Brandon

"Thats not you. Your the academic. Don't try to be something that your not."

Those were the cold words that my father said to me about the fact that I had been caught skipping. He continued to talk on about being responsible and such, but I completely tuned him out and focused on those words. As I thought back I remembered something that crushed me in the worst possible way. Of course I waited for mydad to leave the room before I showed any emotion since whenever I cry in front of him he tells me not to cry because people will look at it as a sign of weekness. Apparently he doesn't realise that its the best way for me to get out my emotions.

All of my life I was the smart one, grade wise. AB honor roll was never a suprise and praise was given when it was earned. But that was it. I was the smart quiet one among two outgoing social butterflies I call my sisters and so as the middle child was the odd man out. But I never really minded. I was given plenty of privacy, which I liked. But there is a fine line between giving someone privacy and ignoring them completely. Over time I began to get the latter of the two, only getting noticed when I did the slightest thing wrong, and was scolded for basically being a selfish child. But I realised that my parents were just being harder on me because they knew I could do better and live up to my full potential.

Over the last few years however I have recived unnecissary cruelty from my parents. Honestly I don't know if the name calling is intentionally hurtful or not, but it does hurt. Because of the people I associate with, the places I shop, and the clothes I wear my parents developed a fear that I was becoming "emo" and or "goth". They feel no reason not to call me these things, and if my mother spots anything that could be considered such to point it out in a rude way and tell me that I should get it. Now she even points out people dressed in all black and says things such as "Look Courtney, there's a perfect friend for you" before laughing at her own joke. This could be a funny family inside joke, but not the way they say it. It really hurts to think that my parents would ever put me into any social category like that, just like they sterotype me based on my grades.

The title may ask you what all of this has to do with Brandon. To put it bluntly I wasn't supposed to be born. Two years or so after having my older sister my mother was pregnant with another child, and it wasn't me. A good among of time into the pregnency she had a miscarriage and lost the baby. My parents never told me the gender, if they even knew it, but I know deep in my heart it was a boy. Brittany and Brandon. That was their plan. After a son they would have stopped having kids. If Brandon had been born then there's no way I would have because of the timing. My parents lost the son they always wanted and got me, the freaky gothic nerd they never talk to. My dad deserved to have Brandon, to have a son. Now he has an overly emotional daughter that he can't stand to be alone with for too long. I know they love me, but they don't like me. They would have liked him.

It seems I've been disappointing my parents alot lately, as I try to grow into my own person and gain some independence. They give me stricter rules and curfew then my sisters, even though one of them is younger then I, angering me with this double standard. Some times whenI disappoint my parents, or they make me feel miserable I can't help but think how much easier their life would have been with him. I wish I could have met him.

He would have made them proud. Instead, they got me.