Run A Breast Cancer Marathon Against Your Prodigal Older Brother Day!
Bury that prick.
Even though he split town to sink most of the inheritance your father left behind into a chain of roller rinks that of course sank fast and tragic. Even though you were the one to carry your mother from bedroom to bathroom ten to twenty times a night during her heavy chemo. Even though he once went six months without a phone call before he showed up on the doorstep asking for money, he's still your Mom's favorite.
And guess where 90% of his minimum pledge plateau came from. That's right.
"But sweetie, I know you don't need my help," your mother told you. "I know I can count on you to raise so much money you'd never even ask me for a dime."
It's gotten to be more than you can handle when she goes on and on about how proud she is to have both her boys running for her cure. You don't address it anymore. The one time you inquired into his intentions, both he and your mom furrowed their brows across the dinner table asking, "Why do you have to be so competitive?"
He can do whatever he likes whenever he wants and she'll still welcome him home. He can fail and fail and fail, dragging the family finances down with him, and she'll still be "so proud of him for trying." And no matter how hard you try to make her happy, no matter how much of yourself you hand over in service to her dying wishes, she'll still spend most of the day re-reading his last letter out loud into the living room.
Let him run. Let him put on whatever charade he has to concoct in order to keep her purse strings untied. If he shows up on marathon day, it'll be a miracle. And a bloodbath.
Because if he shows up on marathon day, he will be beaten. Nothing else matters anymore. The both of you can finish at the very back of the pack, but he will not finish before you. You'll take a pipe to his kneecaps if it must be done, but your brother will lose the race for the cure.
Happy Run A Breast Cancer Marathon Against Your Prodigal Older Brother Day!
