Brothers

I know kids are different. From one another, I mean. I knew going into this 2-kid thing that Fresco would be different from Trombone in significant ways.

(I did, after all, call it when I wrote last year: Dear, Sweet Babby2.0: Enough. With. The. Kicking. I get it: you are the yin to your brother’s yang, you are feisty where he is placid, you will give me no end of trouble until the sorrowful and grey-haired end of my days. Can I please have 10 minutes to sit on the couch in peace before all that happens?)

But sometimes I forget. They look sort of alike and we treat them sort of alike and more so I think I am being over conscious to Not Compare because that way lies Terrible Sibling Rivalry! so I look harder for their similarities while admitting their differences only to myself on a small roster sheet under cover of darkness and then suddenly, I have one of those moments, a whoah, draw back moment and I see the differences in them now, next year, forever.

The other night I gave them a bath together for the first time. Trombone started splashing Fresco, to piss him off. He likes to piss Fresco off so that Fresco will do something naughty like shout or bite and then get scolded. This makes Trombone feel AWESOME. Sadly for Trombone, this plan backfired badly. Splashed with bathwater, Fresco laughed hysterically. Turns out Trombone is the one who hates getting wet, hates water in the face, pitches a holy hysterical fit when you wash his hair.

So here’s the toddler, splashing his baby brother but wiping his own face each time so that the droplets of bath water don’t get on his delicate eyelashes. And here is the baby brother, almost choking he is laughing so hard, just sitting there taking it, not once having it occur to him that he could splash back and really make a game of it.

And there’s me, sitting a safe distance away, shaking my head, thinking about when they’re 10, 12, 18, 25. Knowing how to push each other’s buttons but hopefully learning not to do it too often. Saving it for special occasions. Fresco with a gentle respect for Trombone’s precise nature. Trombone with a sweet, protective arm around Fresco’s shoulder.

(I know, I know. Allow me this moment of wistfulness before the next 20 years take hold.)

That’s what I want for them, anyway. A relationship thicker than water. Even if I never get a picture of the two of them together that is non-violent or non-photoshopped.