A valentine for my brother's ex girl friend.

I knew this person. 


No, not Mcphee.

My brother's ex girl friend.  I just found out tonight that she'd died.

Had things gone differently, she'd have been my sister in law.  The way she left this planet was much different than when I first met her. I remember seeing her mother and step father at a cafeteria in Montgomery, Alabama.  I was with my mother, dad, and son. We'd met for lunch and was on our way out when we heard someone call our name. It was her mom.

My brother and her daughter had broken it off. She married someone There was that cordial chill in which you observe the politeness called for but everyone knows that things aren't good.  My brother was still in college. One of the smaller diamonds on my mom's left hand had been her original engagement diamond.  It was years  before my mom got the others. A lot hours on the job. My mom just didn't understand why someone would ask her son, who had no job, for such a large stone.  To be fair it was probably my brother's fault. My folks were footing the bill for his college, his car, his apartment, basically his existence. He had a lot more college left. If he got any ring at all it would have to have come from my mother. He was so oblivious to all this that he didn't tell his girlfriend that the only thing he could give would be a cigar paper ring. He  assumed that they'd pay for the ring too. He let her think that my parents would foot the bill like they did for every other thing in his life.  My mom would accept a lot of thing but not  when it came to money and her "baby".  So she started quietly breaking them up. Started saying that my brother's girlfriend only wanted him for money he didn't have. By the time my brother asked her to spend the weekend with us in Louisiana?  I think that it was done. She wasn't my brother's girlfriend any more.

We stood there in the restaurant while her mother told us about her daughter.  She had cancer and they had to cut off her leg. Her husband was so good to her.. He took care of her during the stuff you face with cancer. All the time, I could see her jaw working. I didn't know the rest until tonight.


I'm glad that she ended the relationship with my brother.  I was happy when I first heard it but really happy when I read how her life ended.  All the things that she did?  She wouldn't have done them had she married my brother. He wouldn't have taken as good of care of her. He's such a type A person he'd have made the time they would have been married  a real pain. She'd have been miserable and sick.  She had family who would love and support her. With my brother and mother? No.

I feel bad for my brother.  I don't know how he feels about this or if he even knows she's died. I do know that his wife looks just like the old girl friend.  When  I asked him about it he had a fit. I haven't had a decent conversation with him since then. Deep down inside, I hit a nerve.


RIP madam, I can't imagine it was easy raising a family while your were dying but you did.
Good for you. It's my brother's loss.  I'm so glad that you didn't have to deal with him, my mom, and cancer too.

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