by Con Riley
“Last week.” He’d gone home in a haze, and then, days later, had blurted what had gone down to Paul Morse. He’d listened carefully as Aiden relived the whole session, sounding like an automaton. Once he got done listening, Paul had suggested Aiden talk with his son Peter. He’d done so—and hadn’t that been an amazing conversation? He’d had no idea that Peter’s work as a paramedic meant he was an expert on people who were close to the edge. Their discussions meant that Aiden now found it easier to rephrase things from a different perspective.
“It’s the highest form of selfishness to check out and leave a mess behind for your family.” He paused before continuing, looking at Evan until he met his gaze. “Who in their right mind does that? It wasn’t our dad’s decision. Not the man we knew. If he’d been an escalating alcoholic, we might have noticed him getting wasted. He couldn’t have hidden that in his office if he’d gotten past the point of functioning. Gambling’s no different, only it’s easier to hide from other people.”
Evan shook his head.
Aiden could hear that his own voice was pleading. “You know this. You see it at the shelter. Do you judge the men there?”
“No!” Evan sounded indignant. “But they can’t help themselves. They’re addicts.”
“That’s what Dad was.” Aiden shrugged. “He was as much an addict as they are, and that changed the way his brain worked. None of us could have noticed. Not really. Not like with end-stage alcohol abuse or drugs.”
“I noticed.” This week his mom’s voice was steady. “I noticed something was wrong with David. I guessed wrong about the reason, that’s all.”
“And how do you feel this week, after having had some time to think?” the therapist asked her.
“Better.” She nodded. “And worse.” She looked at Aiden. “Do you know why I’m unhappy with you?”
Aiden shook his head, then shrugged again. There were a whole host of reasons his mom could pick from.
“It’s not because you didn’t tell me about the gambling. Not really. I don’t think I would have believed that was his only reason. Not at first. I think I needed to recover from a breakdown to grasp how affected people are when their brain chemistry gets messed up.”
Her arms had been tightly folded, and she sighed as she uncrossed them. “Listen to me, Aiden. I’ve been powerless for years. I don’t only mean since David died, but for a long, long time before that. Part of that was my fault, but knowing what I do now, I can see part was due to David’s illness. Of course it made sense for him to keep me out of the financial loop, but I was the one who let that happen.”
She leaned forward and reached out, gesturing until Aiden held her hand. “I want you to listen carefully so that you really hear me.” Aiden watched her drag in a long, slow breath.
“What you’ve done financially and as the head of this family has been more than anyone could have asked for.” She tugged on his hand when he looked away, waiting until he made eye contact again. “But I’m—we’re—angry because you made choices for us. Can you see where I’m coming from? And can you see that I’m far more angry with myself than I could ever be with you?”
Aiden slowly nodded.
“Can you remember, Aiden,” the therapist asked, “what made you take the course you followed after your father’s death?”
“Yeah. I was desperate. Desperate and frightened.”
“And what scared you the most?”
Aiden’s gaze flicked across the table. He sat back and stared at a picture on the opposite wall rather than look at his brother.
“That I’d lose another family.”
He paused, then quickly swallowed.
“That they’d take Evan back and that Mom would never get better.”
“Who is ‘they’?”
Aiden swallowed again. “Family Services. They said they’d take him back if someone couldn’t be responsible for him. I was old enough, but I was away at college. I had to make sure there wasn’t a single reason for them to doubt that he was provided for really well.”
“So, how did that affect your decisions?”
“It made me desperate to keep things exactly as they had been. I kept going until I could make that happen. No way was I going to lose my brother. No way was I sending him back . . . .” He shook his head, aware that his cheeks must be stained red. “I would have done anything to stop that. Anything. But I guess I shouldn’t have bothered.” He’d had a lot of time to think, alone in Peter’s house. Keeping all this from Evan had only pushed him farther away.
“Why not?” Evan sounded brittle.
“Because of what this has done to us.”
Evan sat up straighter. “You want to know what really pisses me off?” Evan’s voice cracked, and he stopped speaking for a minute. When he resumed, his voice sounded firmer. “I would have helped you. I would have worked just the same as you for the exact same reasons. It makes me feel like such a user that all I did was take. You’ve made me feel like that. You have. You didn’t let me have a choice.”
Aiden watched Evan’s fists clench as he continued. “You took care of us, and that’s amazing, but I could have helped you, Aiden. I wish you’d let me try. I had no idea what you’d been coping with since Dad died, but Joel did. He kept on saying I should help you more, only I couldn’t figure out why when I already helped out at the store. Do you have any idea how dumb it makes me feel that my boyfriend could see what was right in front of my face?”
Aiden blinked across the table, looking quickly at his mother. Did Evan know what he’d just admitted?
His mom patted Evan’s knee. “Joel seems like a nice boy, sweetheart. I appreciated his company this week.” She paused, frowning down at the table. “He’s not what I expected for you. But . . . .” Her gaze flickered over to the therapist before she continued. “It’s good you have someone in your life.”
She looked across at Aiden again. Now her gaze was calm and measured as she resumed speaking.
“Do you understand that we love you, Aiden, but we hate the burden you’ve carried for us? I hate that I let you take it for us. Can you hear what I’m saying?”
Aiden nodded again.
After an extended pause, the therapist addressed them all.
“The therapeutic process is different for every single person. This week’s session has centered on Aiden. I hope he has heard, as I have, how much respect you both have for the difficult decisions he made as a young man.”
She turned toward the couch that held Aiden’s mother and his brother. “You have both stated very clearly that you appreciate the care Aiden has taken of you. I have also heard you both express anger. There are strong emotions at play here, and working your way through them can feel overwhelming. Time, and trust in the process, will help you make constructive progress.”
Evan and his mom quickly agreed.
The therapist looked directly at Aiden. “Is there anything you’d like to add, knowing now that these conversations can be difficult but rewarding?”
Aiden looked across at his family. His mom watched him carefully, fully engaged, her eyes damp and shining, but it was Evan’s gaze that held his. Aiden stared at his brother before he took a deep breath and spoke to his mom.
First he told her that his birth dad had contacted him.
She nodded as if that was something she’d been expecting. “I hope he appreciates you and that you’ll tell me all about him,” was all she said.
When he confessed that he’d fallen for his Italian housemate, his mom said nothing. He added, his voice husky with emotion, “He’s gone home to Milan because of a family crisis. I’m worried, and I don’t know how to help him.”
His mom sat in silence for a while longer, watching as Evan got up and then sat next to his brother. Aiden leaned against him. When she finally spoke, her own voice sounded choked. “I don’t exactly know what to say.”
Aiden glanced up, then quickly looked away. Hadn’t he known this would be too much for her?
> Then she added, “But I would like to listen,” and she reached out and held his hand.
Marco had been gone for over two weeks, but they’d found ways to stay in contact despite the different time zones. In fact, Skyping on their laptops as they lay in bed at opposite ends of the day could still seem very intimate.
“How’s your mom?” Aiden asked the question he always dreaded.
Marco’s image on the laptop screen wavered in and out of focus as he quickly shrugged. “She is doing better.”
“Really?” Aiden had learned to always ask Marco another question. When it came to his mother, it was often hard to read what Marco truly meant.
“She is breathing much more easily now, with only a little supplemental oxygen. And she’s been arguing with her doctors.”
Aiden huffed out a breath. “That’s good. That’s really good.”
“Yes.” Marco rubbed his forehead, then ran his hand through his hair. It looked unkempt and stringy.
“Are you getting some breaks? Are your brothers spending much time at the hospital?”
“They do what they can. They are busy people. I just don’t like to leave her for too long. I sat with her until very late last night.”
The first week Marco had been home, his calls had been hasty and tinged with preemptive grief. He’d arrived home at the same time that his mom seemed to be failing fast. That was when Aiden learned firsthand just how very Italian Marco was.
He’d say what he thought would please Aiden, describing the hospital as the very best and the nursing care as superlative. It took some repeated probing, once Aiden could see his facial expressions, before he’d say what he really felt.
The first time he’d admitted, “I don’t think she’s going to make it,” his face had slowly crumpled.
The next day, Marco had been full of phrases such as, “She is a good age,” or “Her life has been full of love and full of people,” as if he were practicing what he’d say when she was gone.
Aiden’s quietly voiced, “Oh, Marco,” must have been picked up by Marco’s speakers. Again, Aiden watched his face crease and crumple from half a world away.
“I’m not done with Mamma yet.”
Aiden had nodded, feeling worse than useless.
Marco had filled their conversations since then with stories of his childhood. Recalling his particularly close bond with his mom and his eldest brother seemed to make him feel a little better.
It was no hardship for Aiden to listen.
“Ben had to take me to school every day for my very first week. He would whistle all the way there to drown out the sound of Mamma’s wailing. She didn’t want me to go. She wanted to keep me with her. I was her last baby.” He stifled a laugh that sounded somewhat choked. “My classmates thought Ben was my father. I did not tell them any different.”
“How old was he then?”
“Twenty-four? Twenty-five? I cannot remember. All the mothers at the school gates would make eyes at him, like this—” Marco did some outrageous eyelash fluttering. “I missed him when he moved in with his first serious lover.”
Aiden watched from Seattle as his boyfriend tried hard to smile, wishing so much that he could kiss him.
“I miss him even more now. Did I tell you that he would come to every single parent-teacher conference and tell off my teachers?”
“Ben told them off? Why?”
Marco looked indignant. “You should have seen the things they wrote about me! Complete lies about my awful attitude and my lack of attention.”
“They sound like terrible teachers. I bet you were an angel.”
“That’s right.” Marco nodded. He leaned forward and stage whispered, “They said I was overly dramatic.”
“They should have tried much harder with you.”
“Yes. I’m glad that you also can see the truth.” Marco’s smile this time was wide and genuine.
“I bet you were a little shit.”
Marco’s laugh rang out, and that made Aiden want to climb through the screen so he could lie beside him. He watched instead as Marco adjusted his laptop, snuggling down into his pillows.
“Isn’t it time for you to be getting up?”
Marco reached out, touching where he saw Aiden’s face. His smile slowly faded. “Yes. But I’d rather be with you. What are you doing tomorrow?”
“Joel’s taking me to work. He’s going to talk with Levi again.”
“How is that going?”
“Slowly.”
The first time Marco had told Aiden to talk to Joel had been right after he arrived in Milan and before Aiden’s first family therapy session.
Marco had read Aiden’s email about Levi and his violent brother and had said Joel would be the perfect person for Levi to talk with. Aiden hadn’t told him then that he’d been thinking the exact same thing.
It took him a while, and it had made him uncomfortable, but he’d finally called Joel from the phone at the store while rereading some of the emails that used to enrage him.
Your mother isn’t getting better.
The medication alone isn’t cutting it.
Please let other people help her.
That had echoed the notice he’d read at the walk-in clinic.
Is someone in your life living with addiction?
You don’t have to cope alone.
Let other people help you.
Joel had acted as if it were completely normal for them to have a conversation that wasn’t colored by Aiden’s usual animosity. He made it easy by agreeing to talk to Levi right away. Joel had taken Levi out for lunch. Later he’d driven Aiden home, deflecting all his questions.
“Listen,” he’d said as he pulled up at the end of Peter’s driveway. “I’m not going to talk to you about Levi’s personal business. I’m gonna point him in the direction of some services that might help him and his brother, but I can’t make either of them do a single thing.”
Aiden had gotten frustrated. “I can’t understand why he lets his brother hurt him.”
“He doesn’t ‘let’ him, Aiden. He happens to be there when his brother lashes out. There’s a difference between being supportive and asking for someone to hurt you. A huge difference.”
Aiden didn’t think so.
“Wait,” Joel had said. “Are you saying he shouldn’t support his brother?”
“No.”
“But you are suggesting that supporting him is hurting Levi?”
“Yes.” That seemed pretty obvious. Aiden had seen the evidence on Levi’s skin.
Joel’s voice had gotten quieter. Aiden had leaned closer when Joel next spoke.
“Some people might think that Evan having an easy life while you work yourself to death is pretty similar, Aiden. Some people might think Evan should stop taking when all you do is give.”
Aiden had leaned sharply back.
“Some people,” Joel had added, “might say that you let Evan hurt you.”
Aiden disagreed, but Joel had told him to quit it.
“I heard you’ve been having trouble with your cell phone. Bought yourself a new one yet?”
Aiden had shaken his head.
“And what about your vehicle? Have you picked out a brand-new model for yourself?”
He’d shaken his head again.
“That’s what I thought. If Evan asked you for cash right now, you’d give him your last penny. Don’t even try to deny it. Does that make you a victim or someone who is supportive? Maybe you should think about that the next time you want to label Levi for doing the exact same thing.”
Aiden had rehashed that conversation with Marco the next time they talked on the phone.
“What I don’t understand,” he’d said, “is how Joel knows so much about me.”
Marco had sounded disappointed. “You think that I shared how you run your business with him before you told your brother?”
“No.” Silence stretched between them for a long time. Aiden sighed and then admitted, “Yes.”<
br />
“Huh.”
“How else would he know?”
“It disturbs me, Aiden, that you tell me to have faith, then go on to reveal that you have none at all.” He continued before Aiden could interject. “Trust is so hard for you. I wish that you . . . .” He’d stopped there, sounding exhausted.
“I’m sorry. I just don’t see how Joel knows so much.”
“Maybe you should ask him.”
He had the following morning. Joel had arrived before breakfast and had helped himself to coffee as if them hanging out was normal.
“Dude, you’re an open book. It’s not like you do too much to hide that you’re a complete freak about family and your finances. Besides, I have an expert bullshit detector. Pretty much everything you say and do is standard deflection behavior.”
“What makes you such an expert?” Aiden had been annoyed.
Joel’s blinks had been slow and steady. “You’d have to ask my mom.” That was all he offered on the subject.
Marco’s voice summoned him back to the present. He frowned at Aiden via their Skype connection.
“What are you thinking about now? You look kind of constipated.”
“Shut up. I was just thinking about therapy.”
“Are you feeling better, now that you cleared the air?”
Aiden nodded, then shook his head. “It’s strange. Everything is different, and I can’t control what happens next.”
Marco’s sigh was lengthy. “Watching you go through this on your own is like a form of torture. I wish I could be with you, tesoro.”
“Me too.” Aiden reached out and touched his laptop screen, feeling the exact same way about watching Marco deal with his mother’s illness. “Me too.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Marco had been gone for nearly three weeks, and Aiden had gotten used to starting most workdays with Joel leaning on his doorbell.
Now he automatically picked up locally produced organic milk at the grocery store so Joel would quit bitching about food miles at the breakfast table. His pizza order changed too, from pepperoni to extra veggie. Taking Joel’s preferences into account didn’t rile Aiden half as much as it used to each time Joel stayed for dinner when he first hooked up with Evan.
