“So, do you want to come in…?” I don’t expect an answer from the box of ashes riding shotgun.

I’m driving to Guild Hall. My play. Opening night. Quick stop at the East Hampton post office. Postal Clerk, “Package, Mick. Heavy sucker.” A damaged, dirty cardboard box thumps on the counter. I scan the address. Campbell’s Funeral Home, NYC. I fucking freak. My brother Steve’s ashes. Perfect timing, bro. Crushing my high…again.

Idolization blinded me to Steve’s covetous, destructive nature, not obvious till after years of therapy. Forewarned is forearmed. No such luck.

Born eighteen months after me. Geologic time…twins. Inseparable mutual lovefest. Brotherhood. Unbreakable.

Glorious childhood. Cops and robbers, cowboys and Indians, summers at our Chesapeake Bay shore home, fanatic rock and rollers, our infamous band through high school, “The Centaurs.”

College breaks it up. Steve, drama school, me, pre-med. Both back to Baltimore after graduation, me to teach, Steve scoring promos for a local TV station. Biding time. Bigger goals.

Steve reads a want ad in The Rolling Stone. A New York City band, a record contract, looking for a bass player. A gig in D.C. Steve auditions, nails it, headed to NYC…following his bliss.

Phone call. Kathy, Steve’s longtime girlfriend. She gleefully pipes, “Let’s have a surprise farewell party for Stevie. Just the four of us,” meaning Kath, Steve, me and Phyl.” Phyl…Phyllis Giles, my one and only for eight years, now my fiancé. Kath, bubbly, “I’ll decorate your clubroom.” Clubroom. Our notorious den. Wild parties, rock and roll bands, decibels off the charts. Neighborhood menace.

Me, to Kath, “You and Phyl do food, I’ll do cocktails.” Kath, overexcited, “Can we have Gimlets, please, my favorite?” Gimlets. A deadly concoction of gin, Rose’s super sweet lime juice, shaken, not stirred.

Folks escape to the movies. The house is ours. Steve sweetly pretends surprise, brings reefer and cocaine to the mix. Kathy and Phyllis adore this too. Their drug of choice.

Food, mini Maryland backfin crab cakes, Old Bay steamed shrimp, my contribution, two dozen chilled Chincoteague oysters on the half shell…aphrodisiacs. Gimlets, coke, grass, oysters, ooh wee, baby! The party begins. Hendrix turned to ten. We laugh and dance the night away.

Too much booze, too many drugs. A careless remark to Phyllis. I don’t remember what. Enraged, she runs up the steps, screaming, “Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you!”

I start after. Steve, palm to my chest, “You’re the last person she needs right now. I’ll go cool her out, bring her back.” He leaves, I pace.

Steve and Phyllis…gone for an hour. Kathy passed out on the couch.

Half sober, I check upstairs…no one. Outside. I run up the street to Phyl’s house. Locked, lights out, not here. Start back home. It hits. The woods at the bottom of the street. Used to go there to make out. No way. A nauseous wave sweeps.

Downhill run slows to a crawl. I hear whispers in the reeds. Nausea displaced by rage. I scream, “I know you’re in there!” Steve, too coolly, “Give us a minute.” The “us” pierces. A knife in the heart.

Steve’s silhouette appears in the rushes. He buttons his shirt, brushes off, strolls out past me. No eye contact. No words. He casually saunters up the hill. Blaise. So, him. Covetous.

Phyl’s shadowy, rumpled image fights the reeds. Peers in my eyes, “He didn’t make me pregnant.” She wobbles. I try to steady. “Don’t fucking touch me,” she scowls. Fucking. Never, ever said before. “It was all your fault…and don’t follow me.” She dissolves in the night. My legs don’t work, not booze, stupor. I break free. Walk home. I cannot sleep.

Next morning, hung over, the wordless drive to Penn Station for the New York train. Steve riding shotgun, like I am not here. I park. He gets out, casually grabs his bag, jaunts to the platform. Escape? I can’t. Not yet. I stay. I watch. Train arrives. Steve hops on. Departs. Gone. Brotherly love, brotherhood…lost.

Years fly, Steve a top jingle writer in New York, me, a Hollywood screenwriter.

Alex, Steve’s daughter, my niece, calls frantically…too often, spilling Steve’s blitz into drugs and booze. “Detox again”…“Dad and Mom separated”…“They got a divorce.”

Steve spirals deeper, deeper, deeper.

Therapists warn me away. It sucks you in. Enough on your plate. I do. My wife. Nancy is bedridden. A brain disorder. I’m her caregiver. My sanctuary, a playwright’s group. We read our work aloud, offer positive feedback. One play selected end of each season for a staged reading. New York actors, scripts in hand, sitting on stage or walking through the play with skeletal set and props.

My play “Brotherhood” is chosen. Ecstatic.

Ecstasy shattered…again. Years of cold silence. Steve calls, “Hey Mick”.

Me, queasy, “Been a while.”

Him, too friendly, “Two-way street, bro.” Dead air time. “Whatever,” he quips.

Me, blasé, his style, “So, what’s been hap’nin…bro?”

“You know fucking well what’s happening. Alex calls you. She told me. Fucking dialysis. Seven days a week, six hours a day. Fucking hell on earth. I bailed.” Self-destructive.

“Bailed? You’ll die.”

“I need a fucking kidney.” I’ve never asked you for anything”

“No, you just took.”

“My life’s on the line.”

“I can’t help.”

“Can’t or won’t. Bro.”

“Can’t.”

“You’re my…”

“…fucking brother.”

“Fucking yeah.”

“I’ve had hepatitis. Years ago. You remember. You got shots. I Can’t give blood, can’t donate.”

“Bullshit.”

“So be it.”

“Fucking Whatever.” Click.

Delirious that my play’s chosen. I go all the way. A set designer friend dressing the stage. I work with my dream cast every day. Hard. Heaven.

Play rehearsal. Stagehand, “Phone call Mick.” Must be Nancy.

Me on the phone, “Hello.”

“Mick Benderoth?”

“Yes.”

“Sergeant Winbourn, NYPD”.

The police? What the hell? ”Yes, officer, can I help you?”

“I’m sorry to report that your brother Steven Carl Benderoth is dead. Cleaning woman found him in bed.”

Horrifying image. Instant impulse. “I’ll take care of funeral arrangements.”

“The body will be at the morgue.”

Morgue. My brother, toe tagged, in a fridge at morgue. Stultifying.

Winbourn, “The funeral home can pick it up there.”

“It”…My brother an “It.”

Winburn, “Sorry for your loss.”

“Thank you.” Click.

Outside the theater, Steve’s ashes, still on the car seat. I persist, “Come on man, you want to come?”

“Fucking A, bro. Gotta see my story on stage.” Ego still blazing.

“Our story.”

“Whatever.”

Ashes under my arm, I go in the theater.

Curtain. “Brotherhood.” Raves. But that son of a bitch fucked me again. Even in death. His ashes, a last attempt to steal what’s mine. Covetous.

Brotherhood. Bitter Finale.