////// GRANT \\\\\\
I want to make one thing perfectly clear: I am NOT my brother, no matter how much you may wish for it. I do not have his personality. I don't have his "leadership skills". I don't have his "sense of purpose". Comparing Liam to me will only make most of you disappointed, since most of you only care about football.
It's A GAME, people, and a pretty piss poor one at that. In the grand scheme of things, it's two or two and a half hours, one day a week for a few months of a person's whole life. Realistically, most of you that play it will do so for a year or three in high school, then spend the rest of your miserable lives reliving the same few hours of your childhood over and over again. Worst case? IT KILLS YOU. People have died playing it. The rewards don't match the price.
Have you have tried being the little brother of a local football hero? People look at you like you're a freak -- no, a perpetually disappointing freak. That is, if they see you at all. My name isn't Grant, it's "Cyclops' little brother" or "Liam's tag-a-long".
Oh, the Cyclops thing -- I'll tell you about it later. I tried once telling someone who called me "Cyclops' little brother" that in the comics, Cyclops does have a little brother, and his name is Havoc. That's a much cooler nickname than Cyclops, but the guy's eyes had already glazed over due to the fact that I wasn't Liam, looking past me at something much more interesting, I guess. Invisibility is the power of the football hero's sibling, only you can't turn it off.
That's why I retreat into books. There, I can experience TRUE heroism, real drama and great epic stories not defined by a scoreboard. My freedom is found in the adventures of the X-Men; my heroes are not named Montana, Brady or Brees, but Asimov, Bradbury and Heinlein. A throwing arm can only take you to the end zone; my imagination and my books can take me to distant worlds.
My stepfather is a great father -- to Liam. I exist only to waste his money on "useless" things like books. When he seems fit to speak to me he asks why I can't be more like Liam. I may not know who my real father is, but it will never, NEVER be him.
Speaking of Stepdad, I was 9, and I tagged along with him to one of Liam's little league games. Afterward, I sat in the back seat of our car while Liam gushed to him about how great he played, while Stepdad hung on every word. As I listened to my brother's egotistical, self-important blowhard-like speech drone on, I was reminded of the character Cyclops in the X-Men, who had some of those same traits. So, I blurted out, "You're just like Cyclops!". Both Stepdad and Liam suddenly took notice of me, and without knowing who Cyclops is, started going off on me. In desperation of not wanting to get grounded, I amended it by saying that Cyclops was the
leader of the X-Men, and he shot laser beams, much like Liam's arm shot lasers for spirals.
They liked that. A lot. I got ice cream, and Liam got a new nickname. Even when I try to insult him, he still comes off like a hero.