My older brother lives just below me
our rooms are parallels
Our beds almost in the same position
our dressers would touch if there wasn’t several inches of drywall

I hear his nocturnal noises
his closet doors
his TV
his music loud,
so I can’t hear the words
just the vibrations of the bass noises

There’s a vent that connects us
When I was little I used to whisper things to him
he never heard
and then I stopped, wanting to be alone

And sometimes little puffs of cigarette smoke would waft up,
when he was older and I was ten
and those changed to marijuana
a thick smell that forced its way into my throat and made me cough
and when I was older I knew what it was
and didn’t care
ony tried not to breathe in too hard

And when I didn’t want him to know I was there
I would lie perfectly still on the bed
because the bedsprings would creak if I moved
and then he would know I was listening to him

I did this when my parents were fighting with him
when they thought I was asleep
their voices like summer thunder: rumbling and sonorous with a hint of danger
I tried to hear words but I could only hear tones, only gists

I would listen when my brother and his girlfriend thought they were alone
I would press my ear close to the vent
and try to decode the language of love
But I could only hear snippets and those distorted
and I still don’t know the full story
And I would wish our rooms weren’t stacked one on top of the other
when we were mad at each other
because I would stomp on the floor to wake him up
and he would scrape his keys against the vent to keep me up
But I still loved him

And when he moves away there will be an absence
An absence of weed smoke and loud music and keys clanging and yelling, yes
But also an absence of being connected to my brother
My brother below