You don't know how badly you need someone until you do. Or why. But you do. I needed my brother, more than I ever thought possible. He saved my life.
It wasn't easy being born with a dick. Not when otherwise you're a female, with female parts (save the defining one), female looks and a female mentality. And no, it's not a big dick. I'm being generous to myself if I say it's more than four and a half inches. But it works and feels like one. It certainly behaves like one.
I never knew a life without it. Growing up in a small western Michigan city, with no shortage of rednecks, I knew that a girl with a penis was not only unusual, but considered alien and even wrong. I learned early on to hide that detail for the sake of my safety and sanity. Nobody needed to know about it, and I kept people out of that part of my life. They weren't close to me, so there was no need for them to be aware of it. My family was another matter.
My father was happy to have a second boy. He considered them stronger. My mother was disappointed, but she didn't want another child once I came along. Two were enough.
Of course, seeing the second boy begin to develop female characteristics wasn't easily understood either. Higher voice, softer features, a much smaller body than my brother at the same age, they didn't make sense. The medical tests made even less, and when the doctors determined that my body was actually a female body, nothing made sense, at least to my parents. It was 1981, and even though I'd been named Taylor, both the pop star and the definition of trans were many years away, not to mention the concept. I was six, and my body only made me an abomination to others. My father began leaving the next year.
By the time I was eight, he was gone for good. It hurt like hell, and left me with plenty of additional neurosis, yet looking back, it was probably for the best. He wouldn't have been able to contain his rage, and I would have borne the brunt of it. Dealing with my mother was bad enough.
She tried to contain her anger, but it would periodically spit out in petty and destructive ways. When I was seven, she refused to buy me girl's clothes, a situation that would continue off and on for the next eleven years. At ten, our doctor had to step in when my mother insisted I take gym class, which fortunately had been excused from my life. I will always be thankful to him for sparing me that certain humiliation and degradation. And at twelve, Mom told me that since I wouldn't be having a period, bras needn't be on the shopping list through my teens. She said I could be an "in-between" for the rest of my life. It was around that point I first considered ending it all.
It began with trying to drink two large bottles of Mom's booze, of which she had stashed many around the house. All that did was make me violently ill. I soon graduated to self-harm, mostly cutting myself, leaving me with many scars and a habit of wearing long-sleeved shirts. At fifteen, I even acquired a snub-nosed pistol, ostensibly for "protection", though the only protection I really needed was from myself. Thank God I got it. My brother found the gun, sensed what it would be used for, and threw it away. Jacob knew how to protect me from my biggest dangers.
My older brother wasn't a shining star, nor was he everybody's favourite. Hell, there were many times when I wanted him on the other side of the planet. Silent, sullen, often cranky, Jacob was every bad teenage stereotype come to life. He had few friends and even fewer prospects. Our father's absence and mother's increasing alcoholism had left him with both a fatalistic outlook and the burden of being "the man of the house", a title and position Jacob wanted nothing to do with. Yet when the chips were down, I could count on him like nobody else.
When I was bullied on the playground for being a little different (though the other kids had no idea just how different), he would step in and protect me. When our mother was drunk and looking to lash out, he would goad her into some argument, allowing me to escape. When I was fourteen and had finally began to develop, he escorted me down to the department store, reluctantly introduced me to the sales associate in the young women's division, and then paid for the bras which I was both embarrassed by and thankful for. While usually grumpy at these instances, Jacob would come through without fail. He was my aggrieved anti-hero.
On Independence Day of 1990, Jacob shattered my world. He told my mother and I that he had signed up with the military and would start basic training the following month. Having turned eighteen a few months earlier and just finished high school, he'd been able to sign up without any parental involvement. In retrospect, it was obvious that Jacob felt this was his only way out of our depressed town, not to mention his depressing home situation. But all I could see was that he was abandoning me. I was fifteen, and the shit was going to rise.
Three years of high school is a long time to be lonely, not to mention agonized. None of it got better. Mom got worse, school was just there and I had few friends. Worst of all, the best part of my life was actually on the other side of the planet. And considering his communication skills, we were lucky to get a letter from Jacob every few months. Oftentimes, the only way we knew he was alive was that his employer didn't send anyone to our door.
Jacob's timing had been pretty shitty. A month after he enlisted, the Iraqi army invaded Kuwait, leading to America and a number of other countries returning the favour several months later. Our country, and military, was suddenly at war a world away from western Michigan. It would have been little more than news hour TV for us except for one important thing. Jacob was there.
Although he wasn't in direct combat, we knew that my brother was involved in some fashion. His few letters came from the Middle East, and in his usual restrained way, Jacob told us that he had a particular assignment without providing specifics. Even when the brief war ended, he remained in Iraq and continued with his duties. I wanted to know and I didn't. Mostly, I wanted him home.
Our mother didn't deal with it very well. Her drinking increased, as did her outbursts directed my way. I couldn't be bullied in quite the same way as when younger, but it didn't make my days a vacation in paradise.
"Don't you have a boyfriend yet? Or a girlfriend? Or some sort of friend? What's wrong with you?"
Like many unhappy parents, my mother knew how to strike a nerve. I was late in my second year of high school, yet nowhere close to having a date for the sophomore dance. It shouldn't have been a surprise, as the thought of having any sort of relationship was strictly fantasy. I was growing into a scruffy, scraggly young lady, not horrible to look at, but quite rough around the edges, and my self-esteem was more fragile than cheaply made crystal. Worse yet, I found that I was more attracted to boys than girls, which could be very dangerous. If I ever got intimate with a male and he flipped out, got violent and then spread the word about what I had between my legs, life would never be safe.
Girls could have been almost as hazardous, largely due to the fact that I knew this was one secret they would not keep. Word would quickly get around and life would be a living hell. I knew I needed to keep my distance from people.
There was only one person who could keep my secret, not out of guilt and anger but due to consideration, and he was thousands of miles away.
Jacob returned in the fall of '91. He wasn't discharged but had managed to get a month's furlough, allowing my brother to come home and for me to breathe a little easier. Mom cried and doted over him for a few days before returning to her accustomed manner and habits. Our small, rented house slipped back to its usual air of strung tension.
"So what were you doing over there?"
