Lilah Tov (NaNoWriMo)

five

five

           “So, Charles, what are your plans for this summer?”

           Charlie continued to type away on his phone, not bothering to even acknowledge that he had been addressed.

           “Charles?”

           Again, no response.

           “Charles!” my mother stepped in. “Answer your father, or I will see to it personally that you spend your summer as a camp counselor with underprivileged kids!” Charlie hated kids (with the Green children being the only exception). Especially underprivileged ones. I was going to guess that it had something to do with a severe amount of white guilt, but then again, this was Charlie, so maybe it was for an entirely different reason.

           “Sorry,” apologized Charlie, “I was just letting my friends know what a wonderful time I had this weekend. You were asking?”

           “What are you going to do this summer, Charles?” inquired my father, completely dropping the notion of plausibly being agitated with his elder son. I always hated how Charlie could do that. One minute, our parents would be furious with him for whatever reason, and then the next minute, Charlie would apologize and then he would automatically go back to being the prodigal favorite son. And Charlie was the favorite.

           Yeah, there was all that bullshit about not picking a favorite child, but it was clear to even stranger that Charlie was the favorite. He was infallible and could do no wrong. Like, even if he committed murder or treason (though embezzlement was more likely in a family like mine), my parents would stand by him until the very end. Because he was their first child, therefor earning the title of “favorite” by default. If I were the first child—and not Charlie—then I would’ve been the favorite child. But I wasn’t. I was the second kid, ergo placing me in second place for all other facets of life. Even though Charlie was the reckless one, and even though Charlie was the brash one, and even though Charlie was the impulsive one, he was still the favorite, because he was the first.

           “Oh, ya know, I’ll probably just lounge around here and catch up on some reading”—by reading he probably meant porn—“and maybe go boating, presuming, of course, that you’ll have me, Dad.”

           My mom didn’t like that answer. “What about that nice internship you were offered with the senate campaign?”

           “Yes, Charles, what about the senate campaign?” Evidently, my dad, also, wasn’t too keen on Charlie’s answer.

           “Well, I just think that since there’s such a limited amount of time between now and when I go to school, if I worked on the campaign, I just wouldn’t be there enough to make a difference,” Charlie fluently articulated. In actuality, he just wanted to spend another lazy summer around the house. If I knew Charlie (which I did), then he never had any intention of ever joining the senate campaign.

           And because my parents were suckers for their favorite son, my dad said, “Fine,” thereby allowing Charlie to do nothing all summer.

           Then the attention in the room shifted over to me. Because once they were done with Charlie, it was only the natural progression to move on to me. “What about you, Will?” my mom asked. “Do you have any plans for the summer?”

           “Besides summer homework?”

           “Besides summer homework,” affirmed my dad.

           “Will’s gonna hang with me this summer,” Charlie stepped in. “I think that it’d be great for us to do some quality brotherly bonding before I’m out of the house.”