You’re 7 years older than me. 6 years and 7 months if  you want to be pedantic.

I used to be so proud of you. I looked up to you for longer than i’d like to admit.

 

Proud. I no longer feel this way about you. Quite the opposite.

 

You’ve been so cruel to me over the years, treated me so poorly. You’re so bitter and full of resentment. You blame me for so much. Never respected me. Never tried to get to know me.

I remember when you used to ask me to ‘spike’ your hair before you went clubbing. I hated doing it. It was boring. But I wanted quality time with you. I even did your friends hair (I quite fancied some of them so wasn’t all bad).

You are so hateful towards me? I’ve stopped asking myself why. I’ve accepted that you’re just bitter and angry. It’s a shame, for life’s far too short.

I remember when I was a child and you chased me and I ran into a door frame. Several stitches later, and a scar that would make me self conscious for the rest of my youth. A scar on my forehead which meant I always relied on a fringe and never felt comfortable wearing an alice band like I so desperately wanted to at school.

Do I hold a grudge? Fuck no. We were kids. Roles reversed? I’d never have heard the end of it.  I’d continue to be the bane of your existence. The reason your face was scarred.  But for me, I just think it’s a memory. Almost amusing. It’s my ‘Harry Potter’ scar. Sure if affects my confidence at times. No matter how much makeup I try to use, no matter how expensive, I can’t seem to cover it. I stopped trying. I don’t allow it to be a big deal. I concentrate more on my protruding ears and ‘not quite white enough’ teeth.

I remind myself i’m grateful for my eyesight. There’s always something to be grateful for. This isn’t a lesson I learnt from you. From you I learnt that there’s always something to be jealous of, to be angry about, to resent.

Lesson’s I have fortunately, unlearned.

 

I remember when you bet me I couldn’t beat you at Mortal Kombat. On the SNES. £15. Fifteen whole pounds seemed a whole lot to me as a kid. 7 years your junior.  Somehow, I didn’t only beat you, but as Liu Kang, I whooped your ass with that bicycle kick move. I annihilated you.  As promised you eventually gave me that £15 but I was reminded by my mum that you didn’t have much money and I gave it back to you. She didn’t force me to, I just hated the thought of you not having much money. I loved you.  That Polly Pocket I had marked in the argos catalogue could wait until Christmas.

I know you’re not a total asshole. I remember as a young adult you cried when you saw a badger killed by an uncaring driver in the car in front. I remember when I was mean to a girl who turned up to my birthday party you got upset and told on me.  You were right to. But, the reason I uninvited the girl was because she kicked the shit out of me at school and stole one of my favourite brand new trolls. The one I got as a reward for having my first (and only) filling at the dentist. I wasn’t being a little bitch unprovoked. I asked her not to come to my birthday party and took back the invitation. (verbally, i’m sure her mum had put the piece of My Little Pony paper was on her fridge by then).  She wasn’t a nice kid. She tried to bully me into shoplifting. Something I’d never do and have never done. She drew blood on me when she dug her nails in one day. So when she turned up to my birthday, me and a few of my friends were unkind to her.  All you saw was me being a bitch. You didn’t care to ask why I was upset that she turned up. Quite frankly I was scared of her. (She’s since been on Jeremy Kyle twice, Yes, literally been on that show twice! I shit you not). Do I resent you for taking her side? No, I loved that you had a heart and were compassionate in that moment and cared for this girl. Even if you did ‘dob me in’ on my birthday.  Fortunately my mum knew what was going on, so although she told me to be nice, she didn’t blame me.

I’m watching North and South right now. My friend bought me the box set a few christmas’s ago. I try not to think of you often, but I can’t deny a happy memory was of us watching it together. Of course back then all I cared about was Brett and Ashton’s pretty dresses. Re watching it I actually know what it’s about now.

Do you realise how cruel it was when I used to watch ‘She’s All That’ after school every day in my room on VHS and in front of all of your friends you said I was up there … I don’t even want to say the word. Gross! Sure, Freddie Prinze junior was ‘swoon’ worthy, but I wasn’t up to that in my room!!   But in reality, the little loser that I was, I was up there cross stitching whilst watching it and trying to find hairstyles that would make me look prettier for the next day at school. Or polishing, like I did most nights because my room wasn’t quite clean enough (a tamer aspect of OCD).

Years before I even started the dread P (or M) word, you know when you become a ‘woman’, you joked in front of people and said I probably use things that women use during that time to do what you’d said i’d done before.  Lovely.  Do you realise how although completely untrue, your unkind words and gross shit you said very badly affected me.   You made me feel so gross and ashamed, and I hadn’t even entered that phase of bodily changes yet! What a little prick you were.

 

I remember feeling so sorry for you when I saw you cleaning that blue paint off of your poser red Puma. A tin of bright sky blue paint that some of your peers threw on your car in the night.  I was so angry at whoever did it, and my little heart broke seeing you cleaning it off in front of all of the neighbours. It never even crossed my mind that you’d done anything to deserve it. That you’d perhaps been a prick to someone petty. All I saw was someone who worked hard to buy their shiny red pride and joy of a car having to clear the paint from it that someone nastily and cowardly threw on there.

 

Did you ever love me? Sure you’d write it in birthday cards, but let’s be honest, it was hardly sincere. Actions speak louder than a few written words.

 

I don’t feel sad anymore. The only sadness I feel regarding you is that I tried so much of my life trying to gain your approval. Pathetic attempts on my part to try and act like someone you’d want to be around.  What a waste of my time. I see the people you associate with in life, and I would never choose to be around those sort of people.

Now, as an adult, having not spoken to you in almost as many years as you are my senior, I realise that we could never get along. We have different priorities in life.

You used to say I knew nothing about the world because I didn’t have children yet.  The absurdity of such a comment. It’s almost hilarious. What an insult to all of the people in life who choose to not have kids. All the great people from the past, much greater than you and I, who never became parents. Your ass MUST get jealous of the shit that comes out of your mouth dude. Honestly.

Dare I write about the time you turned your back and your kid fell out of the shopping trolley? Remember that?  Costco? Call me a liar. If you’ve forgotten that then you’re even more of a dickhead than I know of. All I did was ask if they were OK and you spoke to me like I was something you stepped in. Dude, you fucked up!  I simply asked if your kid was OK when I found out what had just happened.  I didn’t annihilate your character, or tell you what a fucking idiot you were. I didn’t shout ‘neglect’! I didn’t give you shit that quite frankly a lot of people would have.  I was scared of you.  I didn’t dare criticise you. I didn’t point  out that kids shouldn’t stand in trolleys!

If you ever read this you’d be so angered. You’d be outraged. At what? At me for telling it how it is? You’re in denial. I was in no way at fault and am in no way at fault remembering it now. You’re so fucking nasty.  Rather than own your mistake, you took it out on people.

There’s a pattern too. Whenever someone died, YOU were the only one suffering weren’t you? Your angry nasty bitter c*nt ways in the hospital, intimidating the shit out of everyone, it was all about you. Always about you!  You’d repeatedly take it out on everyone else in the family. No-one dared challenge your shitty attitude. Well, in hindsight a lot of us realise that we were stupid to allow you to be such an asshole.  We were grieving. I was more than grieving, I was dealing with severe OCD at the same time.  (no, not cleaning, literally a horrific disorder that made me not even able to grieve in peace).

But YOU were the only one who lost someone weren’t you? In fact, you were the prick making everyone else even more miserable. I mean, who the fuck brings their new girlfriend to meet the family a few days after a loved one has passed when we’re all grieving? And further more, introduces her to every single person and skips me so blatantly. Petty much? Mature. (yet I need to ‘grow up’. Have some class dude. )

Prick.

Don’t even get me started on her. She’s not even worthy of a paragraph. She’s a punch line.  Funny thing is, I defended her so many times, when others talked shit about her. No-one liked her. Even people who claim to now. Hmmm, oh hindsight. Should have saved my breath. Why did I defend her?

 

I’ve always noticed it’s the most ridiculous and immature and ignorant of folk who love to throw the term ‘grow up’ around.

On occasion i’d ask how I should enhance and improve on my current level of maturity. Never had an answer though did you? Any of you?

I feel better having kids one day knowing they’ll never know you. Your judgement. Your callousness toward their mother. Your ignorant statements. (remember what you said about ‘the poor?’  I won’t repeat it. Grim. So vile).

You have a job where you’re so widely respected. Deemed brave. A model citizen.  I know you better than that though. I have no doubt you have demonstrated great deals of courage in your work. I don’t deny that you have a good work ethic and work hard, long and tireless hours.

But you’ll always be an asshole to me. Someone who I admit i’m intimidated by. Your disposition is anything but sweet. You said being around me was like ‘walking on eggshells’.  Why? Because I called you out on your shit. Because I thought it was disgusting that when you found out that I was on anti depressants you made jokes behind my back about me hanging myself?   I have a sense of humour, I appreciate dark humour, but having a relative who suffered Schizophrenia and did take their own life in that very way, I thought it highly insensitive. Just like the pictures you drew playing pictionary that year. All the kids saw your sick and twisted spiteful drawing on their Nintendo DS’s.

The thing is, the rule was, I was never allowed to question your ethics. (or lack of). I was never to point out when you were being a prick. I was never to be upset by nasty things you said.

Walking on eggshells? I was the one walking on eggshells. I was scared of you. You’d roll your eyes at me repeatedly. You’d never be the first to say hello. Your disdain for me was more than apparent.

I dare not be myself, for fear of you being nasty. I rarely bared to speak for some time. I because nervous in my own home when you visited.

Your arrogance. You ignorance.

I get that I didn’t always look well put together. I was ill dude. I was overweight, which you so often liked to point out at my expense. Even when you were 35 you shouted and referred to me as ‘fatty’.  Holy shit, how on earth you have the job you do i’ll never know.

Do you think I don’t see my double chin in the mirror?  Cheap shot. Oh hang on, you’re cheap af.  Seems legit.

 

You once told me you made sure you got the best marks in class. Not because of passion for the career. No. Because you wanted to be better than everyone else. Issues much? How high strung are you? Unhealthy level of competitiveness. Chill yeah? It’s ok.  It really doesn’t matter.

Just like when you said that you have the best house interior on the street. I said ‘you haven’t been in anyone else houses, how do you know?’. You said you spent enough money to ensure you did. Good priorities there. You’re rare one.  Do you realise how hilarious you are? It’s effortless for you isn’t it? Being that amusing.  Well, perhaps not so effortless, you spent a lot of money to indulge that amount of snobbery.

I could have been a bitch and pointed out that you still live in a shit area. In a terraced house.  But no, i’m not a snob like you aspired to be.

Your priorities are so out of whack, it’s painful.

I doubt you’ve changed much. You’re too far gone. Too much of a spiteful prick. You’re proper cold. Heartless. Do you have a soul? no really, do you dude?

It’s a shame because as a boy you had such a tenderness. A kind part to your soul. It slowly faded over the years. You got consumed by your anger and resentment. You sure can be funny. Your friends will account to this. You can be witty on occasion or the centre of attention in a way where you act silly and everyone thinks you’re ace.

I don’t think i’ll ever see you in positive light again. You’re cold. Maybe not as calculated or manipulative as others in your circle but f*ck me, you’re an asshole of the highest order.

I hope you’re happy, but how can someone so bitter and jealous be happy? I hope you are though. A genuine happiness. Not one that relies on your reputation, praise or financial status. Brag much? *cringe*

I hope you’re the kind of happy that I aspire to be and am well on my way there. But leave me alone yeah? When you are spying on me don’t accidentally like my posts. Rookie error.

 

I hope you never read this because i’m actually fearful of how you’d twist my honest, my open heart. What you’d mock. What would you mock if I lost a lot of weight? There’d be something. I’m sure. The level of anger your hostile ass can reach is scary.  You’re incapable of self reflection aren’t you?

 

I won’t lose weight for you or others who are repulsed by my size. I’ll lose weight to reduce my risk of cancer, stroke and because my health is important to me.

I do struggle with binge eating. I admit that. I have in recent years found out where it stemmed from. At what point in my childhood I turned to food for comfort.

Funny, isn’t it? That as a child I couldn’t handle my feelings so i’d comfort eat because it reminded me of home. Funny eh?

 

Take care.

Stace x