My Big Brother Reggie

My big brother Reggie’s got his shit together. He quotes Pema Chödrön almost incessantly. He puts chia seeds in his protein shakes. He’s brewing his own beer. I think he posted a gym selfie the other day.

Me, I just got out of rehab. A lot of folks I knew there ended up kind of like Reggie. They like Ted Talks and hiking and such. I’m the “treatment resistant” type. This was my fifth rehab rodeo. Naturally, I’m excited to have regained my freedom. But I can’t say I’ve really understood the last few days on the outside. In the beginning it was simple. It started like it always did. Reggie had me over to sit in his living room while he drank his stupid homemade beer and judged me. It was very typical. Sitting on the same couch in the same room of the same beautiful house. He’s always carried himself like a soldier. Tall, with broad shoulders and a sculpted face. He’s the epitome of manhood. I shrivel like a rat in his presence, always have. I slouch. My shoulders slant down like a child’s. I’ve got the pale veiny skin of an addict and a face to match. We were sitting apart from each other on either end of the couch. He sat with a kind of hesitant silence for a moment in the muted light of his living room. It was drab outside and his shades were down. There was a steely glow all over the room. It made the gray couch feel like an extension of the off-gray floor, as if we were sinking into it. Usually I get out of treatment centers in the summer, but this time I got out in December. His nice house with white walls and tall ceilings felt oddly empty in the winter light. I felt oddly empty.

Reggie took a sip and his proud jaw descended slightly. He looked over to me.

“So this is the last time, right Adam?”

“Yeah, Reg. Cross my heart.”

He nodded and took another sip. The stuff smelled like dog piss. It made me glad I didn’t drink anymore. He opened his mouth:

“When are you gonna start writing again? You know it’s been years since I’ve seen you put anything out. You’re always carrying around that notebook but you never pick up a pen. You know you could make a lot of--”

“I know, I know. I’ll get around to it. It’s hard to write in rehab”, I cut him off. It was my nature to drown out Reggies soft, stern tone. It was truly the only advantage I had over him.

“I highly doubt that. You had nothing but time in there.”

“And I highly doubt that what you’re drinking did not come from a dog’s bladder, Reginald.”

“Good one. Good one” he said with just a little too much disdain for it to be funny. He got up to go to the bathroom, shaking his head.

It had been a few minutes and he was still upstairs, so I assumed he got into it with Jane, his wife. That is, his wife who is drop dead gorgeous. I thought about how I haven’t dated since college. Jesus, has it been ten years? I buried my face in my palms for a moment and pulled them outwards. I started to get antsy after that. I knew I wouldn’t see Reggie for at least a few more minutes. I looked behind me to the kitchen where granite countertops rose out of the floor like flat statues. Naturally, I began to poke around the place a little bit. I’m a curious guy.

In one of the kitchen drawers I found a black book that turned out to be Reggie's book for planning how to market his awful beer. This oughta be rich, I thought. It was an unusually thick book, chunky, heavy, and broad. It provoked the sense of touch the way sitting on your hands does. I opened it. Too much mention of “hoppy taste”. Pretentious beer descriptors like “cool mountain spring undertones-- smooth hints of umami”. Insufferable taglines like “enjoy the view: Tastescape Beer”. It was hilarious, and that was only the first page, so I thought I’d be entertained for a while. I was wrong. The rest of the pages had a rectangle cut in the middle of them. Inside the rectangle was a large sum of cash, along with a mysterious looking credit card. I wasn’t going to be entertained for a while, I was going to be entertained for days.

I put the book in the inside pocket of my jacket and replaced it with my notebook that looked similar enough, despite it being a quarter of the size. I felt like Indiana fucking Jones. When Reggie came back down I decided I was bored with him and it was time to leave. We shared an awkward acknowledgement of each other’s presence, a nod with pursed lips, and a wave. I had a decision to make then. I could give this money back to Reg and see where his company would take him, or I could have a little fun. My brother’s livelihood, or some fun? Reggie, or me?

Fuck Reggie and his nice countertops. I deserved the money for just putting up with his pretentious ass for two hours. First stop, liquor store. All together my big brother Reggie had saved up quite a lot of dough to kick start his business—twenty grand to be exact. What a shithead, leaving twenty G’s in his kitchen drawer. He’d better hope all those smart cams around his house stay in working order. I sure was a lucky fella, and after all, I deserved it.

Next thing I knew I was roaring drunk. Days turned into nights and nights turned into days. A drinking buddy of mine said it had been a week, and to that, I drank. I needed a little more action though. I moved up the ladder. Designer drugs, girls, cars, the whole nine. It was like I was living my glory days all over again, seeing my prime blossom once more like a daisy after a hard winter. But the money seemed to be disappearing right before my eyes. The cash was all gone at that point. The card had a total of eighty dollars left on it. When I looked to where my drinking buddy was sitting he was gone. I heard the door slam. More for me, I thought.

Two days later I was back at Reggie’s house. I had broken in. I was cold, sweaty, and pale. I had run out of money, drink, and drugs. I was hoping maybe he had a safe somewhere. Suddenly, the light of my flashlight was met with the kitchen’s overhead lights.

“Hey Adam,” said Reggie. “I knew you’d be back”

I spent the following moments trying to explain myself to him, saying I got our books mixed up, bullshitting, telling him I didn’t know where it went.

“You know what I have to do, right?” He said, with a bit of softness.

About five minutes later I was running down main street with at least two cop cars behind me. I jacked some kid’s bike and was making some progress when a giant hand came from the sky and crushed me in its palm. I turned into ashy dust. I was dead.

Back in Reggie’s kitchen, I felt a bit uneasy. My mind usually wasn’t so cruel, but it was a benevolent cruelness. A kind hand smacking me across the face. I saw the rest of my life as I touched that book. The rest of my apparently very short life. The most horrifying part of my twisted daydream wasn’t getting my innards crushed by a massive hand, it wasn’t the horrid relapse, it was ending up alone, all alone.

I held the two books in my hands and turned them towards and against the gray light, back and forth. They both meant something together, side by side. I just didn’t know what yet. When Reggie came back downstairs he gave me a hug, and said “I love you buddy. I’m proud of you.”

I left with no response.

So here I am, sitting in the park. It’s bright out. My eyes hurt. I’m sitting here, and I’m writing.

For so long I felt like I didn’t even want to get better. Maybe it’s because Reggie has his shit together and I don’t. I’m too human, and Reggie was something more than human. He was good at everything when we were growing up. The good grades turned into the good schools turned into the good jobs. I made too many mistakes. I was strange. I was “the little guy”. I was clumsy and bashful and ugly the way the human animal is. Reggie was superman and I was a defeated villain, left in the dust, forgotten. I felt abandoned, as if the more he succeeded the further away he got, the further I sunk, the less he loved me, and the less anyone did.

Reggie’s black book represented all of that.

It represented his determination, his passion. It showed his resourcefulness and his self control. All the things I lack. The older we got the more I resented Reggie. The more I envied him. The more alone I felt. That visit would probably be the last for at least six months. It had been years since I said “I love you” to him.

But the strange part of it is that he never stopped saying it to me. It dawned on me that Reggie was always there. He never gave up on me as countless people did over time, fed up with my recklessness. I felt alone because of myself. I was angry at the wrong guy. My own selfishness put me in the grave today, the strange metaphorical grave located in the more morbid parts of my imagination. I wanted revenge on Reggie for being himself. I thought he was perfect. But ol’ Reg is just a human too. The fact he didn’t keep his book in a safe showed his humanity, and the faith he had in the humanity of others. I’m beginning to remember moments, like that time Reggie got too drunk at the Christmas party and threw up all over aunt Jackie. Or when he tried to cut his hair himself and nearly ended up bald. He’s just a human too.

As I’m writing in my little black book, I’m remembering how the two books looked in that gray light. They both shone dimly, they both collected the dust in the air, they both had pages. One was massive, and one was rather humble. But all in all they looked pretty much the same. I think my little black book represents my humanity. It may be small, unused, and blank right now, but it won’t be forever. It’s up to me to fill these pages as time wistfully passes on.

I thought the nightmare that followed my discovery of Reggie’s book saved me today. Now I’m beginning to think it was this little black book, the one that I’m writing in. Something tells me there’s hope for me and it too.

A lot of people have little black books. They have dreams, ambitions, ideas, plans to sell their shitty home brewed beer, and they need a place to store them while they think up a little more magic to add. Reggie’s book just happens to have a lot of money in it. Mine, has words, and a lot of blank pages. There are a lot of little black books in the world.

I prefer the ones with blank pages.