Sublime Karma

by Peyton Garver

  Teagan gasped, looking around her in the dark room. “What was that?” She gave off a nervous giggle. “A screech owl?”

  “Probably a fox, out back in the woods,” their dad answered.

  “No,” Jake said, grabbing the remote and muting it.

  The shrieking was now accompanied by a banging on their back door.

  Jake shook his head. “No, that’s Trevor.” He hurried to the back door. “Something’s wrong.”

  “Trevor?” His dad looked at his watch before looking back at Jake. “It’s a quarter after nine.”

  “Yeah, that’s weird. Ari usually puts him to bed at eight-thirty when Gia has the night shift at the hospital…” When Jake yanked open the door, Trevor barged in, wearing his pajamas, signing, and screaming, “Jeeek! Ahree!” He waved a paper in front of Jake as he continued signing and wailing.

  “Whoa, whoa, slow down,” Jake said, holding up both his palms and then swiping his right fingertips over the back of his left hand toward himself, right up to his elbow. He snatched the paper from Trevor, and in Ari’s unmistakable handwriting, he read aloud, “I’m with Dad now.”

  “Wha—Oh Christ, no!” He hoisted Trevor up and ran next door with Teagan and his dad following.

  “No!” Jake said, rushing into her room. He set Trevor on the floor. Ari lay on her bed, her eyes closed. “No!” He shook her shoulder. “Ari! Ari! Wake up!” She remained still, her lips a dark purple. He slapped at her cheek. “Ari?” He brushed back her hair, feeling her forehead and then her cold and clammy cheek. He shook her. “Ari!”

  He picked up an empty prescription bottle. Percocet. “God, please let her be okay,” Jake prayed over Trevor’s incoherent muttering and sobs.

  “Oh, Lord,” Jake heard his father say at the bedroom door.

  Jake glanced at his father, but turned back to Ari, placing two fingers on the inside of her limp wrist. Nothing. He tried again at her throat and found a faint pulse.

  He checked his pocket. “Shit! I don’t have my phone!” Panicked, he looked around. He grabbed Ari’s phone off the nightstand, pressed “emergency,” punched in 911 and speaker. He set the phone on the nightstand.

  “Jake, is she breathing?” his dad asked, moving closer.

  “No!” he shouted when he heard the dispatcher’s voice come across the phone.

  “911, What is your emergency?”

  “Attempted suicide—I think. Percocet. She’s not breathing! Her lips are blue, and she’s like really pale, but she has a pulse . . . Oh, God! Hurry! Send an ambulance!” He spewed out the address. “I’m starting mouth-to-mouth.” In his panic, he felt his adrenaline rush and swept his finger through her mouth. He heard the dispatcher’s voice again as he tilted her head back.

  “Yes, start mouth-to-mouth. Don’t do compressions as long as she has a pulse. An ambulance is already on the way. It should be there within eight minutes. Continue the breathing and stay on the line.”

  Eight minutes? He took a deep breath and covered her mouth with his. Coming up for air, he shouted, “Come on Ari, breathe!” He inhaled again then expelled his breath into her, watching her chest rise as it filled with his air. “Don’t you die on me, Ari!” His own pulse was racing.

  He heard his dad behind him. “Jake, I can take a turn.”

  “No!” Jake took another deep breath and exhaled into Ari’s open mouth as he held her head back. “I can do this,” he said before taking another breath and repeating the process.

  Trevor’s sudden scream startled Jake. He glanced toward the flailing child to see his father trying to pick him up. “Leave him!” Jake barked out between breaths.

  Adam backed away from the hysterical child, who continued his rocking. Teagan watched from the doorway. When she heard the siren, she bolted down the stairs to lead the paramedics to Ari’s room.

  Coming up for another breath, Jake felt a firm grip on his shoulder. “We’ll take it from here, kid.”

  Jake steadied himself on the bed frame before he backed away. He locked his fingers behind his head, listening and watching as the medics took over. While one started with the ambu bag to continue respiration, the other radioed the hospital to give her vitals to a doctor. Trevor had moved closer to where Jake stood, but continued watching the medics work on his sister’s limp body.

  The medic surveyed Ari’s body. “Female, about a hundred-ten pounds. Age?” He glanced at Jake.

  “Seventeen,” Jake blurted.

  “Seventeen,” the medic repeated into the radio. “Apparent opioid OD. She’s got a faint, erratic pulse, still not breathing.”

  A female voice came across the radio. “Set up an IV. One cc naloxone. Continue the ambu bag for two minutes. Then, if she’s still not breathing on her own, administer another mil of naloxone. We’re ready, standing by.”

  “Got it, one cc naloxone.” He reattached the radio to his belt.

  The other medic had already set up the IV and gotten Ari strapped onto the gurney.

  “Is she . . . Will she—” Jake faltered.

  “Can’t say, but you gave her a chance,” the medic measured out a milliliter of the naloxone serum into the syringe. He injected the drug into her upper arm.

  Jake’s nervous energy suddenly turned to fear. He nodded, chewing his thumbnail to keep his emotions in check. Why? Ari, why didn’t you say something last night? Dammit! You knew you were going to do this! He raked his shaking fingers through his hair and locked them behind his head, watching in disbelief as the medics quickly took over from where he left off. “I was with her last night. She didn’t say anything to me. I had no idea . . .” he murmured. “She didn’t say . . .” His eyes welled up. He felt his dad’s hand on his shoulder. “I didn’t know she was going to do this. She didn’t tell me. I thought, when I talked to her last night . . . I thought everything was okay when I left her. She seemed okay,” he whispered. “I should never have left her.”

  “Jake, don’t blame yourself.”

  Jake shook his head, but allowed his father to put his arm around his shoulder.

  The second paramedic looked at Trevor. “Buddy. Hey, buddy. I’m gonna need you to move so we can roll her outta here.”

  “He’s deaf,” Jake said. Moving from his father, Jake put his hand on Trevor’s shoulder and steered him out of the way. He took a much-needed breath, and his adrenalin kicked in again. “Dad, you ride up with her in the ambulance. I’ll take Trevor and Teag with me. We’ll meet you at the hospital.”

  The lead EMT turned. “You family?”

  Jake promptly answered for his dad. “Yeah, and Mom’s a nurse at the hospital. She’s there on shift now. Gia Amato.” His eyes bore into his father’s. Come on Dad, play along. Don’t make her go alone.

  Still silent, he nodded while looking from Jake, to the paramedic, then to Ari’s unconscious body.

  “Are you okay, sir? We’ve got to . . .”

  “Yeah. I’m okay, let’s get going. Jake, I’ll see you at the hospital. I’ll call your mother on our way.”

  Jake nodded, watching them leave.

  “Jake? Shouldn’t we get going?”

  “Yeah, Teag, we will. I need to figure a few things out first.” He sat on the edge of Ari’s bed and picked up Ari’s phone. He patted Trevor’s shoulder to get the boy’s attention and then tapped the phone. Touching his forehead with his fingertips, he turned his palm away from his head, Jake signed, “I don’t know . . .” Then, he pointed to the sentence on the screen. “Draw your unlock pattern.”

  Trevor took the phone out of Jake’s hands and swiped the pattern. It looked like a digital letter G.

  Jake signed, “Thanks.”

  Teagan walked closer to them. “What are you looking for?”

  “Not sure,” He said, opening her texts. “I’ll know if I see
something.” He glanced at Trevor.

  The boy had swiped snot across his face with the back of his hand. His swollen eyes were red, and his face blotchy from crying, but he had calmed. He sat watching Jake with his brown eyes wide as saucers.

  “Teag, take Trevor and get him cleaned up. Wash his face and find him something to wear, but let him get dressed on his own.” Turning to Trevor, he signed for him to go with Teagan and get dressed.

  Trevor slid off Jake’s lap and held his hand out to Teagan. Jake looked fondly at the two. Trevor trusted Teagan, too.

  He turned back to Ari’s phone and read her texts to Greg.

  Ari’s text was the first: It’s not what you think

  Greg’s came next: You say that every time you can’t keep your hands off him

  Ari: Don’t be jealous of Jake I love you. You know that Jake is family

  Greg: I can’t do this anymore Ari you made your choice and its not me I’m tired of you telling me he’s like your brother he’s not your family Ari. Don’t text me again I won’t answer

  Jake expelled his breath. And I told her to grovel. A few more texts from Ari followed, but Greg, true to his word, didn’t reply. Chewing his lip, Jake navigated back to Ari’s other recent texts. Brody Jenkins? He’s a stoner. Jake clicked on the thread. It’s from last week? Before I talked with her. How long has she been considering this? She knew! She knew when I was sitting there with her that she would do this. Dammit, Ari. Why didn’t you say something? Why didn’t I notice how desperate you were? I was wrapped up in my own problems. Oh God, please don’t let her die. Ari, I’m sorry. Jake inhaled deeply and looked up. He opened his eyes wide and blinked several times to prevent them from spilling over. He looked back at the thread of texts.

  Ari: how many?

  Brody: Can get u 5 at 10 bucks a piece

  50$ Ok I’ll pay you at my locker

  No way your kidding right? cameras! I’ll wait in my car

  Ari’s was the last text: Ok see you at your car in the morning

  Brody, you piece of trash. Jake picked up the empty pill bottle and studied the label.

  “Jake? Are we going now?”

  Jake looked up at Teagan with Trevor in the doorway. He gave the boy a reassuring smile. Trevor was dressed in a pair of gray sweatpants, a red hoodie, and a pair of black chucks identical to his sister’s. Teagan had washed his face. Jake stood and pocketed the pill bottle. “Yeah, but we have to stop somewhere on the way to the hospital.” He refreshed to the home screen on Ari’s phone, navigated to a game, and then handed it to Trevor. “C’mon, let’s go.”

  Chapter 30

  “There you are.” Leif sauntered into the home theater in the basement. “What’s wrong?” he asked Brie, plopping down on the seat next to her.

  “Nothing,” she said, staring at the screen.

  He looked toward the TV that hadn’t been turned on. “I call bullshit.”

  She forced a laugh. “Okay. You got me. I lied. Now what?”

  “Well, if we’re sticking to the script, my next line would be, ‘Talk to me.’”

  “Okay. What’s wrong? Hmm, what isn’t?”

  “Is it Jake?”

  “Maybe.” She stared at Leif. “What did you say to him?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “When you were in the Jeep? What were you guys talking about? What did you say to him?”

  “I already told you.”

  “Okay, now I call bullshit.”

  “Is he coming over tonight?” Leif asked.

  “That’s just it. He seemed weird when he texted me earlier. He said he’d be over, but as you can see . . .” she waved her hand, gesturing to the room. “No Jake. Now he’s not answering his texts. So, now I want to know what you said to him.”

  “Give him some space. He’ll come around.” Leif laughed. “He just got a heavy dose of a lot of our inside shit today. I told you I wouldn’t do anything to sabotage your whatever-it-is you have with him. I didn’t.” He grinned. “Is that why you’re in this funk?”

  “Mostly.”

  “What else?”

  “I was thinking about Dad.” She leaned back in the theater seat and looked back at Leif. “Do you ever wonder what it would have been like? You know, if he didn’t die?”

  “All the time.”

  “Maybe I wouldn’t be so screwed up. Mom would have been a real mom. We’d still be living in Potomac. We’d go on family vacations.”

  “You’d have never met Jake. You and I might not be so tight.”

  “Yes, we would have been, Branch.”

  He gave a short laugh and relaxed back in his seat. “It is what it is. This is the hand we were dealt.”

  “I don’t remember a lot, just pieces of him being there. Sometimes I think my memories of him are just memories of memories, if that makes any sense. But, I have this dream sometimes about this place in the woods by a lake. We’re at this big log house, and Dad took me out on the patio at night after Mom read me that story, Goodnight Moon.”

  She picked up her sketch from the floor. She stared at the reflection of the moonlight on the lake and skimmed her finger over it. “We were dancing and singing this song.” From her memory, she hummed the tune, then Leaf joined in with the words.

  “‘Moonshadow,’” he said.

  “What?”

  “‘Moonshadow.’” By Cat Stevens. That was the song. You weren’t dancing. You were leapin’ and hoppin’.” He gave her a rueful smile and reached for the sketch. “This place? It was our lake house in Deep Creek. We never went back after Dad died.”

  “Was? Was our lake house in Deep Creek? We have a lake house? Did Mom sell it?”

  “I don’t think so.” He frowned, looking pensive. “Anyway, after Dad died you stopped talking, and then you stopped crying. Mom started taking us to some psychologist, but you wouldn’t talk to her, either. You’d just sit there drawing pictures of our family. Then, one day you drew a pile of body parts: hands, legs, eyeballs, mouths. And, the people that you drew were missing those parts. Really freaky,” he said, chuckling.

  Brie shuddered. “Maybe I am psycho.” Looking back at him, she scowled. “I don’t remember that at all.”

  “You were only six. It was morbid, but your pictures were actually pretty good. And, when the psychologist showed Mom, it hit me, ‘Moonshadow.’ In the song there’re these lines about not having eyes and mouths and not crying and not talking.

  “At our next appointment the psychologist played the song for you. You said, ‘Daddy?’ in this little voice. And, you looked around like you thought he’d walk into the room. I bawled my eyes out, but you never cried again.” Until last night.

  She gave a dismal sigh. “God, I miss him.” She checked her phone. Still nothing from Jake.

  “Brie,” Leif said, covering her phone with his hand. “Give him some space. He’ll come around. It’s late, and you’ve got school tomorrow.” He paused. “Are you okay?”

  “Am I okay? What are you asking, Leif?”

  “You know what I’m asking.” He turned her hand over and rubbed his thumb over her scars.

  She pulled her hand away. “Honest truth? I don’t know,” she said, looking away and closing her eyes. “I don’t know. I thought about it.”

  “All right, we’ll camp out in here tonight. I’ll go get us some pillows and blankets. You can sleep in those sweats.”

  Chapter 31

  Jake pulled to a stop behind a blue Suzuki—he was pretty sure was Greg’s—and glanced at the Victorian house.

  “Where are we?” Teagan asked, leaning forward from the backseat. Jake looked back at Trevor next to her.

  “I think this is Ari’s boyfriend’s house.”

  Trevor stopped playing with his si
ster’s phone. He looked toward the house, and his eyes suddenly met Jake’s in question.

  Yep, this is it. Jake signed to Trevor. “Stay here. I be back one minute. O-K?”

  Trevor pouted. Jake signed again. “Stay here. O-K?”

  Jake waited for him to respond and then turned to Teagan. “I need to tell Greg about Ari. I’ll be right back. Keep an eye on Trevor, will ya?” Jake hopped out of the Jeep, hurried up the walkway to the wide front porch, and knocked on the door. The streetlight illuminated the Jeep, and he could see Trevor staring out of the Jeep’s window. He pointed at the boy and signed again. “Stay.” It was dark, but the porch light was bright. He knew Trevor could see him.

  When a woman answered the door, Jake signed. “Hi, my name Jake.”

  “Hi Jake, you here for Greg?” she signed back while speaking in perfect hearing speech.

  “Oh, sorry, I didn’t know you were . . . hearing. Yes. I’m here for Greg. Is he here?”

  “Yes, just a minute.” Leaving the door open, she disappeared.

  Jake looked back toward the Jeep.

  “Why’re you here?” Jake heard Greg say.

  Jake’s words stuck in his throat when he heard the ire in Greg’s voice. He managed to say, “Ari.”

  Greg scoffed. “She’s all yours.” He pushed the door shut, but Jake blocked it.

  Narrowing his eyes at Jake. “What’s your problem? I said she’s yours. I’m done with her.”

  “That’s not why I’m here. Ari’s my friend, not my girlfriend.”

  “Did she put you up to this? Tell ’er I’m over her and good riddance.”

  Jake drew in his breath to check his temper. “You don’t mean that,” he said.

  “Yeah. I do. I’m done with ’er and you’re the reason. So, are we finished now?” Greg pushed the door.