Finally, after years of waiting, the time had come.
I’m around the age of 12 or 13 at this point, finally getting the chance to reunite with my two brothers. I’d barely got to see them growing up — the only real comfort I had was knowing they were together. If nothing else, they had each other.
My brothers are older than I am — three and four years older. My eldest brother, when I last knew him, was kind and gentle, loved animals, quiet, but always my biggest brother. I didn’t quite know how to take this person who had grown in his place. I was expecting my brother to still be in there — I guess he was, somewhere — but the kindness and the gentle had been replaced with moody, chain-wearing, pierced-to-the-eyeballs heavy metal music fan. I looked into his eyes as if I was trying to find the brother I knew in there, but he just nodded, “Alright, sis?” and then disappeared off out with his mates, and that was that.
I was confused. I expected him to welcome me with a hug and some kind of mention of having missed me — but it didn’t come. I got to know my brother instead from the other side of my bedroom wall, from the music he played loudly in the room next to mine. If I couldn’t connect with him in person, I’d connect through music, and that’s kind of how it went.
My other brother was more chatty, but he had also changed. In place of the brother I’d known — the one I occasionally spoke to on the phone — was someone who thought taking the mickey out of me and insulting me was the way to show brotherly love. But it annoyed me hugely.
We had a proper argument once. He was laid on the sofa chanting his usual taunts. I lost my temper, threw a pool cue at him like it was a javelin — only I missed him and it went straight through a window. He laughed mercilessly. Me? I got pocket money of just £1.65 a week and it took me about three months to pay for the damages. I was heartbroken, to be honest. I’d uprooted the life I knew for a chance to finally be with them, and the reception I received was frosty at best.
I wasn’t really introduced to their friends, more just mildly mentioned like I was a new responsibility they hadn’t agreed to. I didn’t want anything from them — not looking to be looked after — I just longed to connect after all the years apart. I started to regret my choice. The rejection never even crossed my mind as a possibility, and I wished I’d thought twice about it.
Still, I tried. I was confused by the coldness I met. But I was back in mainstream school, and I had work to do — especially as I had to repeat the first year. I’d left my old school in Year 8 and here I was, forced to do a do-over I never asked for. It was a double blow. I’d worked so hard for this chance — not just in my education, but in the hope of rebuilding family — and it all turned out to be completely different than I’d imagined. So I forged my own path.
I joined a local youth club and made new friends. It’s there I met my best friend, his older brother (whom I dated on and off for a while), and his best friend (someone I also dated now and then). I didn’t tend to get on with girls much — all that time in boarding school with far more boys than girls meant I just found them easier to talk to, easier to be around.
My best friend was someone I knew thought a great deal of me. We hung out often. I loved calling in at his house. His family was huge to me — never quiet, always someone around. His mum was warm and inviting — I liked her the moment I met her. Their dad was older, quieter. He ran a magic show and would take his wife with him to do face painting and balloon animals. It was a household I just wished I belonged to. They felt like a proper family, and I loved seeing them any chance I could.
They had younger siblings — both brothers and sisters — and usually if I called, one of the two younger girls would come out to say hello. They were both under five. The older one had this cheeky, giggling soul, brown curls and a mischief about her that I just adored. I imagined how she’d grow up to be this gorgeous young woman one day. She was ace.
The youngest was even more cheeky — maybe two or three at the time. She tried to talk to me, but I couldn’t understand a word she said. My friend explained that as the baby of the family, she didn’t have to try too hard — she’d made up her own language. Even now, I only remember two words: “Mommy” and “Bobbit” — her mum and dad.
Even though she made no sense to me and he was always translating, she was usually butt-naked and running about, and even now I swear my fascination with balloon dogs started with her. That child couldn’t talk to me, but she could twist up a balloon into a dog in seconds flat, like magic. She just fascinated me.
I’d never had younger siblings — I was the baby of the family — so to meet these little people was something really special. They brought little sparks of light into my life.
So for the most part, I hung out with my little circle of friends. Around age 13, I dated my best friend’s older brother on and off. One summer evening, we decided to give each other something you can only give once. It wasn’t quite the dreamy teenage movie moment — a bit awkward, a bit strange — but it felt like sealing our connection somehow.
I got home just in time for curfew. A member of staff clocked the glowing purple love bite on my neck and commented that teenagers shouldn’t be going out getting “things like that.” But something in me had shifted, I felt different. A few weeks later, after a missed period, I started bleeding quite heavily.
I told him at the time, but he didn’t believe me. Thought I made it up — a way to trap him, to keep him. And here I was, rejected again. A familiar theme pulsing through most of my early life.
After that, I started going out more. Met new people. Drifted into a different group. I didn’t really see him much again, though I stayed good friends with his brother for a few years. It just wasn’t the same.
At school, I gave up. Why bother? All the hard work I’d done hadn’t followed me. No one had my records from boarding school. I’d gone from a Level 7b in maths to a 3a — doing the exact same programme. At the pace they taught, I was never going to catch up to what I’d already achieved. I got bored. Fed up of waiting for the rest of the class to catch up with what I’d finished in the first ten minutes.
During this time, my brothers were starting to get on with their own lives. My eldest moved out to live with his girlfriend in another town. The younger followed when he was old enough to get his own place. They stayed close — I was a bit jealous of that. But I understand it now.
I did get to see my sister from time to time. She was the eldest of us all. She’d left our mother’s house as soon as she could and moved in with her boyfriend. I wasn’t a fan of him, but I loved that she’d found her freedom at last. That was something.
School stayed hard. One kid even threatened to get my own brother to beat me up — said I was lying, that he didn’t have a younger sister. When I told my brother, he laughed. “Don’t worry,” he said. “I’d never hurt you.”
That was mostly true.
Until the day he hit me so hard in the side of the head, my ears rang.
It was as if all I’d ever known was violence, rejection, and using misbehaviour as my way out when things got too hard. With my brothers gone and me getting older, a decision was made — I was to move to foster parents. Only a short walk from the children’s home, but it felt like a hundred miles away.
But I was getting used to being alone.
Missed a bit?
← Part Six – Emotionally and Behaviourally Disturbed
Hungry for more?
Unwearing the Mercury 