Ghost of a Brother's Love

I know my brother loves me, thought David, gazing at the ovoid of moonlight on the cavern floor. He looked up and found the hole he came through. It was difficult to see in the darkness, and the moonbeam showed only when it fell upon something. Its source was somewhere beyond the rim, out of sight.

“James?” David called out. His brother would be there; he knew. James had urged David to go closer to the hole, dared him even. He remembered that. David was eight and James, twelve.

James loved him, as much as he loved James, he was sure of that. The admiration that the youngster held for his sibling was not uncommon. David often wondered if James' cruelness was also not uncommon.

The older brother never cared to play with David. James once told him, “I liked thing much better before you came along.”

David knew that older brothers said such things. David knew that James loved him.

A bit of dirt trickled from above and sprinkled through David's brown curls. He tried to brush it off his head and his blue plaid shirt sleeve as the moonlight played over even bluer eyes. They seemed to give back more radiance than they could have captured. He tried to brush away the dirt but nothing was there.

David looked at the moonlight on the wall. It seemed to move before his eyes, faster than it should. More dirt trickled down. “James?”

The cavern floor was equal parts rock and soil. Nothing grew here but some faint glowing fungus on one wall. At least David thought that might be what it was. Lumps and bumps made up the floor. Still, David found it easy gliding over them. Never had he felt so graceful.

Glancing up, he pondered his surroundings. How did I climb down here? He could not recall. But, it did not take long for his eight-year old mind to dismiss the notion. He was there. Nothing else mattered, nothing save a niggling thought of his brother. James?

The moonlight moved again. David watched rocks and dirt disappear as new detritus took its place.
“James,“ David shouted. “James, come down here. You've got to see this place.”

The verve in David's voice betrayed all of his adoration for his sibling. Nothing could please him more than finding this magical place than to share it with James.

David's smile faded for the moment. Thoughts of other discoveries, other attempts to share things with James surfaced, if only for a moment.

James was often jealous, even selfish about the things David found. Sometimes James was mean.

David shooed the notion away. “James!” he called once more. David loved his brother, and he knew that his brother loved him too.

The moonlight moved farther along the floor. David somehow knew to look up when the moon shone past the rim of the hole, far above.

Farther and farther the light crept, like some watchman's lantern, searching. More rocks, more dirt, then something else.

The beam of light nearly halted when it first touched the colors of the crumpled thing on the cavern floor. The moon slowed but did not stop, as if it were trying to show David something, as if it were trying to convince him.

The ovoid had become a perfect circle. It crept over the crumpled thing showing David the contrasting hues of its blue design against the moonlit earth and stone.

Soiled and dingy and disguised by a lunar halo, it was made up of blues and whites, crisscrossing one another. It was fabric.

David inched closer. No smile adorned the child's face once the moon showed him the rest. The light covered the entire outline of the old shirt, laying atop jagged rocks and looking broken like the tawny bones protruding from its sleeves. The moon lit only a part of the canvas of the pants, but it was enough.

David glanced down at his own shirt, his own pants. The sting of a single tear formed in his eye and a hard lump in his throat. Blue plaid... and jeans... my jeans?

David could not believe what the moon was showing him. He looked up again as another notion struck him, the memory of how he came to be down there. James? A flash of anger faded to compassion. James, why did you do this to me?

Then the notion dissolved. I know my brother loves me, thought David, gazing at the ovoid of moonlight on the cavern floor.

“James?”

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