Something strange happened to my brother, Alex. He is normally a very stoic man; rarely showing any emotions aside from when he laughs. The most he can give me is a half-assed side smile or a faint chuckle. The only way to get any confirmation from him is by directly asking him how he is, which he is at least very honest about. He isn’t depressed. As far as I know, we just suspected that he just isn’t that good at expressing emotions.
But one morning, things were different. Me and mother were downstairs in the kitchen eating breakfast. Normally, Alex is the first to wake up, but not today. We guessed he stayed up late reading or something. Eventually, he came downstairs, and my mother greeted him. However, she stopped her words halfway through. I turned around to see what caught my mother’s tongue and saw something I never thought I’d see.
Alex was standing there, smiling. No half-assed side grin this time; it was a full, ear-to-ear smile with teeth. It was a normal smile, but seeing it on Alex’s face, it felt much more significant than it probably was. It shocked me, and it shocked my mother just as much, like it was the first time we ever saw Alex smile. It took a few seconds of minor disbelief for my mother to finally ask him what he’s smiling about.
“Eh, I’m just happy,” he told us with the same smile on his face.
Part of me wanted to be glad that Alex was showing a face other than the blank one he normally gives us. It was a good look on him, after all. But something about it was off-putting. Alex may have appeared happy, but he didn’t make eye contact with any of us. He just stared right between us like each of his eyes were individually tracking us. His tone of voice wasn’t any different from his normal tone. Upon closer inspection, It certainly didn’t match his face, almost like he was pretending to be happy. Lastly, he insisted on skipping breakfast despite my mother preparing him waffles. He told her he wasn’t hungry before grabbing his bag, his keys, and walking right out the door while wishing us well.
“He probably met a really cute girl yesterday,” my mother suggested.
I stayed home from school that day because I wasn’t feeling well. During the day, a few of Alex’s friends texted me in regards to his “sudden mood change”. I already knew what they were talking about, and I told each of them that he had just woke up in a good mood today. They all seemed pleased with seeing him happy while one of his closest friends joked about him, saying how his face looked like a “puppet”.
I was resting on the couch watching cartoons when Alex arrived home from school. To my surprise, that same smile he woke up with was still there. I even saw the glint of his pearly teeth from where I was lying down. Mother greeted Alex as he walked in and, like this morning, was shocked to see he was still smiling. She finally decided to break the ice and ask him about what’s got him in such a good mood.
“I’m just happy, that’s all,” he said with a steady tone.
Mother pushed a little further and began asking questions. Did you meet a cute girl? Bump into an old friend? Passed an exam with flying colors? Anything at all?
“Nope, I’m just really happy.”
She excused him finally, and he made his way upstairs to get ready for work. Me and mom exchanged looks when he was no longer in sight. There was a cause for concern, but neither of us could put a finger on it.
I spent the rest of my sick day upstairs in my room. I was able to hear my brother come back from work, followed by what I could only interpret as an argument between him and Mom. It wasn’t loud, but there was some obvious emotionally charged back and forth between them. Later, I heard Alex walk upstairs and enter his own room, followed by Mom yelling “I don’t want to see you for the rest of the night!” When I came downstairs to see mother and ask what happened, she spoke as her head rested in her hand.
“He was sent home early from work, his manager told him that he was making customers uncomfortable with his creepy behavior and smiling.”
Days went by, and the same pattern repeated itself. He was still smiling every time I saw him, and when I wasn’t looking, I could assume he smiled still. I would say that I was getting used to the smile, but, in all honesty, there was something that was making it hard to accept it. I couldn’t even get an answer out of him since all he would say was that he was just “happy”.
It changed one day. I got back from school after I started feeling better and saw that Alex wasn’t downstairs. Instead, I saw mom and dad sitting in the kitchen. From body language alone, it seemed like they were urgently waiting for me to come back. Before I could ask where Alex was, Dad held my hand and talked to me.
“Son, go to your room.”
It took me by surprise.
“Why? Did I do something wrong?”
“No, but please go to your room and wait for us.”
I could tell from his tone of voice alone that it seemed urgent. So, I obliged and walked upstairs to my room. It was dead silent there, so silent that I could faintly make out what my mom and dad were saying from the floor below me.
“He attacked me.”
“Is he sick?”
“They just tore.”
I couldn’t get anything else but simple words, but longer words and sentences weren’t intelligible. I tried to listen closer to them, but I ended up picking up another person’s voice instead.
“Hey…”
I heard it from outside my room.
“Hey…”
It sounded familiar.
“Come over here…”
I picked up the tone and voice of Alex from where his room was. It was muffled as it passed through several walls as it came from his room to mine.
“Let me show you something…
I stepped out of my room to investigate, praying that, if I could see Alex, that he was okay. I tiptoed out so that my parents didn’t hear me and made it to Alex’s door. I peeked through the door to find out.
“Brother, I’m happy, I’m so happy, brother…”
Alex stood in the very center of the room, eyes staring directly at me. His smile was ever present, way beyond just grinning from ear to ear. The corners of his mouth were torn and broken, pushed apart by the new rows of a thousand teeth. It reached from one side of the room to the opposite, looking more uneven the further from his head it extended. His lips stretched beyond what they should be able to, chipping and breaking like old paint on rotting wood.
There was no way to tell how he kept his smile from falling, aside from some apparent struggles. I could sense a growing pain from him through the crack of the door, a silent cry for help being masked by an impossible emotion.
It was at that moment when I passed out, probably from shock, but I couldn’t remember. I woke up on the floor right in front of Alex’s room; the door was wide open, the window in his room opened, and Alex was no longer inside. I heard the stomping of my Dad rushing upstairs with my Mom following him. Mom helped me stand while Dad searched inside Alex’s room, then my room, then the bathroom, then their own bedroom. It was clear that wherever Alex was, he wasn’t in our home anymore.
As of writing this, it’s been several weeks since Alex went missing. We tried to go to the police but the trail ended up cold. Mom and Dad are still clearly shaken up from what happened and have been extra attentive to me and my health as a result. I can’t lie when I say I was pretty shaken, too. But, I’m not so scared of what happened to Alex. It scares me more to think about where he is now and what he’s doing with that sick, twisted smile of his.