Being the younger brother, I always had an "and" appended to my name when being introduced. I never got just “Darren”, it was always “Jason and Darren”.
My brother was very emphatic about being listed first – "no, it's Jason and Darren" whenever anyone mistakenly mentioned me before him. J took being first born son very seriously – we’re talking Ancient Asian Empire Dynasty, Curse of the Golden Flower brother trouble seriously. (Perhaps this explains his fondness for the novel Shōgun.) His pride of place in the family birth hierarchy was overwhelming. When asked about me, he’d reply something along the lines of “I’m the older brother. He’s my little brother.” Strangers would not have been amiss to think my name was actually “Andarren” from the way he carried on.
In any event, I have always been shorter than my brother, so I guess being the little brother was not only factual, it was literal.
One of my favorite home videos shows me at about 1year old, playing with a baby rattle quite happily. Along comes J, and seeing my happiness with the toy, decides it’s something he must have instead. So, he takes it. All documented right there on film. He just walks up to little baby brother me, Andarren, and swipes my rattle. What a two and a half year old wants with a rattle is beyond me, but there you go. Baby me of course, starts crying. J disappears from frame for a moment and comes back and dumps an orange in my lap.
An orange. I’ve never liked oranges – it probably stems from this documented event. I kept crying, and the video cuts off at this point. It probably showed my parents congratulating J on finding fruit in the house, and wasn’t he a healthy lad even at the wee age of two – all the while I’m left crying on the bed with a bloody orange. Ripe oranges don’t rattle. Now that I think about it, I didn’t even have a crib in that house. Or at least, none that you can see on the film clip.
When my Dad remarried, it became Jenny, Jason and Darren. And when my Mum had another son, it was Jason and Darren – with the littlest brother Daryl. Or, and THIS is Daryl. Daryl was suddenly moved up to guest star spot, while I was relegated to series regular, and not a popular cast member at that.
Case in point – in Singapore, J would be surrounded by people wanting to touch his toe headed locks for luck. People exclaimed over the blueness of his eyes, the golden color of his hair. While brown-haired-hazel-eyed me was left behind the crowd, waiting for the rockstar J to emerge from his throng of admirers so we could continue on to the Tiger Balm Gardens.
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