Chapter Text
It was him and Ghostbur. That was all it had ever been. Just the two of them.
Tommy’s life started at seven and a half years old. It specifically started on the day that Wilbur left. Their older brother. Well, Tommy’s older brother. Ghostbur was Wilbur’s twin. But Ghostbur was a couple of inches shorter than Wilbur; he always looked up to Wilbur in the same way that Tommy did.
It was a cold night in October. Tommy’s Halloween costume was laying on a chair in the kitchen. He had just gotten it and he was going to show it off to Wilbur. It was a costume of Spiderman. He was going to be Spiderman, and he wanted to show Wilbur. Wilbur, who had read him those comics and taken him to see Spiderman 3 just earlier that year.
Instead Wilbur wasn’t there.
“He’s going to come back,” Ghostbur kept saying.
Somewhere in his seven (and a half) year old mind, Tommy knew that wasn’t true.
On the dusty futon they kept in the living room, Ghostbur sat down and pulled Tommy into his lap as if he was a cat. At first, Tommy squirmed, trying to get out of his grip. Ordinarily, Ghostbur would’ve let go. But no, he stayed firm, keeping his arms wrapped around Tommy tight. Eventually Tommy stopped fighting to get out.
He wasn’t about to stop fighting entirely though.
“He said he wasn’t!”
The more he thought them over, the clearer they were. Wilbur’s words, they were replaying over and over again in his head. The thing about the words was that Wilbur didn’t say them angrily. He must’ve been angry though. If he was angry he wouldn’t have done this. But he just sounded tired as he said,
“I’m going to live in America.”
Tommy had asked why. Ghostbur was right there. And Tommy had asked why.
“Nothing’s been the same since Mum died.”
Tommy knew. He didn’t get Mummy’s hugs anymore. He only ever heard her on old messages on the answering machine. And he was living with just Wilbur and Ghostbur. Before Mum died, Wilbur was off at uni. But now there was no Mum and Wilbur was there and Ghostbur was still there.
Well, now it was just Ghostbur.
“I can’t do this. When… Tommy, when I see you, I see her. I can’t do this, I can’t… there’s a better life for me. Somewhere out there, there’s a better life for me. I can’t keep living this. I hate myself, I don’t want to hate you too.”
Why would Wilbur hate Tommy if Tommy had done nothing wrong?
“Are you going to come back?”
“No, I don’t think so. Maybe someday, but not anytime soon.”
It had been two hours. They were learning about time in school. Wilbur walked out that door at about six. It was now eight. Now Tommy was in Ghostbur’s lap and thinking back on these things made him melt into his older brother’s arms. This obviously soothed Ghostbur a little bit. He let out a sigh and made sure to hug Tommy a little bit tighter. Tommy gripped the sleeve of Ghostbur’s sweater tight.
Ghostbur looked so much like Wilbur. They were fraternal twins, but they just happened to look so similar. And now Ghostbur was on testosterone. That stuff, the thing he takes in a needle and it makes him look like he was born a boy. That was making him look even more like Wilbur.
Tommy looked up at Ghostbur. He quickly looked away. He kept clutching that yellow sweater.
“He said he wasn’t going to come back. He told us.”
“Did he?” Ghostbur asked, and Tommy nodded. As hard as he could.
Ghostbur had memory problems. It could be frustrating. He seemed to forget the most important things. Things like their overdue bills and doctor’s appointments. Things that they were all arguing about. Tommy and Wilbur would wake up bitter while Ghostbur didn’t remember a word.
One time, Ghostbur forgot that Mum was dead.
Ghostbur forgot a lot of things, and Tommy felt stupid for expecting Ghostbur to remember what Wilbur said. But Tommy would remind him.
“He said that he was going to live in America. And he wouldn’t come back. Not for a long, long time.”
“But that doesn’t make sense,” Ghostbur said. “It takes a lot of money to move to America. We don’t know anybody there. Wilbur doesn’t have a place to stay. Does he even have a plane ticket?”
“He’s been talking about this for a while. I thought he was joking.”
“I don’t remember that.”
Something about that phrase was just too much for Tommy. He couldn’t speak anymore, it was just too hard. He broke out into tears. He let his head fall onto Ghostbur’s arms. He wept. He wept, knowing it was just him and Ghostbur. No matter what Ghostbur said, Wilbur was gone. Sometimes Tommy was a little bit smarter than Ghostbur. And he knew. He knew that Wilbur was gone.
Ghostbur let him cry. And Ghostbur wrapped him up tight. Rocked him back and forth as if he was a baby. Really, that was what Tommy needed. That little bit of motion. It was a tiny bit of comfort. A small distraction from the destruction around him.
Mum died about eight months ago. Tommy thought they were doing well. He thought Wilbur was doing better. But then Wilbur started talking about America, and he wrote all this weird, sad poetry. And he sang a song about La Jolla. Tommy didn’t know what La Jolla was. Apparently, a place in California. California was that place that all the movies were set in.
Ghostbur seemed fine that entire time. Then again, Ghostbur always seemed fine.
Ghostbur was being annoying. Ghostbur was not remembering. And Tommy knew that Ghostbur couldn’t help it. But Tommy didn’t want to explain it.
So he didn’t. He just cried. And Ghostbur was there to hold him and smile at him.
And that’s what Ghostbur did. He was there. He held Tommy and he smiled. It became a pattern.
Tommy grew up. Ghostbur did too. On that bleak night, Tommy was seven and a half, and Ghostbur was twenty-one. The days passed, and eventually, Tommy turned eight. Ghostbur twenty-two. Then nine, ten, eleven came. Twenty-three, twenty-four, twenty-five. On and on. The two of them grew up. Ghostbur began to dye his hair gray so that he looked older and teachers would take him seriously when he came to parent-teacher conferences. It never really worked, but Ghostbur liked the style.
Together, they carried on.
Through it all, Tommy remembered. Ghostbur didn’t. Tommy knew what happened that night. Ghostbur would have to be reminded. Ghostbur could remember more things than he did before. He remembered what was important. He got a higher paying job, and paying the bills was no longer stressful. He talked to a therapist, and suddenly doctor’s appointments were easier. Things like that were so easy all of a sudden. Ghostbur remembered how to do them.
He always forgot those rough moments though.
Tommy remembered, and he got old enough that he could remember enough for the both of them.
Tommy knew what his life was like before Wilbur left, but as he grew older, he gained some perspective. He looked upon his life, and realized a couple things. Although Wilbur had been gone for years, there was not a night that he did not think about his older brother. So Tommy had a lot of time for realizations.
Tommy realized that although it was not perfect, he was content with his life with Ghostbur. There were a lot of great things about it.
He also realized that although Wilbur was not angry at him, he was allowed to be a little bit angry at Wilbur.
So he was. And although Wilbur was still in his memory, Tommy casted him out of the good section of it.
He proclaimed that his life started at seven and a half, when Wilbur left. It really got going when Ghostbur took him trick-or-treating in that Ghostbusters costume instead of the Spiderman one because Ghostbur was the one who showed him that movie.
As far as lives go, it could be a lot worse, Tommy always said.
So Tommy was living.
At least he thought he was, most of the time.