My sister died yesterday. I learned she was my sister two weeks ago. Online DNA testing. Before that I spent thirty eight years as a spoiled, only child and stereotypical Gemini. My mother died last year, but before she went to hospice, she bought me that DNA kit and she told me to promise her I would try and “find my people.” Classic abandonment issues had long convinced me I didn’t have, nor did I need, any people. Deep down I knew I wanted them.

I took the test and told myself it was strictly out of obligation, and as it turned out, my people found me. I hadn’t been on the genealogy site in months, I was tired of third cousins, twice removed wanting to friend me up. Jenny reached out to me and wanted to meet. Here, in fact.

I met her just the one time. She didn’t say she was sick, but she sure looked it. It wasn’t as awkward as you’d think. She was bright and funny and had that spark of life that only people who realize they are dying can have.

So, today, I sit in this cafe ́ and wait to meet the half-brother I never knew I had and try and figure out how, or even if, to work me into the funeral or each other’s lives. Jennifer told me I’d recognize him, said we could be twins, so when the younger, fitter, version of me walked to the door, walked away and then walked in, there was no mistake.

“Todd?” His handshake was firm, crap for eye contact, he searches the room like he’s trying to figure out how to order.

“They’ll come over to get your order, the counter is for grab and go.” He’s not relieved. I feel like he would have used the opportunity to walk past the counter and straight out the door again.

“So this is…” he tries to smile, his eyes watery. Only one of us really lost a sister.

“Weird.” He laughs, which frees up the tears. “I’m sorry for your loss, and I’m sorry we met like this.”

“To be honest, I wouldn’t have come if she didn’t tell me I had to. Dying wish thing.” It’s clear he has noticed our resemblance. He keeps looking at my face, taking it in like he’s observing a monkey in its native habitat. Rather than looking back into the evolutionary chain, looking forward at his future face. He lingers on my hair line, it makes us both nervous.

“Same, I… still don’t know why I’m here. How I got here. I mean, I know the chain of events, but this has to mean something. I mean, doesn’t it? Have to?” Even as I say it, I don’t believe it. The waitress comes over.

“Warm up? Anything for you?”

“I’ll have the same thing.” I guess he wasn’t going to flee. “She told you, right? The sickness? What—why she died?”

“No, it didn’t come up, I thought—we both probably thought, we’d have time.” He looks at me, in the eyes for the first time.

“It’s… genetic. Passed down with the Y chromosome. From our father.”

###

I was lying. She had told me. Two weeks ago, sitting in that same chair, almost as she was sitting down, she told me she was dying. Not that I didn’t see it on her face.

“To answer your question, yes, I am sick. Very sick.” She went right for it.

“No, I mean, no. How would I know?”

“I could see in your face, that you saw it in my face.”

“Nooo.” Yes. Of course, yes.

I had seen her profile picture. Her face was round and full. Now it looked like someone washed her on hot and her skin barely fit. Stretched and shiny. Her eyes still sparkled, but with a hint of sadness that we all have lives we will never appreciate.

“You’re kind, but I know. It’s aggressive, and you should probably know, it’s hereditary.”

“Passed down? Like how? Is it guaranteed-?”

“From the father, so I figured you deserved to know. And no, it’s not a hundred percent. My brother- our brother doesn’t have it. Men, right?”

We both laugh, hers turns to a deep cough. The food arrives. She takes a long time to chew. I can see every muscle in her face working overtime. Even small bites puff her cheeks out like she was hiding a golf ball.

“What is it?”

“It’s an autoimmune disease, I brought you some literature. It’s not the thing that gets you, it’s the things you can’t fight that get you.”

It took her thirty chews to work in enough spit to swallow a bite of her scone. I felt like I could see her body burning the calories off, even as she ingested them. I’m no doctor, but she didn’t have long.

“Thank you, for” telling me I could be dying, “reaching out. I wouldn’t have known any of this.” I’m pretty sure that didn’t sound sarcastic.

“What are the odds, you know, if not for the family tree sites and DNA and all.”

The whole thing reminded me of sea monkeys. You get this powder in the mail, sprinkle it in a fish bowl, wait a few days and bam. Instant life.

“Did you know him? Our father? I guess you must have, he stuck around.” Okay, the sarcasm was peeking through, now. She showed me his picture. It was a formal portrait, not like Sears, but like the kind you sat for in the Old West. Faded.

“Not really. He traveled. For work, supposedly, but even when he was home, he was never really there. I’m sure you’ve gotten back on the site and you saw all the other hits.”

“Yeah, he really-“

“Got around? Yep. A real rolling stone.” We both laugh again, this time, hers turns to tears.

“I’m sorry. I’m hitting you with a lot of stuff.”

“No, it’s fine.” Nothing is fine, nothing will ever be fine. “You’re right, this is all stuff I was prepared to find out. Mostly prepared.” The server gives me a warm up.

“Can I get another Green Meanie?” That green sludge was the only thing she seemed able to muscle down.

“What’s in that. It smells like fresh cut grass and looks like… the baby has the squirts or something.”

“Kale, spinach, lemon grass, some kinda sprouts, maybe. A little ginger. You should try one. It boosts your immune system, I mean just look at me!”

That time, neither of us laugh.

“Jennifer… no matter what the circumstances, I’m glad to have met you. I wish it could have been sooner.”

“Me too. You will get tested, right?”

Not a chance. “Of Course. But I’m not drinking that crap.” She smiles. It is the first and last time I see her alive.

###

When my mother died, I just shut it all off. I had the funeral to prepare and to “settle her affairs” even though there was much talk of her affairs “being in order” in the weeks before she passed. It occurred to me, as I swallowed my grief, that there was no grief to swallow. It’s not that I didn’t love her or miss her, it was a natural instinct of mine to stifle sorrow. I was very good with anger and I could cloak myself in shame with the slightest amount of self-evaluation.

Did I tip enough? I’m so cheap.

By the time I had packed or given away or sold my mother’s belongings—the stems and seeds of her life in a POD container, stored a block from the airport, like it was just in town on business—the normal, acceptable window for grieving had passed, and so I really didn’t have to pretend anymore.

“Is there anything we can do? How are you?”

“Oh, you know, hanging in there.”

Here I sit, on a box in my mother’s house—the stuff I felt I should probably keep—reading Jennifer’s obituary. She had a full head of hair in the picture. Plump cheeks in a round face. The sort of smile that looks like it was actually caught mid laugh.

The colors run as my tears drop on the page. I laugh at the fact that I am crying, over a sister didn’t know I had, and still don’t know. Now I am full on laughing, which triggers the sobs. The waves hit me a punch to the stomach, a fist squeezing my organs together.

My absent father, the Johnny Appleseed of illegitimate kids, who had time for a family across town, but not to send me a birthday card. My loving mother and this one box that I tried to cram all my love into. My new sister.

I slip off the box, to my knees and look up as if in prayer. Arms out, letting the sadness rain down on me. I’m not good at crying. I ugly cry. I choke on my own spit, I blow snot bubbles. I am ashamed. Go figure.

My good friend anger kicks my grief aside and takes over. I stand, reach into the box and pull out the faded portrait of my father that Jennifer gave me—the only time I ever saw his face —and crumple it and throw it in the empty fireplace, fully expecting it to burst into flames. I throw the paper with the obituary after it.

It doesn’t help. I pick the newspaper up and fold it. I smooth the picture of my father and toss it back in the box. He looks up at me with that “call me for all your insurance or baby- making needs” smile.

“Fuck you.”

I close the box. Jennifer’s funeral is tomorrow. I’m a pall bearer for the sister I had all of two weeks. I hope I can put my poker face back on by then.