Achilles' heel

So it's half past one in the morning and I'm flicking through the photo album, like I'm elderly, like I've got to see to believe.
And there I am, all nine or ten years of me- bright and sunny and just a little bit shy. I'm there with the peacocks at the farm. Running through a field, half blurry. Standing looking up at the tree that I almost climbed. Nervous, preparing to read a poem out at a school event. Cheesy smile under the Eiffel Tower on French exchange, it's drizzling- the waterproof mac is very garish, and I'm clutching a clipboard. Siberia in '92, maybe '93- I'm picking flowers on the roadside. Another- this time I'm looking for mushrooms in the woods, I'm carrying a bucket.
There's no order to these photos. Here I am at five, armed with my teddy bear and a defiant little chin. Then...
...Heart skips a beat. My grandmother and my birthday party. The one at the teashop; I wore a soft little crown on my head. She's watching me, smiling. I look distracted, slightly grumpy. I can't remember why.
Then it's much later- I'm sixteen- long crazy hair, a lot blonder than I remembered having it. I look a bit slutty, carefree, rather shallow. I hold up pictures of favored bands and make peace signs and my eyes are rarely open- I appear almost drugged. Perhaps I was.
A few photos drop out of the album. I examine them- they are slightly faded and scratched. The Isles of Scilly. I'm about two- really rather pretty, in little shirts with lace collars, and my eyes are blue, not yet green. In one picture I'm in the arms of my mother and we are staring at a donkey who is peering through a hole in a hedge. I'm making a ridiculous face- stretching my mouth wide open. The donkey clearly fascinates me. My mother looks beautiful, like Vivien Leigh, and holds me tight. My heart skips again, twists and aches.
Then there's daddy by the cliff edge and he's carrying me one handed; his black hair is windswept (oh, he looks so young!) and he's grinning, really grinning- he's clearly very happy, happier than I think I have ever seen him before; a moment captured where he is still free, before the past caught up with him.
I realize I am stroking the picture; stroking the face of my father and wishing I had some actual memory of that day.
I tuck them back into the album and put it to one side. But I want more- a few in particular. It's like a strange addiction. I want to see better days. So out comes another one.
More eclectic images. My eyes dance. Was I really that young? Was I really that child? I scan my long lost body- no breasts, no hair removal, no fear. I study my hands. They are unblemished by OCD. By nicotine. My clothes are slightly bizarre, colorful. Not much has changed there, I suppose.
And then finally, the ones I had been thinking about- of my brother and me. Eight years between us. I feel pangs of something close to maternal. He is wearing little Noddy t-shirts and his face is tanned. Thomas the Tank Engine. Squashy animals. I'm holding them out to him but he's not looking at them. He's looking up at me, radiant.
Then, there it is- the one of us in the garden- I can feel that early Summer's warmth flooding through me as I remember. The radio was playing in the background. Something classical. I could hear our neighbor clattering dishes- comforting supper smells wafting in the air. I'm fairly certain it was a Friday afternoon; that feeling when the weekend promises to be eternal. We're on the grass and I'm only wearing one shoe, the other lies discarded just out of shot. There's things cluttered around us- a sort of nest of toys and cushions and mugs of juice. He's staring at the camera, all big brown eyes and toddler scowl- and I'm gorging on an ice cream in my school uniform, watching him, full of love...

Nostalgia is my Achilles' heel- eats away at me, leaves me lingering in the past...better days.
Today my brother talked to me, and his words were tight and full of pain. In a few months he will be a man. Day by day something inside him grows colder. Damage done, he said, and I knew what he meant. I try to save us both. I'll try and save us both. Always. We hugged in the moonlight and it was strong, we are strong- I switched him back on for a bit.

...I would step inside that photo if I could, feel the sunshine on my bare legs, and taste the sweet cold vanilla and chocolate in my mouth. I would step back into that different, distant world; savoring every moment.
I would reach out to my brother, invisible- a ghost from the future, and place a soft charm of a kiss on his head; a talisman- protecting him; keeping him warm... keeping him warm.