I have a brother who is about two months older than I am. Yeah. I know that goes against so many norms so many people have to unform. Take a minute if you need to and then come on back. Cool. So yeah like I was saying he’s about two months older than I am. And we are so alike. We are a blend of serious and silly. We love comic books and adventure tales. We love being Black and both of us have risen from the bellies of some ocean deep whales.

I called him this morning. Deep into some mourning. He is far and I was reaching for him. He was on his way home from the gym and I was looking around my office for inspiration. He already knew. He is my hero. My brother is strength and grace. He is style and wisdom. He is the conversation I need when I have to get back to me. Like my partner and a few other men in my life, he is what I imagine it must have been like to lock an x across one’s chest and salute Chadwick Boseman. A prince turned into a king. The T’Challa to my Shuri. My brother tells me he is proud of me.

I tell him he amazes me. His loving personality is all I knew he would grow up to be. We did not grow up together. We made our siblinghood in weekend visits between scenes of Super Mario and Luigi. We regather our bond regardless of how much distance…colleges and navies or how much time…hours and days and decades separate us. We twin. Though we never shared a womb. We recognize our identical plume. It’s in our drive, our intolerance for nonsense, our discipline, our sheer commitments to living.

I tell him we will reclaim our childhood when all of this
Ends. We know it won’t. We will find each other anyway. As we have always done time after time and one after one. We will go to new places and learn new things. We will wear matching outfits and fill our fingers with candy rings. We will jump as high as we can and laugh loud with slapping hands. We will rhyme and dance. One day soon.

For now we will call each other. We will text and like statuses. I will ask people if they have met my brother. We will pray for the safety and health of our other siblings. We will talk about how much we love our nieces and nephews. Carry on living like our father was a king. Accept all of the glorious understanding that comes with knowing he was simply a human being. Marvel at all we can dream. And take for granted absolutely nothing. Take for granted absolutely nothing.

Image Credit: Photo by Wayne Lee-Sing on Unsplash