Virg Bernero was in the bathroom, helping lift his brother off the toilet. Victor Bernero was frail and weak, dying from AIDS complications.

Virg Bernero was in the bathroom, helping lift his brother off the toilet. Victor Bernero was frail and weak, dying from AIDS complications. "He looked at me with very sad eyes," Virg Bernero said. "He stopped and said, 'You know I don't want to linger.'"

Bernero tried to brush it off. But Victor Bernero was direct and demanding: "I want you to help me die."

Virg Bernero tried to talk his brother out of it, saying how much he loved him. "But he said he did not want to be here much longer."

Bernero cried and talked to his mother and then called assisted-suicide doctor Jack Kevorkian, who had just begun helping people take their own lives.

"I just looked him up in the phone book," Bernero said. "We didn't meet because he was under court order at that time. He said, 'I'd like to help you, but I can't.' "

It was 1990, a time when there were conflicting rumors about the spread of HIV. Bernero allowed his daughter, Kelly, now 22, to hug her dying uncle, even though some feared casual contact could lead to HIV infection.

It's all about family

That moment reveals something important about Bernero: He can be brash and bold, but family means everything.

Virg Bernero, the Democratic mayor of Lansing, had not formed an opinion on assisted suicide, but he did as his brother begged to die.

"People can talk about this issue or that issue, but until you walk a mile in the other guy's shoes, be careful," he said.

As he spoke last week about his brother, who died without assistance a few months after the call to Kevorkian, Bernero was full of emotion. It is a side that he has rarely shown in his campaign for governor.

On TV, Bernero comes off like a pit bull chained to a stake, intense and ready to attack. In person, talking about family, Bernero can be funny, emotional and introspective.

Bernero has had a hard time connecting with the public, trying to overcome his reputation as America's Angriest Mayor. He trails badly in the polls, but he won't surrender.

Bernero might have a secret soft side, but he is still driven and wildly passionate.

Looking back on his campaign, Bernero concedes that he has not done a good job telling his story:a man raised in a working-class home who climbed from the Ingham County Board of Commissioners to the state House to the state Senate and to mayor of Lansing.

His story is complicated, filled with tragedies, but one thing is clear: Most of Bernero's policy positions -- on health care, education and the economy, for example -- are influenced by what he has seen in his personal life.

"His life experiences are so varied, and that's why I think he would be a great governor," said his wife, Teri Bernero. "He'd be a real advocate for the people who are hurting."

Virg Bernero lives and breathes education issues every day. His wife is principal of Lewton Elementary School in Lansing. He has strong opinions, too, about mental health -- he calls the state's system broken -- in large part because his other brother is schizophrenic. As a teen, Bernero was so afraid of his brother that he
sometimes slept with a hunting knife under his pillow.

He's passionate, too, about manufacturing, especially the car industry. His father worked at General Motors for 20 years.

He promises to help the working poor because that's where he started out, drowning in debt, living paycheck to paycheck in a cramped apartment with his wife and two daughters.

He wants to create jobs and help small-business owners because small business is in his blood. His father also drove a diesel truck, picking up produce every morning at Eastern Market and delivering it to restaurants and stores. His aunt owns a pizza place. His grandfather owned a market, and his sister had a candy store.

"When I talk about Main Street, it's not a slogan to me," Bernero said.

But even many Democrats haven't embraced Bernero's vision.

Faylene Owen, a Democratic fund-raiser, said Bernero has been hurt because some Democrats are supporting his Republican opponent, Rick Snyder.

"There are many wealthy Democrats who have gone with Snyder," Owen said. "But the people who know Virg know he has a passion for this state. He's very outgoing, gregarious, fun to be with.... That's what I like about him."

A'Lynne Robinson, Lansing City Council president, said that it takes a while to get used to Bernero's brash, demanding, my-way style.

"He says, 'This is the way it's going to be,'" she said. "Because he's so passionate about his position, he doesn't understand how somebody can't see the merits of it."

They've butted heads, she acknowledged.

"He rubs some the wrong way, but Lansing has had a balanced budget the last five years," she said. "I'd say that's effective."

Mark Alley served under three mayors as the Lansing police chief before stepping down in the spring.

Alley, who was part of Bernero's cabinet, said his former boss would make a great governor: "He's very decisive. But he will also listen."

Sagar Sheth, president of Moebius Technologies, credits Bernero with helping him get tax breaks and a loan of about $250,000 to transform a struggling auto parts supply business into a medical device maker in Lansing.

The business that started in 2006 with one employee has grown to 10.

"Without the support, I think we probably wouldn't have survived," Sheth said. "I can't imagine how much attention a large company gets."

A bit nerdy, too

Even though Snyder grabbed the mantle "one tough nerd," Bernero is pretty nerdy himself.

His high school sport -- the debate club, a perfect outlet for a fast talker who likes to argue. He became a state champ.

His favorite TV show is reruns of "The Andy Griffith Show."

And while he might exude the gruff personality of a shot-and-beer guy, Bernero is allergic to brew.

"One beer gives me a headache," he says.

He relaxes with newspapers and books, mostly political biographies, and he rarely watches TV except for news. He doesn't know how to program a DVR, and his wife is the handyman, remodeling rooms, stripping wood floors, putting up light fixtures.

"I try to get him to help me, but he doesn't have the patience," Teri Bernero said. "He gets so frustrated."

Their daughter Virginia, 19, who is fair-skinned like her father, said the angriest her father has ever been with her was when she'd get sunburned.

"You are going to have pieces of your nose chopped off," the Central Michigan University student quoted her dad as saying.

Her punishment: "I had to write, 'I will protect my skin from the harmful rays of the sun,' like, 50 million times," Virginia Bernero said.

Facing tragedy together

Bernero felt both fear and compassion earlier this year, though, when his family was stunned by the murder of Virginia Bernero's boyfriend, Darren Brown Jr. Reports said the killing of Brown and another man were drug-related.

"I was terribly scared," said Virg Bernero, who rushed to his daughter and told her to "fully cooperate with the investigation."

Bernero said he distanced himself from the investigation to avoid the appearance of a conflict.

Of Brown, Bernero said: "He would brighten up the whole room. He was very creative and musically talented. If this young man was here, you would not suspect that he was using drugs or certainly that he was ever involved in selling drugs, and I don't know that he was."

Brown, 18, a graduate of Lansing Catholic High School, was a freshman at Michigan State University. Two men have been arrested and charged with murder.

Campaign connections

In small groups on the campaign trail, Bernero easily connects, working the room and firing up supporters.

TV doesn't come so naturally.

Instead of trying to connect, Bernero often reverts to techniques he used as a high school debate champ. He speaks fast and furious, making arguments and attacking his opponent with ferocity. On TV, it comes off as cold.

"That's probably true," he said in a moment of introspection. "I hadn't thought of it."

Robert Kolt, a Democratic political consultant based in Okemos, said: "When he appears on television, he is perceived to be way over-caffeinated, almost jumpy. And he talks too fast and gets too excited and is too emotional."

Teri Bernero has urged her husband to show a softer side, telling him: "Remember Virg, you have to hit the issues hard, not the people."

Virg Bernero is frustrated that he hasn't told his story as well as he would have liked during this campaign.

Most of the TV advertising on his behalf has been purchased by the Michigan Democratic Party, and it has focused at least as much on attacking Snyder as touting Bernero's achievements as mayor of Lansing.

When he's campaigning, he often makes six or seven stops a day. His campaign doesn't put out regular updates to reporters on where he's going next.

When many statewide candidates were glad-handing at Ann Arbor tailgates before the University of Michigan-MSU football game Oct. 9, Bernero's campaign said he watched the game at home with his family.

He acknowledges that people don't warm up to him easily.

"It takes people about five times to meet me before they think I'm not bad," Bernero said. "I kind of grow on people. At first, they might say, 'He's a loudmouth. He's obnoxious.' Then, they say, 'Man, he's a real person. He gets things done.'"

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