The Summer He Let Me Be General by Jacob Alexander Cohen

The last time Dave showed up clean, he brought bagels and a joke.

“I had to use the car key to spread the cream cheese,” he said, holding it up like evidence. “Don’t worry. I wiped it on my pants first.”

It was early—gray morning light, barely six—and we sat on the hood of his rusting Civic in the driveway, steam rising from coffee in mismatched mugs. He wore a collared shirt that still had fold creases in it. His hair was damp. He looked awake in a way I hadn’t seen in years.

“You smell like a laundromat,” I said.

“That’s dignity, little brother. Tide and Folgers. It’s the new cologne.”

I let myself laugh. I let myself believe.

For a week, he came every morning. Sat with me. Asked about books. About Mom. About that girl I’d been seeing.

“She still into that tarot crap?” he asked, smirking.

“She reads palms now.”

“Hope she sees how much of a nerd you are in your lifeline.”

His voice had weight again. His eyes didn’t float. One morning, when the frost still clung to the grass, I watched him stare at nothing for a second, then blink it away and ask, “You ever think about Dad lately?”

I didn’t answer. Not right away. I was busy pretending this would last.

Dave didn’t leave all at once. He disappeared in fractions.

First, it was the edits. “Just going to the store,” he’d text, when he meant “scoring.” “Already ate,” when he hadn’t. “Sober,” when his pupils were black dots swimming in milk.

Then came the smell—sweet, chemical, like rotting fruit soaked in hand sanitizer. The kind of smell that tried to hide something and only made it worse.

And then, the eyes. The rest of him moved, joked, lied, but the eyes didn’t light up. They just… floated. Like he was watching from behind glass.

When we were kids, we built a fort out of snow and warped plywood behind the garage. I was twelve, he was fifteen. He made tunnels and called it “The Bunker.” He tied one of Mom’s dish towels to a stick and planted it in the icy dirt.

“Looks like surrender,” I said.

“It’s a flag, you idiot. You’re the general now.”

He let me bark orders. Made fake maps. Died dramatically when I told him to. For three days, we drank cocoa from a shared thermos and talked about what we’d do if we ran away. When the rain melted the walls, he just shrugged.

“Nothing lasts, bro. Might as well enjoy it while it’s here.”

The ER nurse sounded tired.

“He’s asking for you.”

Three weeks had passed since our last bagel. I’d stopped bringing two out in the mornings. Then one. Then none.

“I’m okay,” Dave wheezed into the phone. I could hear the rattle in his lungs. “Just got a little… overexcited.”

“You coughed blood.”

“Did I? Huh. Drama queen lungs.”

“Jesus, Dave.”

He changed the subject. Asked if I still had the Genesis controller he’d left behind. I lied and said yes. We both knew I’d thrown it out when it stopped working. Or maybe when he did.

I drove through Southie at three a.m. once, windows down, hoodie up. I called his name out the window like a lunatic. I don’t know what I thought would happen—that he’d be standing on a corner, arms out, saying “Took you long enough”?

Another time, I chased a guy across two subway cars. Same jacket. Same messy hair. Same shuffle. He turned. It wasn’t him. Just another ghost wearing skin.

The funeral was in Nonantum. A Wednesday. January 25th. The day after my birthday.

No casket. Cremation. We sat in folding chairs and stared at a photo of him as a kid—grinning, shirtless, missing teeth, knees scraped raw.

Mom didn’t cry. She just kept folding a tissue in her lap over and over, her hands stiff. My uncle talked about God like He was some guy who’d gone to high school with Dave.

There were sandwiches afterward. The tuna kind. Someone brought cookies no one touched.

I stood by the photo and whispered, “You picked a hell of a week to go.”

Back at her house, Mom handed me a shoebox.

“His stuff,” she said.

It rattled. Inside: a cassette mix labeled Drive Forever, a concert stub from ‘98, a pocketknife, and a photo. We were at Lake Winnipesaukee, arms around each other, tongues out, sun in our eyes.

He must’ve been ten. I was seven. I stared at the picture for a long time, like I could reach in and pull us back out.

Sometimes now, I wake up with his name lodged in my throat. I swallow hard, sit up, check my phone for messages I know won’t be there. I go jogging. I buy greens. I reply to emails. I tell people I’m fine. Then, halfway through brushing my teeth, I remember he’s still dead.

One night last fall, I stood at the sink, eating peanut butter straight from the jar, staring into the dark backyard like it could talk back. The dishwasher clicked behind me.

Then I heard him laugh.

I froze. Turned.

It was nothing. Just the rinse cycle finishing. But I dropped the spoon anyway.

I never stopped loving him, not even when I hated what he’d become. And maybe that’s all this story is. A failed prayer. A note in the margins.

He was here.

He mattered.

Sometimes, when I pass two brothers playing catch in the park, I hear his voice in my head: “Bet you still throw like a girl.”

And sometimes, when it rains, I remember the summer he let me be general.

Jacob Cohen

Image: Drug paraphanalia from pixabay.com. a spoon and a couple of baggies and foil and a straw.