Matthew

On a cool and clear desert night at a campground somewhere in Arizona during the summer between high school and college, my brother Matthew and I climbed on top of the roof of the bathroom. We lay on the black tar sandpaper roof still warm from the day’s heat and watched the stars come out. Other than the lights from the bathroom beneath us, no light shone for hundreds of miles in the still desert air and the stars danced bright and beautiful in the Milky Way above us. We watched for shooting stars and talked and talked. While I don’t remember what we said, I remember an overwhelmingly peaceful feeling of everything’s gonna be alright. It was a year and two months post Daniel’s death and we were both still gut-punched but I was about to move out. I knew, had always known, that if I made it to that point, everything would be okay from there. Matthew had already made it out and his stories of college life gave me hope for the kind of future I could expect for myself. In a few short weeks, I would join him at the University of Arkansas and finally be able to free myself from the “benevolent dictatorship” (their words) of my parents. Freedom was so close I could almost feel comfortable saying it would be mine. 

I have such a fondness for that night: for a girl and her brother sharing a moment of peace in a life of chaos. I’m grateful for that moment and for the solidifying bond that would carry us both through the next few years. After I entered university, it felt like we moved in a world alone. We were each other’s anchors in a world that was foreign and exciting and scary. Daniel’s death sent me reeling through a world that no longer made sense, a feeling compounded by the culture shock of entering university. Nothing felt solid except my relationship with Matthew. We were the only ones who understood the enormity of the experiences heaped on us—the trauma of the past and confusion of the now. Together we navigated shrugging off the cult-like control of our parents and finding our footing in a world that we had been woefully underprepared for. We met up every day and talked about things I was learning in my psychology classes and in therapy, things we were reading online, TedTalks we’d watched and books we’d read. Matthew was my guide to university life and he taught me how to do everything from registering for classes to swiping my dining card. Matthew wrote me stories: things we experienced together, funny anecdotes, character observations of the people around us, adventures undertaken. We sat together for phone calls with our parents and dissected their texts. We put names to the things that had damaged us. Slowly, we began to unravel the suffocating webs of fear, obligation and guilt that our parents and religion had woven around us. Together, we fought our way into the light. 

Years later, at the end of a damaging relationship, I read one of the stories Matthew had written for me. I saw myself through my brother’s eyes and I read my own words, spoken to a friend. I saw myself confidently taking charge of a bad situation and holding my ground. I didn’t see the victim I had somehow become during this relationship, I saw a good friend; a kind and compassionate person whose strength made the lives of the people around her better. Matthew’s words brought me back to the self I had lost touch with during the relationship. To see oneself through the eyes of someone who truly loves you is a transformative experience I wish for every person. My brother’s love has buoyed me through many difficult times—how many more times throughout my life will this relationship lift me up, protect me from harm and empower my best self? 

Growing up is a difficult process in the best of circumstances and while Matthew and I weren’t gifted the best of circumstances, we were gifted each other and for that I will forever be grateful. Daniel’s death will never be a positive and I will always mourn him and the potential lost but the ashes that were the aftermath of his death were the soil in which my relationship with Matthew flourished. I’m glad that we had each other.