To my brother Scotty

Dear Scotty,

I am alternating between shock, grief, and denial. Part of my brain keeps coughing up trite understatements like "he was too beautiful for this world" and "the brightest stars burn out the fastest." Another part keeps saying the doctors made a mistake, that there's no way this happened. And the rest of me just wants to kick and scream, punch holes through walls, set something on fire to watch it burn and hope the smoke carries my words to you, or an echo of your voice to my ears.

I had a dream last night that I was standing in your hospital room. You sat up and smiled at me and told me I'd been worrying over nothing. Were you telling me goodbye? I woke up, convinced of the dream's reality, only to get the voicemail notification that you were gone.

Scotty-love, I know you're watching me write this. I know you'd never cause anyone deliberate pain. I wonder if you know just how big the hole is that your loss has created. The edges are ragged and burnt, a wound beyond mending, beyond healing.

I remember camping on the beach with you. Drinking cheap wine coolers in my apartment in Mullet Lake, when you complimented the roses on my rug, directly addressing them, then curling up on the foot of my bed to sleep. I remember the hip-check dance we used to do when we fried chicken together at the Dam Site. I remember the night of candy and cheesecake after Eddie dumped me, the way you rushed offstage mid-performance to answer your phone when I called to tell you you had a new nephew. I remember how you choked up when we made you Jonah's godfather. I remember the night we snuck through Bay View in the dark, on foot, for the hell of it, the way we could never find your car when we walked out of WalMart after shopping. I remember the way you always glowed. I told everyone you were my sunshine, and it was true.

I was a fat, bitter, angry girl when I met you. You coaxed me out of that, convinced me to start dressing in something other than oversized tee shirts and baggy cargo pants, made me go shopping with you, refused to let me buy anything other than "girl clothes," and told me I was beautiful so many times I had no choice but to believe you. I could be in the foulest mood, or in the depths of the blackest depression, and the mere fact of your presence would make it a good day again.

Just by being you, you showed me and everyone else in your life the ideal of what a man should be. True, honest, faithful, loyal, an innate talent for seeing and bringing out the best in everyone. You had a trick of texting me at random, somehow sensing something in my life wasn't right. Usually the texts would read "I love you!!" but once, on a particularly rotten day, "I don't know if I've told you this, Meg, but you're one of the best sisters a guy could have. Much love."

You gave me so much, sweetie. Laughter, love, and the courage to be myself. You were as much my brother as if Mom had given birth to you. To hear you sing, to watch you dance was to experience pure joy, to feel my heart soar. 

I've been watching your YouTube channel all day, alternating it with "Light and Day" by the Polyphonic Spree, because that song - the feel of it, the joy in the music and the way it soars with ease - has never failed to remind me of you.

You were light and peace, happiness, the sun after the rain, the epitome of light and joy and spirit in its purest form. The world is a cruel, cold, dark and lonely place without you. You burned like a star, and I miss you, o my brother.

With love forever,
Megan