Macabre Moments

I remember the day you called to ask if you could move in with me. You sounded nervous while you told me about this opportunity to travel with the winter work season.

I said yes. No second thoughts, no hesitation, no nothing. The feeling of homesickness never really left me, I guess. Growing up around you and Manuel for the most significant part of my childhood meant being around my first best friends. Always together and sharing everything. I look back at those times, and it feels so easy to wish I could wake up in those days.

But that’s all science fiction. This is the real world.

I moved here in late October ‘22. You moved in November ‘22. It was like having a piece of home with me. The feeling of being away from everyone disappeared those five months. We were housemates again, though it never really felt like that in the past. We just lived together because it was just that—a family under one roof.

Excited is an understatement for what I felt. I couldn’t believe it; I had my little brother living with me. It was the best. And every moment I caught you lounging, I joined you, talked your ear off, complained to you, everything. Sometimes we didn’t do anything but sit together. Even that was an activity. That’s the thing with siblings; anything you do together, even nothing, is something.

You left in April ‘23, after the work season was over. I was sad, but glad you’d be back in November.

And you were.

One thing I noticed this time around was how quickly you were growing. You were changing into someone more responsible, more independent. You looked happy and in control of your life. You were turning into the man you were supposed to be. I was so proud of you and I made sure to tell you. Because I was proud. There’s nothing like watching your brother flourish.

Then you left, again. You came back that summer of ‘24 to buy a house here. That following winter, like every winter since you moved here, you stopped by my place for a hug and to announce your arrival. Classic Chuy. Nothing had changed then; you were at your house and we’d still see each other when time permitted. Like clockwork, you left again. I tended to your house while you were away working in Salinas.

I think everything changed when we bought our house. It was right before last winter, and right before Jack was born. It was perfect.

It was November ‘25 when I picked you up from the airport. I remember you blowing up my phone asking where I was, telling me to stay home with Jack, and threatening to call an Uber. It pissed me off because I had been one stoplight away and you were sending a barrage of nonsense to my phone.

“Wassup bro, you came?” You said this as you opened the car door and put your stuff inside. You were laughing in that sarcastic-insult way you did when you would push buttons. I didn’t care, though.

I dropped you off at your house. I drove to mine. Somehow, someway, we managed to find a house a couple of blocks from yours. It was perfect being so close.

We never got to really enjoy that, did we? Maybe for three months we did. If you didn’t walk to my place, I would walk to yours.

Now, I can’t help but glance in the direction of your house every time I go to my in-laws. I can picture you walking, head hanging low, looking at your phone, headed in the direction of my house. I can’t help but see your ghost.

I can’t help but glance when I pass by—whether I’m going to work or going out for errands, I glance over to the left. I can only see the roof and part of the fascia, and it takes me back to when I set up your security cameras.

I took them all down a few months after the accident.

Sometimes I go to your house and park on the driveway. I stare at the overgrown weeds, the hole in the wall where the doorbell was, the Final Notice taped to the front window. It’s all empty. I wish you would step out of the house and tell me you’ve been there this whole time.

I would have been picking you up from the airport today.