I put my hand on my chest. “God . . . my heart feels like it’s going to explode—”
“That’s anxiety,” my father said. “A panic attack.” He held his arm out. “Come on. Scoot over.” I slid over. He put his arm around me. I couldn’t stop shaking.
“You can’t drive one handed,” I said.
“Watch me.” He zipped through the city traffic. He was a good driver, even one handed. “Listen, now—not everyone you love is going to suddenly drop out of your life like Jimmy did.”
“But things happen.”
“Sometimes. Not always.”
I tried to take a few deep breaths and relax. I was sitting next to my father. His arm was around me. I should have felt safe, but I didn’t.
“Dad . . . slow down, okay? Don’t go so fast.”
My father hadn’t been speeding at all, but I guess he understood how scared I was, because he slowed the car down. We got some nasty horn honking from the traffic behind us, not to mention a few interesting hand gestures from the drivers who passed us. None of it seemed to faze him.
“It’s going to be okay,” he said. “Everything’s going to be all right.”
I nodded. I wanted to hear that everything would be all right. I needed to hear it, even if I couldn’t believe it.
22
Mrs. Woolf showed up at the gallery that night. It was a shock to glance around the room and see her standing there chatting casually with my father. My mother and I looked at each other.
“You didn’t know she was coming?” I asked.
“No,” my mother said. “We invited her, of course. Jack too. But she wasn’t sure. She hasn’t gone out socially since Jimmy died.”
“I should go over and say something.”
“She’d like that.”
“I don’t know what to tell her. I don’t know what to say about ditching Jimmy’s funeral.”
“You don’t have to say anything. Enid understands.”
“I don’t know.” I walked over to Mrs. Woolf slowly. When she saw me, her face broke into this terrific smile, and I caught a glimpse of her famous dimples. It was just automatic that we hugged.
“I’m glad you came,” I whispered.
“I’m glad too.”
“Is Mr. Woolf coming?”
“In a minute. He’s parking the ear.” She held me at arms’ length and looked at me. “Your mom says you’re having a rough time.”
This was so characteristic of Mrs. Woolf: to turn it around and worry about me.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I’ve had trouble sleeping and panic attacks. Outside of being a little crazy, I guess I’m fine.”
Mrs. Woolf laughed. “You can’t go through what we have and not end up a little crazy.”
“Mrs. Woolf . . . I’m sorry about not going to the funeral. But once I got there, once I got to the church—”
“Oh, Morgan.” She reached over and squeezed my hand. “You were Jimmy’s friend, and you were there for him when it counted.”
“I wanted to say something to you at the funeral . . . and that night at the hospital, too. I know that was a terrible time for you.”
“The hardest part was the not knowing,” Mrs. Woolf said. “No one at that hospital would tell me anything definite. Your aunt was the one who finally gave me a straight answer. She was in the emergency room a very short time. Something like two minutes. Then she came back out and told me Jimmy was probably not going to make it. And she asked me if I wanted to see him.”
“Did you?”
“Yes,” Mrs. Woolf said. “Even though I had talked to the police and the nurses, there was part of me that wouldn’t believe he was in there. I had to see him . . . I wanted to say good-bye to him.”
I bit my lip. Hard. I was not going to give in to a big emotional scene.
“I looked in on him for a minute, but your aunt stayed in the emergency room with him the whole time. I know it was terribly difficult for her to come out and tell me he had died.”
Mrs. Woolf’s eyes filled with tears. So did mine.
“Why is it,” Mrs. Woolf said, “that I never seem to have a handkerchief when I need one?”
I patted my jacket pockets: no handkerchief, no Kleenex.
“Here,” my mother said. She dug in her purse and handed Mrs. Woolf some Kleenex. I backed off. I was probably the one person in that room who understood exactly what Mrs. Woolf was going through, but I couldn’t talk to her about it.
Mrs. Woolf blew her nose. She was smiling and crying at the same time. “I talked to your sister-in-law,” she said to my mother. “She recommended a therapist out near Glen Ellyn. She says he’s very nice.”
“Do you have an appointment?”
“Next week.”
This was really news to me. I couldn’t believe it. The gallery was packed, but I pushed my way around people until I found my aunt. She was sipping wine and talking and laughing with a bunch of her friends.
“Could I . . . I need to talk to you a minute.” She stopped smiling when she saw me and followed me to a quiet corner a few feet away.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“Mrs. Woolf said something about seeing some therapist you recommended.”
“Yes,” my aunt said.
“She’s okay, isn’t she? I mean, she’s not having a nervous breakdown or anything, is she?”
“No . . . she just feels she needs a little professional help right now, that’s all.”
“I didn’t know what to do. She started crying. I didn’t know what to say.”
“Fay’s talking to her,” my aunt said, glancing across the room. “She’ll be okay.”
“She must be in really bad shape if she has to go into therapy, huh?”
“No . . . I think she’s coping well.”
“How can you say that? Look at her. She’s really falling apart.”
“Enid’s not falling apart. She’s coming to terms with some of the pain she’s feeling. She’s handling it.”
“God, I thought I was having problems, but at least I don’t need any professional help—”
The minute the words were out of my mouth, I thought about the panic attacks and not being able to sleep. I thought about the bottle of pills in my jacket pocket. They didn’t just drop out of the sky. A doctor had prescribed them for me. I was getting professional help, and I hadn’t even realized it.
I looked at my aunt. “I didn’t want to come to you about not being able to sleep. That was Dad’s idea, not mine.”
“I know,” my aunt said.
I stuck around that gallery for twenty more minutes; then I just had to get out of there. It was too smoky, too loud, too crowded. And everyone in that damn gallery seemed to be paired up: my mother and father, my aunt and her boyfriend, even Mr. and Mrs. Woolf. I knew they were going through a rough time, but they had each other. They held hands and walked through the gallery. They took time and really looked at the paintings.
I walked out onto Madison. I didn’t go far, just a little way down the street. When I crossed the bridge over the Chicago River, I stopped and looked down into the water for a little while. A couple of years earlier Jimmy and I had stood in the same spot and watched them dye the river bright green for Saint Patrick’s Day. “Hang in there, kid,” Jimmy had said to me that day. “Spring is just around the corner.” Right now that green river and the promise of spring seemed a million light-years away. Right now, in the dead of winter, I stood looking down into a gray river, chunky with ice floes. I reached into my jacket pocket and took out the bottle of sleeping pills. I pitched them over the railing and watched them disappear into the water.
I didn’t need the lousy pills.
I didn’t need anything.
23
I wanted to handle Jimmy’s death on my own, but after a couple of months I realized it was doing me in and I wasn’t handling it at all. I didn’t think anyone else would notice this about me, but they did. One afternoon in English:
; “Can I have your quatrains, Morgan?”
“What?” I looked up into Mrs. Klein’s face. “My what?”
“Last night’s homework,” she said. “Two quatrains—you forgot to turn them in at the beginning of the period.”
“Oh,” I said. I couldn’t even remember what a quatrain was, let alone having been assigned to write one. “I don’t exactly have my homework, Mrs. Klein.”
“Where is it?”
Jody shot me a look that said: “Make something up!” And who knows? In the old days I probably would have thought fast and had an ironclad excuse ready for Mrs. Klein. But not this time. This time I just couldn’t think. This time I just didn’t care.
“I guess I forgot to do it,” I said.
“Stay after when the bell rings. I want to talk to you.”
As soon as Mrs. Klein had gone back up to her desk, Jody leaned over and whispered, “You’re a lot braver than I am, Morgan. She’s been talking about those damn quatrains for over a week now.”
“She has? I guess I haven’t been paying attention. . . .”
“Hey, are you okay? You’ve seemed kind of . . . I don’t know . . . out of it lately. I see you in the halls, I say hi to you, and you act like you don’t even hear me.”
“No, I hear you. I just . . .” I couldn’t look at her. I stared straight ahead. My eyes stung, and everything written on the blackboard blurred in a chalky mess. I didn’t know what was wrong with me exactly.
After the bell had rung, after everyone had filed out, Jody stood up and said quietly: “I don’t think anyone should have to face Mrs. Klein alone—want me to stick around?”
“Oh . . . Jody, thanks, but I’m okay.”
“You always do that,” she said.
“What?”
“You always say you’re okay, even when you’re not.”
Jimmy had said that to me once, and it was okay for him to say it because he was Jimmy, but that didn’t give Jody or anyone else the right to say it.
I looked at Jody. “I said I’m okay. You better get going or you’ll be late for your next class.”
Jody shrugged and picked up her books and walked out. I just sat there and watched her go. I didn’t say anything to stop her, even though part of me wanted her to stay.
“Morgan?” Mrs. Klein said. “Come on up here, won’t you? I don’t have a class this period, and we can talk.”
I picked up my books and went up to one of the desks at the front of the room. I sat down. Mrs. Klein opened her grade book and turned it around so I could see it. She ran her finger along a line of D’s and F’s.
“Your grades have really started slipping lately,” she said. “There’s a lot of work you haven’t turned in.”
“Oh,” I said.
“And you seem to be having a lot of trouble concentrating in class.”
“If it’s about the quatrains . . . I’ll do them tonight and hand them in first thing tomorrow.”
“No, it’s not just that. . . . I called your mother this morning and asked her to come in for a conference.”
“What? Why?”
“I know you’re going through a difficult time right now, but—”
“What did my mother tell you?”
“But I want you to understand that you’re probably facing an incomplete on your report card this quarter.”
“What exactly did my mother tell you?”
“She reminded me about your friend . . . about his death.”
I picked up my books.
“You know, an incomplete isn’t the end of the world. You can make up the work next quarter or even in summer school—”
I stood up. “I’ll get the work turned in. All of it. I’ll get it turned in.”
“If I can do anything,” Mrs. Klein said. “Help you get caught up after school—”
“No, I don’t need any help.”
“I just want you to know I understand—”
“You don’t,” I said. “No one does.”
I turned around and walked out. I went to my locker, dumped my books in, and pulled out my jacket and boots. I walked past three hall monitors and right out of the building. It was a little trick I had learned from Jimmy: Act like you know what you’re doing and where you’re going, and no one will bother you.
I ended up spending seventh period down at the boathouse by Lake Ellyn. I stood just inside the door and watched a couple of little kids lacing up their skates out on the pier. They got out on the ice, and even though one of them was just a beginner, they were both doing a pretty good job. Jimmy had tried to teach me to skate once, but I was just no good at it. Now I was sorry I hadn’t tried harder. Watching those kids go around and around on the ice made me feel bad. I bit my thumbnail and watched them for the longest time.
In a way I felt sorry for those kids: They were having the time of their life, and they didn’t even know it.
24
“I just got a call from the school,” my mother said as soon as I walked in the door. “They said you didn’t show up for seventh period.”
“Mrs. Klein says she talked to you.”
“Yeah, this morning.”
“I guess it looks like I’m failing English. . . .”
“I don’t care about the damn English work,” my mother said. “I only care about you, about what’s happening to you.”
“I don’t know,” I said. I looked at her. “I don’t even know.”
“That night Jimmy was killed,” my mother said, “it hit you so hard . . . so hard . . . there was absolutely no color in your face, no expression—”
“I don’t want to talk about that night,” I said.
“I was worried about you because you weren’t even talking coherently—and before Loey gave you that shot she said . . . she said the whole thing hadn’t caught up with you yet. Do you remember that?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I remember.”
“I think maybe it’s finally catching up with you now, don’t you think?”
I was a bunch of knots inside. “I guess. I don’t know.” I started up the stairs. “Can we talk about this later? I’m just very tired.” I went up to my bedroom, yanked off my boots, and collapsed on the bed. This overwhelming fatigue was swallowing me up. I just wanted to be left alone and not have to talk to or see anyone, but in a couple of minutes I noticed my mother standing in the doorway.
“We haven’t talked about this before,” she said. “But . . . you know, Enid’s feeling a lot better since she started seeing that doctor Loey recommended—”
“I’m not seeing any therapist.”
“Enid says he’s easy to talk to. Why don’t you let me call and make an appointment for you.”
“No! I’m glad it’s working out for Mrs. Woolf. I’m glad she’s feeling better. But I couldn’t ever do it. Talk to someone about Jimmy. I couldn’t. It’s too private.”
My mother ran her fingers through her hair. “I think maybe you pushed it—going back to school and everything so soon after Jimmy’s death.”
“Maybe . . .”
She nodded. “Try to get some rest.” She started out the door, then she turned around and looked at me. “Where did you go when you were supposed to be in seventh period? What did you do?”
“I went down to the lake—I stood in the boathouse and watched the ice skaters.”
“Oh, Morgan, it’s so cold down there! Honestly, the thought of you all alone down at that boathouse—”
“I didn’t know what else to do.”
“You could have called me!”
“I didn’t think. I wasn’t sure you’d understand.”
My mother looked at me. She seemed hurt. “You know, I wish you’d tell me some of the things going on in your life. I do understand. . . .”
“I want to tell you stuff, I really do. Look, can’t we talk about this later? I’m just very tired. I had a crummy day and I’m just very tired.”
“I hope you get some rest. We’ll talk later, okay?”
&nb
sp; “Yeah,” I said. “Okay.”
We would not talk later or anytime else. I had my own system of working things out, my own way of facing things and not facing them. These methods did not include having a heart-to-heart chat with my mother. I couldn’t let her in. I just couldn’t. I wasn’t letting anyone get close to me again. Too dangerous. I couldn’t share the bad stuff I was feeling with anyone. Jimmy was the one I could have talked to. Jimmy was the one who would have understood. But Jimmy wasn’t here now, and I had to handle the sadness alone. Only instead of handling it, I put it on hold. To be dealt with later.
This was my detour system.
25
My parents let me lie around in bed for exactly three weeks. Then one morning my father came into my bedroom and pulled the sheet down to my nose.
“I don’t think it’s such a hot idea, little one, your staying in bed all the time like this.”
“I just need to be by myself for a little while,” I said. “I need some time alone to figure things out.”
He sat down on the bed and looked at me. “Just exactly how bad are you feeling? Tell me.”
I peeked at him over the sheet. “What do you mean?”
“Well, I guess I’m asking you if you’re so unhappy you’re thinking of hurting yourself. I guess I’m asking you if you’re thinking of suicide.”
“What?” That really got my attention. “Am I thinking about what?”
“Are you thinking about hurting yourself?”
“No!” I yanked the sheet down to my chin. “I’m not like that! I’m very . . . stable! I’m not a self-destructor!”
“I know you’re not,” my father said quietly. “And I know you’re stable. But sometimes even very stable people get depressed, and that’s what I’m talking about here, kiddo. Depression.”
I couldn’t believe my father was sitting there talking to me about suicide the way most fathers might ask their daughters how they want their hamburger done at a barbecue.
“I’ll handle this,” I said. “I’ll handle what I’m going through and I’ll be okay.”
“Now you’re telling me what you think I want to hear. I want to know how you really feel.”
Say Goodnight, Gracie Page 11
