For a few moments, we both laughed. As we approached the Fort Pitt Tunnel, Justin's memory turned morose and focused on strange details. He described the color and print of the dress my grandma wore to the Christmas dinner that ended with my grandfather rushing her to the hospital. He vividly described the inside of our grandfather's casket.
"Hey, Maggie, do you remember the Christmas everyone got mad at you because you started crying and wouldn't stop?"
"Yeah, I remember. Aunt Mildred suggested someone beat me." I shook my head, and a feeling of disdain coated my stomach. It was not a memory I wanted to dredge up.
"That's the day that I realized you and I were alike," he said.
"How could you tell, Justin? We were really young. I don't think either of us could have comprehended mental illness."
"You're right. At that age, I didn't, but what I did understand was the pain I saw in your eyes. Maggie, you cried from your soul." He turned his head and stared at the walls of the tunnel, his voice choked. "Maggie, would you like to hear the rest of the stuffing story?"
"Sure," I said, keeping my eyes focused on the road.
He pushed his body back into the passenger seat and continued looking out the side window, as if purposely avoiding any potential eye contact with me. "About fifteen minutes after I was sent to the guest room, Aunt Mildred burst into the room to continue her tirade. I was sitting on the floor in the corner of the bedroom, still crying. She demanded to know why I wouldn't eat the stuffing. Then she accused me of always causing scenes and screwing up all the family celebrations. She got really pissed when I stared at the wall and didn't look her in the eye."
Justin stopped talking and began gesturing wildly with his arms. Glancing quickly at his face, I tensed. A wild animal glanced back at me through Justin's eyes. It took me a moment to realize he was imitating Aunt Mildred. When he spoke again, he did a lame imitation of her barking at him, so many years ago. "Justin, if you don't stop this anti-social behavior, you're going to grow up and be a criminal. Don't think I will visit or write to you when you're sitting in jail. If you don't end up in jail, you'll end up being nothing but a bum like my brother."
Justin sat silently, staring out the front windshield, biting his bottom lip. I reached for his hand.
As we exited the Parkway, I looked at him and finally comprehended why Justin avoided family functions. All of his memories lacked happiness.
I resisted the urge, swelling inside of me, to ask questions about Mildred's brother. My better judgment said it was not the right moment. Instead, I asked him if he remembered anything good about his childhood. He thought for a long time, and then said he liked fishing with his dad and when his mom read him books at bedtime. He told me his whole life consisted of mood swings and profound loneliness. I let go of his hand and clutched the steering wheel. I turned my head slightly to the left, as if to look at something important reflecting from the side mirror. I didn't want him to see my eyes water.
Neither of us felt tired, and he mentioned being hungry, so I called out for a pizza. As an appetizer, I pulled out a bag of chips, a half eaten bag of Oreos, two glasses, and some orange juice. Between bites, we talked about drugs--rather he talked, I listened. "In middle school, I was either bored or getting into trouble. The first psychiatrist convinced my mom I was under-challenged at school and depressed. He prescribed the original anti-depressant. It seemed to help. My grades got better, and I even played on the school baseball team. In eleventh grade, the shit hit--mania. My dad rushed me to the emergency room. They admitted me to the psych ward, and I honestly believed I was going to spend the rest of my life locked up there. Finally, the doctor found a pill combination that stabilized me. After that, life became a series of mood stabilizers, antidepressants, and hell, for all I know, I could have been swallowing birth control pills. My mom filled the prescriptions, and I would dutifully down them."
"I didn't know you were hospitalized in high school," I replied, flabbergasted.
"Of course, you didn't. And you probably didn't know that when I left Penn, my parents drove me straight to the hospital. You see, Maggie, telling anyone would violate our family policy. The combo stopped working and the doctor finally confirmed the diagnosis as bipolar and promptly put me on Lithium. Lithium and I cannot live together in the same body. The shitty side effects were worse than the stupid disease. Right now, I'm on a cocktail that helps. Hopefully, it will last longer than the standard six months."
"What do you mean by 'the standard six months'?" I asked.
"Of the drugs that actually helped, the effectiveness only lasted months. Then it was on to another mix," he replied.
"What about the antidepressants in middle school, didn't they work until high school?" I could hear the fervor in my voice and feel fear spreading through me.
"Yes and no. They worked, but I switched brands a lot," he explained.
"The drugs I recently started taking seem to be helping. My brain has never been so quiet." I said.
"Enjoy it while it lasts. For people like us, feeling normal is just an illusion that goes up in a puff of smoke every six months. Except for weed," he replied, and grinned.
The doorbell rang, and I paid the pizza delivery guy. After I placed the pizza box on the coffee table, I walked to the kitchen and continued talking, trying to make sense of his words. "I hoped that if these drugs worked, Sam would come back. Now you're telling me that my future is jumping from one drug to another?"
As I carried the paper plates and napkins to the living room, fingers of anger crept across my brain, Not the rage of an episode, but a boiling pissed-off type of anger. Justin seemed to read my expression because he shifted in the chair and reached his hand out to me.
"Sorry, Maggie, I wish I had something to say that would let you keep your hope, but I don't. Bipolar 1 or Bipolar 2, it doesn't matter. It's just shit that never goes away. For Christmas one year, I got this junior Swiss Army knife. To test it out, I cut a hole in the top of my mom's sofa. She tried to hide the hole by throwing a blanket over it. With the blanket in place, the sofa looked perfect. Come evening, we would all gather to watch TV. My mom was always cold, so, she grabbed the blanket off the couch, and wrapped it around her shoulders, exposing the gaping hole for the world to see. The medicine, Maggie, is our blanket. This disease has no cure. Hell, I'm not sure if anyone really fucking understands what happens in our brains. The drug companies knit the blankets, and the doctors wrap us up in them. The blankets cover the disease for a while. When it's covered, we go to school, get jobs, and fall in love. Then something causes that blanket to fall off the back of the couch. Good-bye school, so long job, and welcome back loneliness. Don't get your hopes up, Maggie. The fall is too hard."
We ate our pizza in silence, and then Justin gave me a hug and walked to the bedroom. For a long time, I sat on the sofa and stared at the blank TV screen.
CHAPTER 14
The Cuckoo Clock Ticked.
Early Thursday morning, Justin and I embarked on our fifty-mile trip to Ellwood, an old western Pennsylvania steel town, which had outlived its purpose. A fine mist drizzled from the gray sky, and my gloom from last night persisted. Not wanting to ruin his visit, I attempted to mask my introspection with inane chatter. He looked straight through me. "Maggie, I know you're still upset over our conversation. I'm sorry, really I am. But it's true. Think about your life, you'll see it."
"I realize my past isn't a pretty hallmark card, but, Justin, I need hope, and the idea of changing drugs every six-months is not reassuring."
He gazed out the passenger window. Haze disrupted the normally pastoral view of the Ellwood-Zelienople road. He shrugged his shoulders. "It is what it is. We'll sit and watch Mark and Steph live happy and successful lives, knowing our destiny is loneliness. Maggie, you and I, we're defective," he said.
I clenched the wheel. The word echoed inside my head. 'Defective.'
"Maggie, in elementary school, I met a kid named Robert. We liked science, loved bas
eball, and became best friends. Our friendship collapsed on a horrible day in the ninth grade. I didn't understand at the time, but the medication of the month quit working. We were shooting baskets in his driveway. Everything was fine, until the rage hit me. You know what I'm talking about, the kind that erupts from nowhere, but controls everything."
I nodded in understanding. He continued speaking. "Robert started trash talking like guys do on the basketball court, and I snapped. In my fury, I tackled him to the ground and started pounding on his face, like it was a punching bag. Later when my brain kicked into a somewhat normal mode, I biked over to his house to apologize. His mom wouldn't let me see him and at school, he wouldn't look at me. He was the only best friend I've ever had."
Reading facial expressions is an important part of a conversation, and the seating arrangements of the car were not conducive to eye contact. Part of me wanted to see if his expression was smug, sad or even resigned. Instead, fearing the worse, I forced my eyes to remain glued to the white line of the road, lines that existed for the sole purpose of keeping us centered. "Okay, that was one bad experience. I'm sure that you have other friends."
"Maggie, who is your best friend?" he asked.
"I have two, your sister and Amy."
"They're family, not friends." Justin replied. "I mean friends, real friends you can call for no reason other than to talk."
"Julie Hill. We've been friends since first grade," I replied, feeling rather smug over the length of our relationship.
Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Justin fidgeting with his watch. "When was the last time you hung out with her?" he asked.
"Halloween, but Justin, she has a job, lives in Ellwood, and has new baby."
He inhaled. "Fair enough," he said. "Do you have another friend who is not family?"
"Sure, Tom and Aggie, my classmates. I see them every day. Sometimes, we have lunch together, and occasionally we go out to dinner."
"Wonderful, when was the last time you guys did something together?" he asked with a note of skepticism in his voice.
Focusing on the road, I gripped the steering wheel tightly. "At the beginning of the semester, we went out to dinner."
"Great friends, Maggie." He looked at me with a smirk. "Eight weeks since the start of the semester?"
"That's not fair, Justin. We had lunch together two weeks ago," I said, rolling my eyes. "And for what it's worth, we're law students, the only thing we have time for is studying."
"Really, all you do is study?" he asked. Again, his voice oozed doubt.
My stomach tensed when I thought about friendships. The topic was loaded with bad memories, and my brain refused to let them go.
***
"I don't understand, Shari. I thought we were going to live together next year. I put your name down on the roommate selection form."
"I'm sorry, Maggie, really I am. I planned on living with you, but I can't. It's better if I live with Jessica. You can find another roommate or request a single room. We can hang out sometimes and eat dinner together."
"Shari, it's too late to get another roommate and a single room costs more money," I said, tears forming in my eyes.
"Maggie, I like you and sometimes, you're really funny, but your moods scare me. I don't know what to do when you stay in bed crying for days. I hate it when you call yourself ugly, stupid, and fat. Your so pretty, and I hope that someday you see how wrong you are, but for me, it's too hard to be your friend. It makes me feel bad about myself. Maybe you should get some counseling or something for your moods."
***
Justin waved his hands. "Earth, calling Maggie. Is your time so booked there isn't an extra moment for anything but studying?"
After a few seconds, I begrudgingly replied to his question. "Not really."
"Boyfriend?" he asked.
"Shut up, Justin. You know the answer to that. Don't rub it in anymore."
"Maggie, I don't have any friends either, and I haven't had a real girlfriend in three years. It's our destiny, our curse, our fate. We'll end up alone."
I stared at the road, not wanting to speak. He seemed to enjoy releasing this theory out loud. "Sometimes, I wonder if I'm being punished for doing something really awful in a previous incarnation." He said this not necessarily to me, but to some far off cosmic listener. "Most days, I just attribute it to shitty genetic luck."
Off in the distance, a clump of cows enjoyed the beginning of their all-day eating binge. I ignored an urge to stop the car and run at them, just to explode their peace. Instead, I inhaled and wished for an end to this drive.
Suddenly, Justin clapped his hands together. "But, my dear, we are ten miles from Great Aunt Mildred's corrosive stare and cheeriness--we need cheeriness. And the fact that I didn't bring shit for her is starting to bother me. Is there somewhere we can stop so that I can buy flowers or chocolate?"
A snicker rose into my nose. "Justin, she's diabetic."
"Wonderful," he said with a fist raised forward. "We'll buy her two boxes."
After the laughter subsided, we decided to stop at the Giant Eagle before entering Aunt Mildred's den.
The parking lot contained a handful of cars. A boldly-lettered sign in the window read: Open Until Noon on Thanksgiving Day.
Inside the store, Justin immediately began to goof around. He charged a shopping cart toward me bellowing, "Get in. Get in. Come on, Mags. You're skinny. Sit in the cart, and I'll pop wheelies. Where in the hell are the flowers?" he asked, whipping the cart from side to side to follow his shifting gaze.
I slammed my hip into him and grabbed the shopping cart. Pushing it into the stacked line of carts, I said, "Flowers do not require a cart, Justin. We will walk to the floral department and choose a bouquet, pay for it, and get the hell out of here without incident."
I grabbed his hand and wedged his arm under mine. Laughing, we walked, like Dorothy and the Scarecrow on the yellow brick road toward the floral department. Fortunately, a few nice bouquets remained in the buckets of water. Justin chose an extremely loud decibel level to express his total dismay at the lack of Venus Fly Traps. I quickly snatched up two bouquets. In one hand, I held a lovely bunch of yellow chrysanthemums, and my other hand clutched a spray of multi-colored carnations. "Pick one, Justin."
"Why do carnations remind me of funeral homes, Maggie?" he asked with a perplexed tilt to his head.
Continuing to stand with the flowers in my hand, I stomped my foot. "Because, you're sick and morbid, Justin, and I'll assume that means you want the chrysanthemums?"
"Hell no, I'm buying her the carnations. They'll match that dismal 1956 furniture she has in her living room. Or should I call her décor Early American Funeral Home? At least, it's cold today and our butts won't stick to that damn plastic sofa cover."
That comment pushed us both over the edge. We laughed like two little kids until a baritone voice from behind destroyed the moment. "Hi, Maggie."
The hair on the back of my neck stood at attention, and my posture became broomstick straight. My body reacted to his presence before my eyes could, because as the first syllable of my name emerged from his mouth, I inhaled, dropped Justin's arm and turned to face him. "Hi, Sam."
His eyes and mouth smiled. He appeared to be genuinely happy to see me.
I smiled back and said, "Happy Thanksgiving."
Justin stood silently next to me, trying to figure out what was happening. Then I noticed Sam awkwardly looking at Justin. Even though Sam had suffered through all the family Justin's stories, I forgot the two of them never met. "Sam, this is my cousin, Justin. Stephanie's brother."
A sensation of relief wafted between the three of us as Sam said, "Hi, I've heard a lot about you."
Justin flashed him an expression that said, "I bet you did." To his credit, Justin maintained control and said nothing obnoxious. Grateful for the few seconds of polite banter between them, I calmed my flip-flopping stomach and tried to think of something to say.
"How's the new jo
b going, Sam?"
"It's great, Maggie. Everything I hoped it would be. How is the final year of law school? Did you accept that job offer?" Sam asked.
My insides bubbled with joy, and sweat covered my palms. "Yeah, I did," I replied, shifting my weight from leg to leg and clearing my throat. "I'm trying to move the start date. I want to go to Florida and hang out with my grandparents--R and R after finally finishing school."
"Do it, you earned it." He transferred the shopping basket from one hand to the other, obviously, trying to decide what to say next. "Well, I just wanted to say 'hello.' I have to go. My mom forgot a few things, and if I don't get them to her, she'll blame me if the bird isn't finished on time."
"Tell her and your dad, I said, Happy Thanksgiving."
"Same to your mom and Ed. Give my love to Aunt Mildred."
All three of us broke out in huge grins after that line. "Take care, Sam."
"You too, Maggie," he replied, turned, and walked down the aisle.
Justin and I walked silently to the check-out. He paid for his flowers, and as we approached the car, I tossed my keys at him. "You drive."
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