“No.”
For the first time since the graduation, I felt something other than anger when I thought about my brother.
I felt disappointment.
Jeremy had been favored his entire life, but favoritism had done something strange to him.
It had trained him to accept advantages without examining who paid for them.
The Lexus arrived, so he drove it.
The tutors appeared, so he used them.
Study abroad became possible, so he went.
Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars landed beneath a chandelier, so he smiled for the cameras.
He had never been required to ask what somebody else had lost in order for him to receive.
“Did you know the money came from Grandpa’s trust?” I asked.
“Not at first.”
“At first?”
“I saw the account name before graduation.”
I gripped the edge of the table.
“So you knew.”
“I knew it came from a family trust.
I didn’t know there was a problem.”
“You knew I existed.”
“That’s not fair.”
I stared at the photograph of him holding that oversized check.
“You were standing in a room where Mom told me to get out of the family picture.
You watched me sit by the kitchen.
You watched Dad call money from Grandpa’s trust his investment in you.
At what point would asking one question have become fair?”
Jeremy did not answer.
Then, very softly, he said, “I’m sorry.”
I had imagined hearing those words from my brother many times.
I thought they would feel like rain after a drought.
Instead they felt incomplete.
“Are you sorry because it happened,” I asked, “or because your company is in trouble?”
He exhaled.
“I don’t know how to answer that without making it worse.”
“That might be the first honest thing you’ve said.”
He gave a broken little laugh.
Then his voice changed.
The polished MBA confidence disappeared.
“Maya, I have commitments.
Contracts I’m trying to finalize.
People expect this launch to happen.
If the funding gets pulled apart now, I could lose everything before I even start.”
I thought about my own business plan.
SnapFix.
Six years earlier, I had asked for a fraction of the support Jeremy received without asking.
Dad called it a hobby.
I repaired phones and computers after work anyway.
I saved what I could.
I took small jobs on weekends.
I learned that being underestimated could either poison you or educate you.
I never got the grand launch.
No country club.
No giant check.
No champagne.
But every dollar I earned belonged where I put it.
Jeremy’s voice trembled.
“Please.
