Brother Issac

Issac Fissing spent the day in his chair staring down the avenue from the window of his living room up in his third floor study. It was too gray and messy to meander out but glare as he might into that dark and blustery storm he could not make it leave. Like some stoic and unwelcome guest, it was spending the night, invited or not. He watched it wriggle the street lights, and shred the awnings. It’s wind rattled windows and it’s thunder declared its presence, pounding loudly on the roof overhead and all Issac could do was wait it out. Flash. When he was young he would quiver at a storm like this, but by now he’d seen too many and knew that this too would pass. Boom. When he was young his brother Roger would crawl into his bed under the “big goose quilt” and they’d talk for hours. Roger would chatter him through the storm make him laugh and finally sleep. Eventually, as they grew older, they both grew ill from the accumulation of the many long cold damp winters in that drafty house. It was the mold. In the end, Issac refused to leave until Roger succumbed to pneumonia in the fiftieth winter of his life. He was a bright man, was Roger, and he was proud to be called his brother. Of course Issac was no dim bulb either, but possessed none of the social skills and graces of dear Roger.  Roger would light up a conference like Fred Astaire would a  ballroom, smiling so effortlessly, here, there, and trailing a wake of smiling faces and cascading laughter. You always knew where Roger was in a crowd – you could hear it all about him - in the center of the mass like a queen bee in their hive. Poor Rog’.

Issac on the other hand was no lady-killer…more the party-killer. It was a reputation well deserved, too. Oh the party’s he palled. Always someone just leaving as he arrived…always, Solo. But no matter, because Isaac was a loner and company is not something he cherished which may be the root of the problem and not the outcome. He had never married because he found no one, whilst Roger never married because he found too many. So too, you always knew where Issac was. The Lab Rat. That’s what they called him, because he lived there more than any other place, but his Mind wandered far from the tidy little lab and it’s brilliance contributes in a very big way to the way we think of science today. Issac would work a party like a void. The lonely corner a black hole. The yawning place. The jumping off point for many to say their, “Gotta-go’s.”

Issac’s contributions were far and well documented in scholarly circles - dusty little gatherings of intellectual respect. Meanwhile Roger’s face was on the Institute’s Annual Report, his portrait in the Hall Of Honor and he was even interviewed on the evening news on several occasions.  He was a handsome man, never needing make up. He got Mum’s looks. Issac got Dad’s ears. And as much a reputation Roger earned as a cocksman, vicious rumor cast Issac as “queer but celebate”.  Like some frustrated friar. It simply was not fair but Issac did not care. They were brothers and that’s all that mattered to him.