Bebe Moore Campbell

by 72 Hour Hold

  “What about failure rate? The group can’t possibly help everybody.”

  “I don’t know about that,” Carleen said. “I only know about my case. I had no contact with any other parents or kids. The program is strictly anonymous.”

  “What about when you visited?” I asked.

  “I never visited the site. I’d meet my sons and the counselors somewhere that was neutral.”

  “So I guess you think it was worth the twelve thousand a month?” I asked.

  “I paid about thirty-five hundred,” she said.

  Bethany’s expression didn’t change.

  “They told me it cost twelve thousand dollars a month.”

  “They told me that too in the beginning. It’s a test, to see your level of commitment. There’s a sliding scale. If you can pay, fine; they accept the money. But they have donors who finance them. Nobody is ever turned away because of money. I know that this is a lot to absorb. Would you like to talk with someone else?”

  “Yes.”

  Twenty minutes after Carleen waved good-bye, a Latino man— Francisco—appeared at our table and sat across from Bethany and me. Thirty minutes after he left, an older white couple showed up, Fleur and Larry. Their stories were similar to mine. Sick loved ones, a system that had failed them, nowhere to turn. And then suddenly a light. I was suspicious of the light.

  Maybe I’m being brainwashed, I thought, when people kept coming. In my mind, all kinds of scenarios played out. Maybe the group was a cult. Suppose I took Trina there and they took out her organs and sold them. My mind was putting up a valiant effort, fighting with all it could muster the inevitable conclusion that came from feeling my back against the wall.

  “What other choices do they give us?” Carleen had asked me before she left.

  Harriet probably said that.

  “THE BEST TIME TO DO IT WOULD BE TOMORROW NIGHT,” Bethany said when we were alone. “When you pick her up from the hospital, Angelica and I would meet you with Brad. We’d just keep going.”

  “What do you mean, we’d travel together?”

  “There are two openings, yours and mine. How long do you think they’ll be there? We have to make a move now. ”

  “I can’t do that.”

  “Yes, you can. Just toss some clothes in a bag. A pair of jeans and some tops. The same for your daughter. They’ll give her pajamas and toiletries.”

  “I have a business to run.”

  “Leave someone in charge. You won’t be gone that long. Better sooner than later, Keri. At least now she has some meds in her system. A week from now that may not be the case.”

  “I have to go,” I said, and stood up.

  “If you leave her to the system, she will be lost.”

  “Let me think.”

  It was impossible to process everything I’d heard. Nothing was linking up in my mind. Clyde would have ripped Brad’s presentation to shreds. But I couldn’t even contact Clyde if I wanted to. He wasn’t answering his cell phone. I called Orlando on my way to the hospital. He was in rehearsal and couldn’t really talk, except to go on and on about what a good role he had. Hanging up, I felt frustrated. Ma Missy should have been with me. She could have read Brad, told me if he was for real or not. But Ma Missy wasn’t here, and I had no one to help me make the most important decision of my life.

  TRINA WAS TAKING A SMOKE BREAK WHEN I GOT TO THE hospital. “I’m ready to go home,” she announced when I sat down with her in the television room. “There’s nothing wrong with me, and I don’t need to be here.”

  “Trina, you have a mental illness—”

  She waved her hand, as if shooing away a pesky fly. “No, I don’t. I just shouldn’t have smoked weed, that’s all. I think the guy who gave it to me laced it with something. Come early tomorrow; then we can go to IHOP. I’m fiending for pancakes.”

  “Things are going to be different when you come home, Trina. You will have to take your meds, start seeing your therapist regularly, and there can’t be any cursing, violence, drugs, or drinking.”

  Even I recognized that my words held no authority. I wasn’t telling her, I was pleading with her. Mother as supplicant.

  “I know,” she said blandly.

  “I’m going to type up a contract, and you’re going to sign it,” I said. “And if you break the contract, you’re going to have to find another place to live.”

  “Okay.” She stood up. “So come get me early, so we can have some pancakes.” Trina licked her lips and rubbed her tummy. “Yum-yum.”

  If she’d been eight years old, I would have laughed.

  “So they are sending her home tomorrow,” Elijah said as I was leaving. He shook his head. “She’s not ready yet. So many times, when they send them away, they’re not ready. Then they just come back. On and on and on. In my country, we are not so developed. We don’t have special places, special medication for the ones with the mental illnesses.”

  “What do you do with them?”

  Elijah shrugged. “We just let them be. Sometimes, the less hope, the better.”

  The testimonies of strangers formed a merry-go-round in my head. Richard. Carleen. Francisco. Fleur. Larry. They’d all ridden out the horrors of before and grabbed the brass ring of after. But what guarantees did I have that one day I’d count myself among them? Maybe I’d end up with the others whose first names had been withheld, the ones for whom the program had been just another failure.

  Option number two was simpler: Start again. Go back to support group. Call the SMART people. Wait. Call them again. Hope that she meets the criteria, that she is swallowing the bottle of pills or punching me as they come through the door. Hope that she gets put on a seventy-two-hour hold. Hope that the hospital has a psych bed available and that the meds don’t work so fast that she’s totally lucid after three days, too lucid to stay longer. Pray that the hospital decides to extend her hold and that the patient’s rights advocate is lazy. Pray that Dr. Bellows will do all the paperwork, come to court, and testify on my behalf. Pray the judge will see things my way. Wait. Hope. Pray. Trust the system.

  At home, I began cleaning. My drugs of choice: Windex, Pine-Sol, Murphy’s Oil Soap. The vacuum zigzagged all over the family room. I folded towels and put them away. I threw out old food in the refrigerator. My inner obsessive-compulsive was in charge, anxious to cross off everything in the cleanup to-do list. The goal was to keep moving until the ache had transferred from soul to muscles. The point was to change the focus.

  Orlando rang the bell close to eleven. He was on a high, still in character, still spouting lines. We made love right on the family room couch. It felt different, the way he stroked me, the way he sucked my nipple and rubbed my ass. Then I realized that he was fucking me the way the man in the play would have done it.

  I liked it.

  Orlando fell asleep on the couch. Toward midnight, and still with energy to spare, I approached the pile of unopened mail and magazines, letter opener in hand. Five days’ worth of mail. But what was this?

  Dear Keri,

  Happy birthday! Sorry this is late. I know you think I wasn’t the greatest mother, but I have always loved you. I am trying to make amends for the past. I just wish that you could find it in your heart to …

  I crushed the paper in my hand. My fist closed over it and smashed down some more.

  Later, when I’d try to remember exactly what propelled me over the edge, I could never say with any degree of certainty what final wind blew me there. All I knew was, my child would never be able to say I didn’t try hard enough. A click went off in my mind, and I was racing across the plantation in the dark.

  16

  THERE WAS NO TIME TO MULL THINGS OVER THE NEXT morning. Five minutes after I told Bethany my decision, we were on a three-way phone call with Brad. Thirty minutes later, I was seated on the same oceanfront bench where I’d heard the first testimonial. Bethany sat on one side of me and Brad on the other. I handed him a check for twenty-five hundred dollars, what he’d
determined I needed to pay each month.

  “Tell me what will happen,” I said to him.

  “Tonight I’ll meet you in the parking lot of the hospital. You need to arrive there by cab. Tell your daughter that your car is in the shop and a friend will be taking you home. Bethany and Angelica will already be with me. I’ll drive everyone to one of our houses. Your daughter will meet with a psychiatrist while she’s there. You’ll stay at the first house for a few days and then move on to another and then another until you reach the destination. When you’re almost there, someone will take your daughter the rest of the way alone, and you’ll return home.”

  “Like the underground railroad,” I said.

  Brad smiled. “Actually, that’s the model.”

  “What do you know about the underground railroad? ” I asked.

  Brad hesitated. “I’m not much of a history buff. It was a means of freeing slaves, getting them north to Canada. Harriet Tubman was the most famous conductor on the railroad. I know that much,” he said. “It seemed an appropriate model for what we do. Mental illness is a kind of slavery. Our movement is about freeing people too. We won’t always have to hide and run and do our work in the dark. The day is coming when people with brain diseases won’t be written off or warehoused, when everyone will know that recovery is possible.”

  He seemed to be speaking only to me.

  “Where is the place? How far away?”

  “Can’t tell you that. It’s for everyone’s protection.”

  “How will I be able to contact her?”

  “Someone will call you twice a week. You can talk with your daughter then.”

  Before I responded, Bethany chimed in. “Think of how many times you haven’t known where Trina was. There have been weeks when Angelica was missing. At least, this time around, you’ll know she’s getting help.”

  That made sense.

  “You came to us for a reason,” Brad said, wrapping his fingers around my wrist. His touch surprised me; it was so unyielding. “If we go away, that reason will still be here. You have a mentally ill daughter with a history of noncompliance with her medication regimen and all the concomitant chaos this usually entails. There is no end in sight. You can start again with the SMART people and seventy-two-hour holds, or you can try us. We will not wait for her to hit bottom. We’ll reeducate her so she accepts her diagnosis, takes her meds, and gets therapy. There’s no guarantee that what we do will work for your daughter, but we’re used to success.”

  He let go of my wrist, but, looking into his eyes, I felt he was still holding me.

  “If she could just get back to being who she really is. Everything is waiting for her. She can start where she left off. She can still have the life I dreamed of for her.”

  “Or maybe she’ll have a new dream.” He spoke in a gentle voice.

  “So many things could go wrong.”

  “Look,” Brad said. “Everyone who will be with you is trained in worst-case scenarios. I personally transported three people with their parents at one time.”

  “Have you ever lost anyone?” I asked.

  “No one has ever died under our care, if that’s what you mean.”

  “What’s the worst thing that ever happened?”

  “On the road?”

  I nodded.

  “A patient with schizophrenia got a knife and assaulted his father and the person from the program. They both had to have stitches.”

  “What happened to the patient?”

  “Our person managed to subdue him and take the weapon. He called for backup, who came, gave the patient a sedative, and took parent and driver to the emergency room.”

  “How did you get into this?” I asked Brad.

  “The hard way.”

  I knew what that meant. “How long would I be gone?”

  “Three to four weeks.”

  “When would I have to leave?”

  Brad looked at his watch. “What time are you going to pick up your daughter at the hospital?”

  “Around seven o’clock, assuming she’ll still be there. The last time she just left without me.”

  “Then we’d go to Plan B,” Brad said.

  “Will it just be you, Bethany, and me?”

  “Don’t know yet. This afternoon I’ll call someone at the hospital for an assessment of your daughter.” Seeing my surprise, he added, “We have people everywhere.

  “I’ll meet you in the parking lot at ten after seven. Be packed and ready to go. Make sure your daughter’s been to the bathroom. Bring as much medication as you have. You can get more on the road. Need to ask you a few things.” He looked at me sternly. “Will you be able to be away for four weeks?”

  I nodded.

  “Do you or your daughter have any physical problems that I should know about?”

  “No.”

  “Have you ever been arrested for or convicted of a felony?”

  “No.”

  “Do you have a plausible excuse for being away that you can tell anyone you feel needs to know?”

  “Yes.”

  “Have you told anyone about this?”

  “No.”

  “Don’t.”

  IT WAS NEARLY ELEVEN O’CLOCK BY THE TIME I REACHED the store. In the trunk of my car were three suitcases, one filled with enough of my mix-and-match clothes to last for several weeks. Two others contained a summer and fall wardrobe for Trina. Adriana was at the register, and Frances was in the back, altering a woman’s dress that had come in yesterday. In my office I busied myself with payroll and writing checks, but still I heard the familiar voices.

  Juicy and Coco and Spirit were standing near the purse display, chatting with Adriana. Juicy seemed to be telling a story, one she acted out in pantomime. When she finished, the other women roared with laughter. I’d never heard Adriana laugh so exuberantly. Customers in the store turned to stare at them. I did too. Spirit’s arm was on one of Adriana’s shoulder’s and Coco’s was around the other. Juicy pressed against her. They formed a tight circle. Family.

  They could reclaim her, I thought. They wouldn’t have to promise her anything but their arms around her shoulders. I’d been thinking that Adriana had been saved, that I had saved her. That was my delusion.

  “Adriana,” I said, after Frances had helped the other customers, “I need you.”

  Keeping an eye on the girls, I called Frances over and led her and Adriana to the office.

  “I’ve made arrangements for Trina to stay in a mental health facility for a while. I’m going to take some time off.”

  “You going back east?” Frances asked.

  “I don’t know. Maybe.”

  “You want us to go visit her at the hospital?” Adriana asked.

  “No. She’s not in any shape to see anyone. I’ll tell you when.” Peering out the door, I saw Coco waiting near the register. “Frances, go help Coco.” As soon as Frances left I turned to Adriana. “Cut them off,” I said.

  “What?”

  I nodded toward her friends. “They want to bring you back down to their level. They don’t want to see you living clean. That’s why they keep coming here.”

  “I’m through with all that.”

  “Stop seeing them,” I said.

  She stared at me for a very long time. “I can’t do that,” she said. “They’re still my friends. I’m not like them, but I can’t just dump them.”

  I wanted to tell her that she couldn’t trust them. I wanted to grab her by her shoulders and shake and shake until she got it. But I had a hard row to hoe ahead of me, and I needed all my strength. “They’re not your friends. They don’t love you. They can’t even love themselves,” I said.

  But she didn’t believe me.

  TRINA WAS WAITING FOR ME AT THE HOSPITAL, PACING BACK and forth in front of the nurses’ station. Her face was scrubbed clean; her smile was subdued. She called me Mommy and kissed my cheek. I wanted Clyde with me. Here’s our kid, I’d say, the wonderful one, not the other one. She wa
s utterly compliant and controllable, not a person in need of an intervention. But I knew things could change in two seconds.

  Puff. Puff.

  “Go to the bathroom,” I said.

  “Why?”

  “We’re not going straight home. My car’s in the shop, and a friend is picking us up.”

  She walked back to her room and as soon as she disappeared my phone rang. It was Orlando—himself, not in character.

  “Where you been, baby? I’ve been trying to catch up with you all day.”

  “Orlando, I really can’t talk right now. I’m running. I put Trina in a mental health facility, and I’m taking off. I need to get away. I’ll call you when I get there.”

  “Where you going? Are you coming to the opening?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t think so.”

  I could see his face, the dejection in his eyes. I was his favorite audience. Trina was walking toward me. Orlando’s next question was forming in his mind.

  “Orlando, I have to go. Talk to PJ, okay? He really needs you. I’ll call.”

  Elijah was sitting behind the sign-in desk. “Young lady,” he said, smiling at both of us, “you take care of yourself. Do what you need to do. I don’t want to see you back here again.”

  Trina giggled.

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “You won’t.”

  17

  THE EVENING AIR WAS CHILLY. HOSPITAL STAFF AND VISItors milled about. Across the street the emergency room was packed. Brad was standing in front of the door that led from the hospital to the parking lot. When he saw us he said, “There you are,” grabbed Trina’s hand, and shook it. “Brad,” he said, “your mom’s friend.”

  “Brad who?” she asked, and I thought, We’re not ready for her.

  “Sebastian.” The name slipped off his tongue so easily, I almost thought it was real.

  Trina gave me a look, and I knew she was trying to figure out who Brad was and how he fit into my life.

  “This way,” Brad said, leading us across the parking lot, down a dark row of cars until we were in front of his blue Explorer.