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“I grieved bitterly, Cheated
of earth, cheated
of a whole childhood, of the great dreams of my heart
which would never be manifest.No one knew any of this.
And then I lived.I kept being alive
when I should have been burning:
I was Joan, I was Lazarus.”— Louise Gluck, Saint Joan
For as long as he could recall, grief followed his family around like a dreadful curse— dark, looming, and omnipresent.
Sure, there had been a time where they had been free from such tragedies, but those days have been long gone. Buried six feet into the ground.
Death was no stranger to him.
He has faced it before, years ago when he was forced to attend a funeral he wanted no part in, with no other choice but to watch as they began to lower their father’s casket to the ground.
Every day after the funeral he had secretly hoped for their dad to come back, wishing to see him opening their front door in a grand entrance to announce his return, just like before.
Their dad never came back, and in two week’s time he’s had to learn that whatever death has taken does not come back.
When Tyler began to fall, he did not think about the unfairness of untimely endings or what awaited him in the darkness after death. He only thought about one thing: the family he’ll have to leave behind.
Regret and desperation fills him as he desperately tries to cling to life.
It was not his time, he pleads.
He cannot leave them, he reasons.
His fall does not slow down, and he wants to scream.
How could he leave first after all he went through, after all he’s sacrificed?
He does not see where he lands, all he registered is the pain.
i. Radiance.
When Tyler opens his eyes for the very first time in his life, he opens it to the setting sun eclipsing into a world big enough to swallow him whole.
There are blurred and distorted faces watching over him, producing sounds he cannot yet understand.
This world frightened him, but thankfully he isn’t alone, not really.
He’s got a twin sister by his side, and it’s with her and for her that he will learn how to conquer this strange new world.
He’s two when Taylor is placed next to him in the same crib.
Taylor isn’t as big or as strong as the other people around him.
She’s small, and she has the same eyes and hair and skin as him.
It was fascinating to watch someone that looks so much like him, so he continues to watch her with great curiosity.
But unlike him, Taylor cries a lot. She cries when she isn’t sleeping, and she will make it everyone’s problem. Tyler doesn’t know where she gets all the energy from, but when her eyes start to wet upon being separated from their mother, Tyler readies himself for his sister’s tears.
It doesn’t take long until Taylor is crying once again, and at this point Tyler isn’t sure what causes his sister to cry so easily, but he is determined to put a stop to them.
Slowly, he reached forward to grab hold of her hand.
Magically, she quiets upon his touch, and he continues to hold her until her cries have hiccupped to a stop and there are no more tears falling down her cheeks.
He lets her settle next to him, content to let his sister use him as a makeshift pillow so long as it puts a stop to her crying.
Tyler doesn't truly understand this yet, but it's by watching him, and grasping onto his tiny hand, that Taylor is able to sleep peacefully.
At three years old, Tyler is able to run and even faster than ever.
He speeds past their kitchen until he’s outside their yard, watching in excitement as the world is bathed in sunlight.
It was a beautiful day outside, perfect for running and exploring, and as soon as he reached their mother’s garden his eyes narrowed in on a small butterfly fluttering across the flower bed.
He chases after it without a second thought, excited to have something to run after, screaming in excitement as he inched closer and closer to his target.
Once he’s captured the small insect in his hands, he calls out to Taylor who’s been running after him all this time.
He made sure to open his hands wide enough for his sister to see, but the butterfly had immediately fluttered away from his grasp before Taylor got a good look of it.
With a yelp, he runs after the butterfly, grasping onto Taylor’s hand in order for his sister to catch up to him.
Laughter filled the yard as they chased after the small insect together. They kept running until their feet couldn’t keep going, and as his legs gave out, he flops himself to the grass from exhaustion, with Taylor following right after him.
He remembers laughing a lot with his sister then.
Taylor laughs the same way stars twinkle at night, and it’s a memory he would never forget.
He’s four by the time he’s able to read and write his full name without getting his b’s and d’s mixed up.
Their mom says she’s proud of him, and their dad says he’s a genius for learning so quickly.
He doesn’t really understand much of what their praise meant, but he’s happy that he gets to be complemented by the two of them.
A part of him soaks up their encouragement while the rest of his being surrounds himself in their love. His chest swells as his confidence grows.
He feels expansive, as though his heart is big enough and strong enough to contain the whole world inside of it.
And when Taylor offers him her first ever drawing as a congratulatory gift for writing her name next to his whenever he practices, he does everything he could to keep getting better at his penmanship.
He's five when he first saw blood spilled on the ground.
Taylor had been so small then, innocuous and fragile from the moment she was born.
Worry and panic overtook his entire body as he watched her fall down and scraped her knee on the pavement. No other thought had crossed his mind but the urge to run to his sister and make sure she was okay.
It always broke his heart to hear her crying.
He pushes all his anxiousness at the sight of her injury at the back of his mind and focuses all of his attention on his sister.
Thankfully, he still had the band aid their dad gave him last week from baseball practice, and much like how a magician procured a white rabbit from his hat, he pulls the precious item from one of his short pockets and places it on Taylor’s injured knee as gently as he could.
"Pretty cool huh?" He coaxes when he notices her fascination towards the cartoon sun printed on the band aid. He gives her injured knee a soft pat before adding, "I was saving that for baseball practice with dad, but I think it looks a lot better on you than me." He adds with a wink, hoping to elevate her pain as much as he could.
Tyler gives her a reassuring smile, hoping that she’d take comfort in his reassurance.
It was like a switch, to see Taylor crying one moment from an injury, to smiling just as brightly as the sun painted on the band aid placed on top of her knee.
Taylor stopped crying, and Tyler is able to breathe a lot better knowing that he did his job right.
The band aid stays on her knee the rest of the day, and was only taken out when their mom sees the extent of her injury and has Taylor sitting down on the kitchen stool as she applies antibiotics on the dried cut.
Tyler had gotten an earful from their mom about how to properly treat injuries and the dangers of infections, but at least they both got ice cream afterwards for looking out for each other.
And as he ate his share of the sweet treat, the one thing that resonated with him was the last thing their mom had told him: It’s the older brother’s job to look out for his family.
Tyler makes a promise with himself then. He will do his job, and will do it right.
The flowers around his head smell sickly sweet and his nose is starting to itch but he doesn't mind.
"You look like a prince!" Taylor exclaimed with pure delight. The sun makes her eyes sparkle and her hair shine like warm honey and Tyler wonders, not for the first time, if his sister was made of stardust.
Their mom had always fondly called Taylor her little moon, and Tyler thought there might be some truth to such an endearment.
His sister lays back on the grass, her skin flushed against the green, daisies are kissing her arms and cheeks.
Taylor smiles, and he watches her fondly.
The two of them are sprawled out by the park’s freshly trimmed grass. A few feet away he could hear their mother’s soft laughter closely followed by their father’s.
Days like where the four of them get to spend the rest of the day together are his favorites, closely followed by baseball practice with their dad.
Tyler hopes, more than anything, that he could spend the rest of his life this happy and content.
A year later Tyler's entire world shifts off of its axis.
It starts with a phone call from their father’s office, closely followed by a trip to the hospital and the sound of their mother’s sobbing.
The sterile air inside the small room where their dad was confined sticks to him, even as they get home the scent of antiseptic clings to him as a firm reminder of what he had seen, of what he had heard.
Taylor clings to him even stronger, completely shaken.
He does his best to comfort her with reassurances he himself desperately wished to hear from their mother.
He tells her the same thing their father had told them earlier, and he reminds her that their dad is even stronger than him.
“He’ll be fine, Tay.” He says with as much conviction as he could muster. “He promised us he will.”
With their parents still at the hospital, it was up to him to reheat the leftovers for dinner and help brush Taylor’s hair when they got ready for bed.
He does not sleep soundly that night, but when Taylor startles awake from a nightmare an hour later, he pushes his own unease aside and holds her until her breath even out and she’s fast asleep in his arms.
Taylor is a warm and familiar presence next to him, and Tyler takes comfort in the fact that he at least has his sister with him.
But it doesn’t stop him from missing his parents any less.
They had just buried his father.
He doesn't cry but his eyes are stinging.
The sky was clear and blue without a single cloud in sight, and all the birds were singing high up above the treetops, completely unaware of the tragedy happening below them.
He stands still, listening as the bird song mixes with his mother’s sobbing.
His hands clenched into fists at his side, but he didn't say anything.
There was nothing to say, nothing that would be able to take away the pain eating at his chest or the grief in his sister’s eyes as she held onto their mother, looking so lost and confused.
He hated how powerless he felt, how useless he was at the face of such loss.
What’s even worse is that there’s now a hole inside his heart, and it’s growing bigger the more he lets himself feel the pain of such world shattering grief.
The pain is suffocating but he tells himself he is not afraid.
He cannot allow himself to break fully when he still has his sister and mother with him.
He is not alone, he reminds himself.
And with his resolve made up, Tyler finally allows himself to unclench his fists.
Their father’s death changed something in his family.
Mom hasn’t left her room after the funeral, and by the time the sun has set and Taylor’s clinging onto his sleeve to ask him when dinner will be ready, he could still hear her crying.
“I’m hungry.” Taylor reminds him after they’ve left their mother’s room without as much as a glance from her.
Tyler doesn’t really know how to cook, but he’s the only Taylor can rely on right now.
And it's the older brother’s job to take care of his family, he tells himself.
“Don’t worry.” He tells her, tightening his grip on her hand to make sure she understood what he was going to say next. “I’ll take care of you both.”
“I promise.”
He knows nothing about cooking or how to work the stove to catch fire, but he’s seen his mom do it a hundred times, so he’ll probably be able to figure it all out. And besides, Taylor needed him and he’d do anything for his family.
He ends up burning himself when he accidentally touches the metal part of the pan while he was cracking some of the eggs on the sizzling plate, but he manages not to burn their dinner and they manage to end the day with their stomachs full.
Tay puts a band aid on his burn mark, and after dinner he lets her sleep over for the night.
He could feel her shaking next to him, and he held her as she broke down and cried in his arms.
Tyler continues to hold her, his touch a silent support as she wept for their father’s death and for their mother’s grief, and at the pain of losing someone they will never get to be with.
He could feel his own heart, or what’s little left of it, breaking all over again.
A part of him, a stronger and more vindictive part, wants to be angry. He lets the feeling sit, taking root inside his chest as he feels Taylor’s tears finally subsiding and she is finally fast asleep in his arms.
A weight has been lifted from his chest as his anger continues to grow like flames lapping at anything it touches, burning away his grief until he is no longer consumed by it.
Releasing a breath he didn’t realize he had been holding, he lets himself relax before pulling the blanket over him and his sister.
Once he’s laid back down, Tyler closes his eyes and dreams about clear blue skies and the endless sound of songbirds.
In the dream, there is no grave below the trees, only the distant sound of his parents’ laughter and Taylor’s soft voice as she calls for him to follow her.
The dream comforts him, even for a little bit.
ii. Rage.
Through the years, Tyler has had to grow up faster than his sister. He also had to learn a lot of things if he wanted to keep his promise. He took to his new role the same way he practices baseball: bruised, aching, tired and worn, but he’s all the better from it.
He will overcome any hardship life throws his way like how he’s won everything in his life, with dust under his nails and blood hot in his mouth. Hard-won and bitter-fought.
He has learned how to function despite the gaping hole left in his heart that’s constantly threatening to swallow him whole.
There isn’t a trace of the eight year boy left in him. He is broad-shouldered and weatherworn, strong from the labors of all the various house work and baseball training, all the softness inside of him discarded. Scars and calluses cover his fingertips, and he feels stronger and hallowed out all at once.
There is anger inside of him that has not left since Taylor had slept over the night of their father’s funeral. It follows him around wherever he goes, and he uses it as an excuse to fight whenever the bite of rage and violence calls out to him.
Their father wouldn’t be able to recognize him if he ever saw him now.
He thinks it’s a good thing. After all, dead eyes would be easier to look at than his own gaze.
His family had no need for broken promises and sugary sweet words of comfort. They had needed someone better and stronger to stay afloat, and he had been ready to shoulder that responsibility as the older brother.
It doesn’t matter what he has to lose or take apart, or how much of himself he has to give up in order to hold his family together.
All that matters is them and that he does his job.
And over the years, he’s taken great pride at being able to do his job right.
For a while he starts to think that all the hard work he’s been doing is finally paying off, and that things are looking up for him and his family.
Their mom has been getting better lately. She still asks about their dad, and they haven’t been brave enough to remind her that he’s never coming back home, but at least she’s finally there in their lives again, existing in the same house as them and no longer trapped in time by her own grief.
Taylor says she’ll be a regular member at the mechanics club starting next semester, and she’s looked happier since.
He hasn’t seen her so excited in a long time, and when she asked him what he thought about her joining, he put on the biggest smile on his face and told her he couldn’t wait to see what she’ll work on next.
Taylor responded to his answer like a flower unfolding to spring, offering him a smile he would fight thousands to protect.
When he finally manages to save up enough money from a few part time work Taylor has no business knowing about, he finally takes her out to celebrate their birthday.
He takes her to the same ice cream shop their dad used to take them to after work, making sure to keep his mouth closed about where he got the money despite Taylor’s questioning gaze.
Just like their dad, he lets her pick out whatever flavor she wants, insisting he’s got enough money to pay for everything when she tries to tell him how expensive the place was.
Taylor ends up picking out all her favorites, the same exact flavors never change even after all these years, and when she hands him his share, he’s not surprised to find all his favorites stacked up the exact same way he likes them.
Taylor grins up at him when she sees his reaction, and he smiles at her fondly before paying.
The walk to the park had been quiet save for the sound of their footsteps as they stepped on cracked pavement.
Next to him, Taylor is laser focused on making sure none of the ice cream melts on her fingers and he stifles out a laugh when he realizes she’s nearly finished eating hers while he’s barely eaten any of his.
He catches sight of her wandering eyes as her gaze momentarily shifts over to him, and what he sees has his insides churning.
He doesn’t know why she looks like she’s seconds away from crying, but he nudges her with his elbow to get her attention and asks her what’s wrong.
She doesn’t tell him what’s really bothering her, but he lets her get away with it.
Taylor never pushes him for answers when he’s frustrated about something, so he returns the courtesy and doesn’t call her out on when she lies about wanting to try his share.
He still offers his share to her, just because she asked.
Taylor deserved more than just a few more scoops of ice cream, but for now that’s all he can offer her.
The sun is beginning to set when they make a detour and head over to the park near their neighborhood.
Taylor excitedly makes her way on an empty swing and he quietly follows after her, sitting on the empty seat on Taylor’s right.
The two of them quietly finished eating as they watched a bunch of neighborhood kids playing, chasing each other around while their parents watched closely behind. The smiles on their faces are bright and evident.
It was glaringly obvious that none of these kids have ever experienced grief in their lives.
His family haven’t been so lucky.
Taylor shakes him from his train of thought when she thanks him for the ice cream. He immediately turns his gaze back to her, letting her gratitude soften the sharpness inside his veins until he’s able to return her tenderness with his own.
“Well I promised you ice cream yesterday, didn't I?” He says after a moment.
Tyler smiled. There was still a thrum of tension at the reminder of what they had lost- of the things he cannot protect her from- but Tyler’s hands are calloused and scarred, and the fire underneath his skin is proof. Undeniable, irrefutable proof that he will protect his sister and give her a life she deserves.
Because Tyler is the older twin, and he has a promise to keep.
“Yeah, you did.” She answers him with a smile of her own. “Thanks, Ty.”
"What are big brothers for?"
Only a few days into the new school year something goes terribly, terribly wrong .
He tried to deny the problem at first, hoping that the problem wasn’t real the same way he had hoped their father’s sickness wasn’t going to kill him.
But life had ways of making him eat his words, and suffer even more.
So when a brand new set of problems presents itself in a form of a parallel dimension where shadowed monsters are out to kill him and his sister, he finally finds himself at a complete loss for what to do.
Thankfully, he’s not alone this time.
And with his and Taylor’s life on the line, he finds his strength to keep fighting.
In the phantom world, the sky is always red and darkness entraps the earth in a blanket of shadows.
There are no other sounds to be heard apart from their own ragged breaths and the sound of their footsteps as they run.
There are no birds to be seen or heard, only the creeks and bumps of shadowed creatures as they begin their hunt for flesh once more.
Tyler rarely gets scared, but when faced with the unknown and surrounded by smiling monsters that are trying to kill him and his sister, he can’t help but shudder at having to wake up each night to such a place.
Thankfully, he rarely has the chance to think about anything in the presence of imminent death.
He’s never really been one to sit down and contemplate the how’s and why’s of what made up the world, and whether or not the grief haunting his family like a ghost had been what the world had intended for them all along.
He’d rather not know the answer to such a question, he doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to accept whatever the answer is.
Which is why when his hands are entrusted with weapons and he’s been instructed to run and fight for their lives, he tightens his grip and does what he’s always done, he forgets about unanswered questions and channels all of his anger at the face of hardship and lets it carry him until all that he is is pure, vicious defiance.
He does not die on their first night in the phantom realm, nor does his sister and the rest of their friends.
And in the following weeks after that, he starts to hope once more.
In all of Tyler's fifteen years of existence, he has never considered— not even for a second — breaking his promise to Taylor.
Even when he’s been dealt with the shittiest of cards in life for as long as he could remember, nothing was going to stop him from protecting the only thing left of what’s his.
He wasn’t going to leave Taylor or his mom alone, not like dad did.
He couldn’t possibly let them experience that mind shattering grief all over again, not when he could do something about it.
When he had taken on the burden of caring for his family, he had been prepared to face off the worst life had to throw at him.
Death was no stranger to him, but when he felt the warmth of Taylor’s body beginning to leave his side and as gravity began to shift underneath his feet and he started to fall , he thinks death was not something he’s ready to face once again.
At least not so soon.
But life always had a way of making him beg for the impossible.
His fall had been no different.
When Tyler finally felt the impact of his fall coursing through his body, he could only hope that when he finally opens his eyes, it’s to the sight of clear blue skies and the endless sound of songbirds once more.
iii. Resurrection.
He does not die, but staying alive wasn’t easy either.
Waking up has never felt so agonizing than when he opens his eyes again.
His lungs are on fire, and when he finally managed to open his eyes properly, he swore he could still feel something piercing him. He doesn't try to recall why he felt as shitty as he did after waking up nor does he want to.
He can at least admit it to himself that he’s pretty scared to try and remember what’s causing so much pain on his body.
It’s even worse now that he’s fully conscious, and it won’t go away no matter how much he hoped for it to.
But then again, when has hoping for things ever worked out for him?
An image of himself flashes across his mind then, his body stuck in the phantom dimension and losing blood, far too much blood.
He tries to blink the nightmare from existence, and when he feels cold and unfamiliar hands trying to pin him down, he pushes them away to try and break free.
By the time he's registered the fact that he’s in a hospital bed, he is already far too agitated to listen to all the voices trying to calm him down. Another pair of hands try to pull him back and he thrashes to break free.
White hot pain immediately shoots up from his side and he screams.
Despite the commotion all around him, he still manages to hear Taylor’s voice shouting for him, and he fights everyone off even harder. He fights until his arms are a bloody mess from pulling out his IV line and his heart rate is going a mile a minute, but he doesn’t stop and by the next second he's already out of the hospital room and running across the hallway.
He keeps running.
He feels like he’s been running his entire life.
He doesn't let himself think of anything else.
He can't. Not when every time he closes his eyes, he sees that bloody fucking tree.
He's already down the hallway in record time, running faster than all the time Coach was shouting at him to pick up the pace during practice.
His insides are on fire and he could feel his consciousness slipping every time he tries to take in a single breath, but he pushes through the scorching hot pain until he finally reaches the one person that mattered most in the world.
Seeing Taylor stops him from his track and he doesn’t even have any time to register the relief he felt before he’s being tackled into the tightest bear hug Taylor has ever given him in his life.
They had landed with a loud thud in the middle of the cold hospital floor, but Tyler hadn't even felt the sting of the impact. What he had felt was Taylor’s tears as it began to soak his hospital gown, and Taylor, whole and alive and unhurt in his arms.
He could cry from the relief, and for the first time in his life, he finally allowed himself to.
“It’s alright. I’m here” He whispers, circling his hands over Taylor’s back the same way their dad used to whenever she woke up from a nightmare.
“I’m right here.” He promised.
He doesn’t let go of her even as his blood begins to stain her white sweater, he only holds her even tighter, suddenly afraid of ever forgetting the warmth of Taylor’s arms as she holds onto him.
He’s never going to let anything keep him from her ever again, he promised himself then.
And as he felt their mom’s gentle fingers holding his own, he lets himself hold on to a little bit of hope.
He had thought— he had honestly thought— he was never going to see them again.
Fifteen years isn’t enough time, not when he still has so much to do for Taylor and their mother; not when he still has so much of himself he can still give in order to protect what’s little left of what he considers to be his.
Death may have taken from him before, but he will fight tooth and nail if it ever tries to take him from his family again. Besides, fighting his way for a chance at a happy ending isn’t news to him, not when he’s been fighting all his life.
And he will continue to keep fighting for that chance, because if there’s anyone out there in this world who deserves to be happy after everything, it would be his family.
Tyler knows this, he knows this more than anyone.