by Han Nolan
"Yeah, I guess so," I say.
Pete continues. "It can get kind of intense in this room, but it all stays in here."
Haze takes off his sombrero and pitches it onto Dr. Gomez's desk. "Yeah, what's said in here stays in here. What's said in here stays in here," he repeats, laughing at himself as if he invented the phrase.
"So come on, both of you—sit," Pete says. "Peace." He sits back on his pillow and crosses his legs.
I glance at the peace sign on his T-shirt.
AUNT BEE: Sit, Jason.
"Okay, maybe," I say. I sit back down.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: See, that wasn't so hard.
Shelby sits, too.
"So what's this about, man?" Haze says.
Shelby tosses a chunk of cheese in her mouth. "Just wait a second. I'm not—I can't bring myself to say it yet." She doesn't look at any of us and her face beneath all her millions of freckles burns red.
SEXY LADY: She looks miserable. Look at her eyes. They're so bloodshot. She's not so attractive now, huh?
CRAZY GLUE: Yes, she is.
I stuff a bunch of cold french fries in my mouth and wish I had remembered to grab some ketchup packets.
"What do you mean, you're not ready? You just said..." Haze begins, but Pete puts his hand on Haze's arm to stop him.
"Is it about your mother?" Pete asks.
Shelby nods. "What else?" She bites down on her lower lip.
Haze, Pete, and I exchange glances. Then Pete says, "Center of the room. Come on, everybody."
Pete scoots on his butt toward the center, and then Shelby and Haze do the same thing.
CRAZY GLUE: Okay, now we're in for it. Touchy-feely New Age mood ring stuff, just great.
I don't move. I don't know what to do.
Pete nods at me and says, "Jason, kill the lights, will ya?"
"Yeah, thanks, Pete," Shelby says.
I jump up.
CRAZY GLUE: Yes! Something easy to do. Go ahead, goob.
I flip the switch on the wall and the room becomes pitch black. I had forgotten that we have no windows in the room.
"Perfect," says Pete.
And Haze says, "Ah, darkness. I do my best business in the dark."
"Eew, gross," Shelby says, and Haze laughs.
I crawl on my hands and knees till I reach the circle and sit down between Shelby and Pete. We all sit cross-legged, knees touching. Then Pete leans forward and puts his arms around Haze's and my shoulders. The rest of us do the same so that we sit in a huddle with our heads almost touching, closing off the top of the circle.
CRAZY GLUE: Very touchy-feely! Do we like this?
SEXY LADY: I know I do.
We sit there for a couple of minutes, quiet, in the dark, with our arms around one another's shoulders, breathing in one another's lunch breath. It all smells mostly like smoked cheese.
Then Shelby sighs. "Okay, I guess I'm ready now." Her voice sounds shaky as she begins.
"My mom, she's really hurting, you know? I mean her brain is all there. She's as with it as ever, but her body is just wasted and her insides are like, well, I don't know. She's having trouble breathing now. She's got all this mucus she chokes on, and she can barely speak because her tongue doesn't have much muscle tone, and she can't hold her head up at all. The only thing she can move, really, is one finger on her right hand, and the doctors say—" Shelby sniffs and takes her hand off my shoulder to wipe her nose and sniff again. "The doctors say she's probably going to suffocate. That's how she'll die. And every night, she's choking, and the nurse has to come in and clear out her lungs, and when the nurse has a night off, since my dad's not usually there, I do it, and my mother, she doesn't want to live like this anymore. She—she doesn't want to live. She doesn't want the nurse or me to clear her lungs—and"—Shelby sighs again, only more deeply, and pauses to wipe her nose—"and, sometimes—sometimes I think maybe she'd be better off—you know—dead."
"Whoa!" Haze says.
Shelby sniffs. "I know, right? It's terrible, what I'm thinking. But I can't help it. Sometimes when I hear her choking in the next room, I—oh jeez, I think about just leaving her there, just plugging my ears and leaving her there till it's all over." She raises her voice a little. "But—but it's only for an instant. Just a flash of a thought, and then I shake it out and run into her room, and I'm so glad she's still alive. I still need her. But that thought, that terrible thought is there. I hate it. I hate myself when I think it. I just hate myself."
Shelby's voice is so close. We're all so close, we can hear one another breathing and feel one another's pulse through our arms placed across one another's backs. My own breathing is faint, shallow. I don't want to breathe at all. I want to just listen. It feels as if we're so far away from the rest of the world, caught up in the hush and darkness of this room.
Pete whispers, "Sometimes I've wished my dad were dead, too. Our lives would be so much better, and easier, you know? But then I'm sorry. I'm always sorry when I think that. He's an asshole, but I love him."
"Yeah, my parents can both be royal assholes, but you know, you love them anyway," Haze says. "So like, what's that all about?"
AUNT BEE: All the months your mother was in a coma, you never thought that. You begged and begged God to let her live.
CRAZY GLUE: God had other plans.
LAUGH TRACK: Isn't that a shame.
Shut up, everybody!
We sit huddled together for a few minutes, just being there with one another, and it feels dangerous to me that nobody is saying anything.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: Ah, the dreaded silences.
Then Shelby starts again. "My mother wants me to help her die now." Her voice is just a whisper, but it feels like it's coming from inside my own chest. "She wants me to leave her when she's choking and just let her suffocate, and I'm so afraid that one day I'm going to do it."
I feel Shelby's hand claw my back and grab my shirt as though she were looking for something to hold on to, to save her and keep her from falling into that terrible place where those kinds of thoughts live, but I know from my own experience, there is no holding on, not for any of us. We have become, through no fault of our own, these falling bodies. That's what it feels like, there in that windowless room. Just like we're one of O'Hagan's odd mathematical equations for falling bodies, and as scary as that is, sitting with Shelby, Pete, and Haze makes me feel for the first time that I'm not alone. At least we're all falling through space together.
Chapter Seven
SLEET PELTS ME on the walk home from my bus stop. Little chips of ice burn my cheeks and the tips of my ears. The sky and river are both a dreary gray, the water choppy where it hasn't yet frozen. I walk past the warehouse turned art studio, the collar of my coat turned up and my shoulders hunched against the wet wind. It's always windiest on that coner. My mind is on Shelby and the meeting. The street is slick with rain and black ice, so I watch my steps, careful to avoid the puddles since the sole of one of my shoes has a crack in it.
CRAZY GLUE: You've got to put a piece of milk carton in your shoe. That'll fix it.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: He's not worrying about his shoes.
CRAZY GLUE: Yes, he is, or we wouldn't be talking about it.
My mind drifts back to the meeting in Dr. Gomez's office. Right before we left the room, after we had turned the lights back on, Haze asked Shelby if she could ever do it—leave her mother helpless and choking—and Shelby lost it. She burst into tears and said she didn't know. Even if her mother wanted her to do it, how could she?
CRAZY GLUE: You're starting to think about your own mom, goob. Careful.
AUNT BEE: He needs to think about her. It's not healthy pushing her memory away.
I stop as usual just across the street from my house and as usual I stare up at it. The windows look dark and the house vacant. I shiver and remember when we first moved in and the house seemed gigantic to me. Back then, there were only small cracks in the ceilings and no holes in the roof. We could fill
the cupboards with food.
CRAZY GLUE: Yeah, yeah, and you had plenty of heat, and cable, and the phone worked—don't go there.
I wait for a car to pass, then cross the street, climb the steps, and pause at the door.
LAUGH TRACK: As usual. (Laughter).
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: Now he will conjure up some sweet memory from the past that will remind him of his dad in the good old days.
LAUGH TRACK: As usual!
AUNT BEE: It's important for him to remember something nice about his father before he goes inside.
Remember that Christmas when the chimney guys were fixing the flue in our chimney in the old house, and Dad got the idea on Christmas Eve to dress as Santa and climb into the chimney and have Mom call me outside to see him?
AUNT BEE: He knew you were starting to doubt the whole Santa Claus myth. He just wanted you to believe. There you were standing out in the cold staring up at your father all dressed up like Santa.
CRAZY GLUE (ACTING AS JASON): "Look, Mom—it really is Santa!"
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE (ACTING AS DAD): "Ho! Ho! Ho! I'm Santa Claus. Jason, have you been a good boy this year?"
CRAZY GLUE (AS JASON): "I guess so. Sometimes, right, Mom?"
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE (AS DAD): "Well, since you've sometimes been a good boy, I've brought you lots of pr—pr—Lara? I think I'm stuck. Uh! Ah! I am. I'm stuck here! I—can't—get—out!"
CRAZY GLUE: Yeah, he got stuck in the chimney! He got so totally stuck! He had so many pillows stuffed in his costume, they were coming out through the neck hole.
LAUGH TRACK: (Laughter).
All those police and firefighters and reporters came, and it took forever to get him out because they couldn't figure out what he was caught on.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: It was his hiking boots. He was wearing those monster hiking boots—remember?
CRAZY GLUE: Yeah, and the whole time he was stuck, he was holding on to that big sack he'd filled with clothes and books. He was stuck for hours, but he still held that sack over his shoulder.
LAUGH TRACK: (Laughter).
SEXY LADY: That photo of Santa in the chimney went all over the country—Reader's Digest ran it, People magazine, even Time. Your dad was famous.
I loved him for doing that—dressing like Santa and all.
MY SUBCONSCIOUS: Ah-hem. I hate to interrupt this trip down memory lane, but doesn't anyone else smell fire?
ALL: Shit!
I burst into the house and decide the smell is coming from the kitchen. "Dad!" I run through the living room and dining room and call again. "Dad!"
I arrive at the kitchen and see a pot on the stove glowing red at its base. I grab a potholder and sweep the pot into the sink and turn on the faucet. It sizzles and hisses, and steam rises, blinding me for a second. I jump away from the sink and turn off the stove.
"Dad!"
There's an empty can of soup on the counter and, stuck to the burner, bits of what must have been chicken and rice burned almost to ashes. I shut off the faucet, then turn around and notice a newspaper spread out on the kitchen table. "Jeez, you didn't steal the neighbor's paper again. Dad!" I grab the paper and wad it as best as I can, then shove it into the wastebasket under the sink.
CRAZY GLUE: Way to hide the evidence, goob. That's the first place the police will check.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: No one calls the police over a stolen newspaper or two.
CRAZY GLUE: Or three, or five, or seven.
AUNT BEE: I'm worried. Why isn't your father answering you?
LAUGH TRACK: Uh-oh!
I open the back door and check outside. "Dad!" I call. Our backyard isn't big—just a little lawn, a few dogwoods, a sycamore, and a garden bed where my mom used to grow all her varieties of onions.
CRAZY GLUE: All her heart-healthy onions. How ironic. A fat lot of good they did her.
I don't see my dad anywhere.
I slam the door and check down in the basement, where my mother kept her darkroom. Then I hurry upstairs and go through all the rooms. I check under the beds. Back when my grandmother died, members of the Greek Orthodox Church came calling. They brought casseroles and cakes, and my dad hid under his bed until everyone left. He hates crowds.
I see the helmet I hid from Dad still pushed under my bed, but nothing else. There's nothing under my parents' bed, either, but I notice a large box sitting on top. It's Dad's memories box from Greece. I glance inside as if I think he might be hiding in there; then I hurry out of the room. I keep calling him, but there's no answer.
My hands shake when I grip the banister on my way downstairs and my legs threaten to buckle beneath me. I don't know what to do. Where can he be? I go through the house again, calling everywhere.
AUNT BEE: Everything will be all right. Calm down. Don't panic.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: But this is bad. He's left the house. He could be anywhere. Anything could have happened to him.
CRAZY GLUE: I don't have a good feeling about this.
What should I do? If I call the police and they find him, they'll put him away, but if I don't call them and I don't find Dad, then what?
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: Go, son. Go look for him!
I leave my backpack in the hall and run out into the street calling for my dad. I go into town, where the sidewalks are deserted because of the weather. The lights in the shops that line the streets look warm and inviting. Maybe Dad went looking for a warm place to spend the day and was drawn by these lights. I go into every store, down every aisle—no Dad. Nobody's seen him.
I stand at the top of the street facing the river. From here the sky and river look like one great big charcoal fog. My jeans are soaked from the thighs down, and I can feel the cold burn my legs. Ice water has seeped into the crack in my shoe and soaked my sock. I want to go home and change into dry clothes.
AUNT BEE: Go on home. Maybe he's there now.
CRAZY GLUE: He could be anywhere. He might never be found.
I head down toward the river and slip on a sheet of black ice. Landing on my back, I lie in the road with my arm over my face.
CRAZY GLUE: This can't end well. Get up!
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: You have to do something about your dad. Every day is some new disaster.
Yeah? Like what?
SEXY LADY: Is this your life for the rest of your life? This isn't hot, Jase.
I love my dad. If you love someone, you stand by him, forever, no matter what.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: Is it really love?
Mom could always handle it. Why can't I? Was it always this hard?
AUNT BEE: You're not your mother. You need help. You can't do this alone anymore.
CRAZY GLUE: If you don't get up, the rest of your life might only be a few seconds longer. A car's coming, goob. Get up!
I scramble to my feet and a car horn honks at me. I wave and try to smile.
The guy in the car rolls down his window. "You okay?"
"Yeah, watch out for the ice there."
The guy nods. "Crappy weather, huh?" Then he rolls up his window, not waiting for my answer.
I give it to him anyway. "Yeah, and a crappy day, too—a crappy, crappy day."
Chapter Eight
I DECIDE to turn around and go back into town to the phone booth in the alley at the top of the hill. I check the change in my pocket.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: If you had a working cell phone, you could keep track of your dad better and maybe this sort of thing wouldn't happen.
Mind telling me something useful?
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: I'm just saying what's on your mind.
I slip a coin in the slot and get the numbers for the local hospital and clinic, thinking that maybe Dad's mouth was giving him trouble again, so he rode the city bus out to one of them. I'm happy to hear there's no George Papadopoulos registered at either place. I hang up and stare at the phone for several minutes.
CRAZY GLUE: If you're waiting for it to start talking to you on its own, you're in for a long wait
.
AUNT BEE: Go ahead. Call him. Call Pete. That's who you want, isn't it? It's the right thing to do. He's okay. He's got a car. He can help.
I grab the receiver, call Information, and get Pete's number. Then I count out my change again. My hands are shaking and stiff with cold.
I hesitate. I don't know if I can do this. He'll know. I'll have to tell him about Dad.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: Look at it this way. There might be a whole lot of people out there right now who are finding out about your dad. Better you find him and find him fast.
CRAZY GLUE: Yeah, come on already. Pete's father's a drug addict. Haze's folks are reenacting the Civil War, Shelby's thinking about assisted suicide, and you're worried what Pete's going to think about your crazy father? Get on with it, goob.
I put another coin in the slot and dial Pete's number. He answers on the second ring.
I'm surprised for some reason to hear his voice. It sounds different on the phone, kind of thick. He says hello, and I just stand with my mouth hanging open.
CRAZY GLUE: Say something already, goob. He's said hello twice already.
"Uh, hello—uh—Pete? It's—it's Jason, uh—yeah, and I'm—I'm in trouble. I need your help."
"Pope-a-Dope? What's happened? Where are you?"
"It's my dad—he's missing. I can't find him anywhere." My voice cracks. It feels like a wadded sock is stuck in my throat. I squeeze my eyes shut. "And he—he's got mental problems. He's a little—mentally ill." There, I've said it. For the first time ever. I feel sick. I'm dizzy. I've betrayed my dad—and my mom.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: She may have told you never to tell anyone, but these are extenuating circumstances.
I hold on to the metal shelf below the phone.
AUNT BEE: Steady. Steady. Everything's okay.
"Oh man, have you called the hospital?"
"Yeah. Yeah, I've called around. He could be anywhere. I don't have a car and I thought that maybe..."
"You're in the old section by the warehouse galleries, right?"
"Right, number four-oh-nine River Road."
"Be there in about twenty minutes."
"Thanks, Pete." I try to swallow the sock in my throat. It hurts too much. "Be careful; the roads are really slick," I say, but he's already hung up.
