Part 1 — The Man Beside Me
“Terrible buttons.”
I turned from the mirror just in time to see my brother, Matthew, struggling with the cuff of his white dress shirt.
I smiled. “That suit cost more than your first car.”
He finally pushed the stubborn button through the hole and examined it with a frown.
“Fine. Terrible expensive buttons.”
I laughed, expecting him to grin back.
He didn’t.
Instead, Matthew faced the full-length mirror in my bridal suite and tugged at the front of his jacket. Then he rolled his shoulders backward.
He lifted his chin.
Straightened his spine.
Then somehow tried to stand even straighter.
My smile faded.
There was something unnatural about the way he was holding himself.
“Matt?”
He stepped away from the mirror as though I had caught him doing something embarrassing.
“I’m fine, Jo.”
I had been his little sister for thirty-two years.
I knew every version of Matthew’s “I’m fine.”
There was the I burned dinner but we can still eat around it version.
The I forgot your birthday present is still in my trunk version.
The I’m exhausted but I don’t want you worrying about me version.
This one was different.
This one hurt.
Before I could ask what was wrong, there was a knock on the door.
Our wedding coordinator peeked inside.
“Five minutes.”
Matthew turned toward me.
For a brief moment, whatever insecurity had been hiding behind his eyes disappeared.
There he was.
My brother.
My protector.
The man who had stood beside me through nearly every important day of my life.
He held out his hand.
“You ready?”
“Not remotely.”
“Excellent. If you were calm, I’d assume someone had replaced you.”
I slipped my hand into his.
That was when I felt it.
His fingers were trembling.
I looked down.
Then back up at him.
“Matt.”
He stared straight ahead at the closed ballroom doors.
Then he asked quietly, “You’re really sure you want me doing this?”
The question went through me like a blade.
Because Matthew had never doubted his place beside me before.
Someone had taught him to doubt it.
And I knew exactly who.
My future in-laws.
Part 2 — The Brother Who Became Everything
I was eight years old when our parents died.
Matthew was nineteen.
One week, he was a teenager complaining about his unreliable car, his job, and whether a girl he liked would ever call him back.
The next week, he was sitting at our kitchen table filling out paperwork that no nineteen-year-old should have had to understand.
I remember watching him complete a form from my school.
There was a line that read:
Relationship to child.
He wrote:
Brother.
Then his eyes moved down the page.
Another word appeared there.
Guardian.
Matthew stared at it for a long time.
Finally, he crossed out brother and signed his name again where the guardian was supposed to sign.
At eight years old, I didn’t understand why he sat motionless afterward, staring at that piece of paper.
I understand now.
That was the moment he realized childhood was over.
For both of us.
After that, Matthew became everything.
Brother.
Parent.
Cook.
Taxi driver.
Homework supervisor.
Hair stylist—which, to be fair, he was absolutely terrible at.
Once, he borrowed a book from the library about braiding hair because I had complained that the other girls at school wore pretty braids.
He spent nearly forty-five minutes studying the diagrams and attacking my hair with a brush.
When he finally finished, I looked in the mirror.
I immediately put on a hat.
Matthew looked offended.
“What? It looks great.”
“I look like I touched an electric fence.”
“You look fashionable.”
“I look injured.”
He pointed at me. “Respect the artist, Mojo JoJo.”
That ridiculous nickname had started because my name was Jodie and Matthew apparently considered himself a comedy genius.
I crossed my arms.
“I’m telling Mom when I see her.”
The words escaped before I realized what I had said.
The room went silent.
Matthew’s smile vanished.
