My Brother

I shall write about my brother in spite of yesterday's post.

 When I was three he left home to join the army but I remember one evening when my parents were out and the four of us were together. I must have done something wrong. I was crying and he said to my sister, "You shouldn't cuddle her when I have chastised her."

The next memory was when he came home on leave. He was enamoured with me. I didn't know what to do it felt strange especially as there was no physical contact in the family. My mother had told me when I was five that I was too old for cuddles.

He took me to the toy counter in Woolworth's and asked me what I wanted. In my head I wanted nothing and everything. I was afraid 

that he was going to spend money on me. I can't remember what I asked for. They were all cheap plastic toys. I was confused and felt uncomfortable because no one ever took any notice of me except to say "Be quiet or don't do that." 

I think he wrote to my mother from Egypt and one time there was a photo of him with his army mates. "That's him in the middle," said my mother pointing to the fattest. "No it's not he's on the end. It says on the back," I said.  My mother burst into tears, "He's so thin." 

He was too you could count his ribs.

He never came home to us. But shortly after that he came back to England from Kenya to a military hospital in Grayshott in Hampshire.

Was it Kenya or Egypt? 
 He came out of hospital and was discharged from the army with a pension. He married a much younger women who was petite. I remember she had to buy children's shoes. I was a bridesmaid.

NB I was also a bridesmaid to my sister and cousin. Three times a bridesmaid never a bride.