutely aware of the fact that I was getting older. A big, red “You Are Here” sign constantly flashed over my head to let me know where I was, while reminding me where I still had yet to go. Sometimes I wished life went in reverse order: I want epilogues before interludes and dedications after prologues. Maybe then I could have something a little sweeter to look forward to. And yet each day continued to pass and mark some new change about myself even though it seemed like everyone around me was already done changing.
I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t aware of the fact that I have four older brothers; the age difference between me and them was significant enough that I never stopped looking up to them. They were done growing almost before I even began, creating lives as I learned to walk and talk. Sometimes nostalgia smells like sweat, and sometimes it smells like the laughter of me and all my brothers on a random evening in the middle of a summer I can’t remember.
an abridgement about the end of youth