Letter to my Brother

Do you love me?

More.

Do you respect me?

Love, I've come to find out the hard way, is not enough.

And it doesn't excuse...so many things.

I thought you loved me. The quick, spasmodic hugs. The winning flash of your smile.

Family. What is family? A prison. A haven. Why are we obligated? We aren't. Call it my French background, or my French blood, but the French have a penchant for challenging accepted norms about family. I have long held the belief that family is who we choose, and might not be, in fact often is not, composed of blood. Maybe it's just that I refuse to be bowed down by guilt.

All the times we sat beside each other, yet each within our own cyclone, as our parents raged. I thought, foolishly, that we shared that. It was the more precious for the tight tension of silence that I thought bound us. I thought that finally, on the day I said goodbye to Father, you were with me.

I was wrong. Years later when you said, "I knew that one day I would be the victim of your silent treatment," I realized I had been mistaken. You hadn't understood at all.

Why had I tried so hard? I had in some way worshiped you, even though you are the younger. Your pan-like dancing bright eyes and tightly curled hair. Maybe you kept us all in thrall with the constant threat of your anger. When we were little you used to chase me. You slapped me. Then you blamed it on me when Mother came home. You tore the posters from my door when I shut it to keep you away. When we fought, you would never stop. That I remember most of all.

You, who always ate too little as a kid and I, who ate too much. How miserable you made me feel about my weight. When I would visit you, you wouldn't feed me, and I always wondered if it wasn't just your horrible lack of hospitality, which was legendary, but your way of imposing your judgement on me. When you visited me, you had no desire to socialize over a meal such as, I don't know, lunch, and I again felt chastised. You would ask me, a look of concern on your face that was also one of embarrassment - for yourself - if my health was okay. Guess what? It was. When I finally lost weight, no thanks to you, I loathed to share that victory with you, but it was inevitable you would celebrate how "great" I now look. Your smile of amazement and relief made my blood curdle.

Yet you drink like a fish and when you do eat, you sit down like the King of England at table and gorge yourself on meat and cheese. WTF?

The time I came to see you, and got lost. I got hysterical on the phone, and that made you angry. I was crying by the time I got out of the car. You said nothing and grabbed my bag.

That was our hello.

The jealousy you felt whenever I came around you and your friends. I grant that I earned part of that when I slept with your roommate in college. Probably you were afraid that would happen again. And what, by the way, in hell was that all about? Were you upset for me - or for him?

Get over it. It was college!

But gay men? The looks you shot me in Hawaii when I shared a pineapple drink with Fernando. Or when Alfredo and I shared a bed in the hotel because we had to! How threatened you were.

Am I somehow cooler than you? That is laughable.

And me feeling so inadequate - so ugly - surrounded by all of your beautiful bodies.

When your marriage came, and I asked to please not be roomed next to Father at your Italian wedding that none of us on Mother's side could afford - you refused. Then grudgingly - yes, very grudgingly - you allowed me to attend your small, stateside ceremony. "Don't bring too many people," you said. What was I, a gypsy caravan? There was only me and my husband.

I was so proud of you. Photos of you, articles, programs, are littered around my home. They spill out of boxes. I purchased your paintings.

Have you ever read a single one of my articles?

And you looked up to me, I thought. I felt terrible about my divorce in case it somehow led to yours. You had seemed so charmed by my marriage. As if I'd proved that marriage could work. Then I didn't.

I was the only person in the family who understood what you do for a living. You were constantly bemoaning that none of us did. I was the only one. The art of it. Did you even know that I taught the history of dance in my classes? You always acted surprised if any of us knew anything about it. It was your personal domain. I get that you needed it to be. That none of our attention was good enough.

We would never be artists.

I would never be an artist.

And yet, you denied me the chance to see you dance your final dance. "Don't even bother coming to my final season," you told me. "I don't want you around with your cloud of negativity."

You would have thought, at our age, just for a second, it would have occurred to you that was something you could never take back.

How wrong you were.

How long I withstood your torture.

It's not about negativity. At least. Not mine.

It's about HAPPINESS.

Mine.