by Beth Vrabel
Finally my name was called just as Gramps ran up to me. “Sorry, Richie,” he said. “I can’t find another face shield.”
Max snorted from the sidelines.
I shrugged, ripping the remnants of my shield from where it plugged into my helmet, and suddenly was glad Mom wasn’t around after all. “I’ll go without it.”
“You can’t, doofus. One eye, remember? Protect the spare and all that.” Gramps flapped his hand at me. “You didn’t even bring your glasses.”
I ignored him, stepping onto the mat at the same time as my opponent. This guy had a couple inches on me and was super thin like a whip. He looked fast. And cocky, considering he winked at me as we shook hands.
“Remember to protect your right!” Max called. For a second, I thought maybe he actually did feel guilty, enough so to start coaching me again. “You’re totally blind to the right. If he tries to hit you there, you’re screwed!”
Nope. Not even. He was just being a jerk.
The judge pointed to Max. “Any more specific pointers like that and you’re out of here.” Turning to us, he said, “Fighters ready? Begin!”
Sure enough, the kid sent a flurry of roundhouse kicks to my right. Thanks, Max, for that little heads-up. I twisted and blocked, whipping away his leg and pegging him in the ribs. The judge stopped the match and awarded me the point.
Two more to go.
“Sweep the leg!” Gramps yelled, then folded over laughing at himself. “Cah, cah, cah!”
Almost immediately, the guy whapped me in the shoulder. “Point!”
I borrowed the blitz tactic and landed a jab in the chest, practically pushing the guy off the mat. This time, I winked at him as I was awarded another point.
One more to go.
Two things happened at once. First—and it took a while to believe my eye on this—Mom and Dad rushed to the ringside. That’s right: Mom and Dad. Second thing: Max shouted out more helpful advice. “Remember, if you get knocked in your left eye, you’re totally screwed!”
“Fighters, begin!” the judge called.
“Dad?” I said.
Bam! Ridge hand to my left eye.
Chapter Twenty-One
I don’t want to be dramatic about this.
But that hit to the eye?
It took about a thousand years to fall to the mat, Mom’s screams still echoing in my skull. For a moment, I could see—Dad rushing toward me, Max’s face filled with shame, Gramps bellowing—then blackness. Blackness forever.
Naw. I’m just kidding.
What really happened was this: I got knocked in the eye. It watered like crazy.
“Stop the fight! Stop the fight!” Mom screamed as Dad ran straight across the mat and grabbed me.
He held my face in his hands. “Good to see you, son.”
“You too, Dad.”
“Well, you won’t see me for long. That’s about to swell shut.” Dad shook his head at me and slowly the amount that I could see diminished to about a sliver.
“Ice! We need ice!” Mom yelled.
Then, of course, everything went black as a judge pressed an ice pack to my eye. “Will we be able to resume the fight soon?”
“No,” Mom snapped. To me, she added, “Where was your face shield?”
“It shattered in my first fight so I went without it.”
“I’m going to kill you, Richie Ryder Raymond.” Mom pulled me into her. Apparently, the murdering would be after the hugging.
Here’s the truth: Dr. Carpenio can lecture like no other.
“We agreed that you’d be monitored annually. That’s once a year. Once a year. Yet I haven’t seen you in almost twenty months. Do you understand why we monitor you so closely? Do you all understand what’s at stake for Ryder?”
“I’m back to being Richie now,” I cut in. Everyone ignored me.
“Of course, we understand what’s at stake,” Dad broke in. “His remaining vision. His … life. We get it. We messed up.”
“We just lost track of time,” Mom added.
“My office left no less than four messages for you on your cell and home phone,” Dr. Carpenio said.
“What? I never got any of those,” Mom said, the shock apparent in her voice.
I squirmed in my seat, somehow feeling all of their eyes on me and sort of wishing my left eye was still swollen shut. But the tournament had been two days earlier and I could actually see Dad’s outraged face, Mom’s hurt expression. (By the way, that “something urgent” that came up? It was Dad getting an earlier flight home as a surprise.)
“Richie?” Mom snapped.
“I might’ve deleted one or two—”
“Why would you do that?” she gasped.
After the longest thirty seconds of silence ever, Dr. Carpenio broke in, his tone much gentler. “I’m sure he did it for the same reason you didn’t put more effort into tracking the appointments. You were scared. Scared what we’d find when we did have another screening. I get that.” He sighed. “But the fact is, you have a chronic condition, Ryder. I mean, Richie. And you, Dr. Raymond and …” he nodded to my dad, “… Dr. Raymond, you have a child with a chronic condition. It’s scary, sure. But that’s life. Get over it. Take care of business.”
I got why Dr. Carpenio was super grouchy. I mean, Mom did pull the fellow-doctor card and begged a last-minute Saturday appointment, calling Dr. Carpenio on his cell phone and saying she couldn’t trust anyone but him. And Dr. Carpenio did arrange for an emergency MRI and rushed bloodwork that Saturday. Now we were gathered at his office to hear the results. And to get a lecture, of course.
“Well,” Dr. Carpenio sighed, “I’ve got news.”
“Good news or bad news?” Mom asked.
Did your hands ever sweat so suddenly it felt like they were melting? I used to think this feeling in my stomach at this point of every doctor’s visit was like being punched in the gut. Then I took up martial arts, and I now know that this feeling is much, much worse than a simple punch in the gut. I pushed around thoughts about my recent headaches, of having to get closer to things than I was used to, of what it was like to go through radiation. For a stupid second, I almost bolted from the room.
“Both,” Dr. Carpenio said, still looking at his files. “First, the bad news: you’re going to need new glasses. Real glasses, this time. You have a refractive error but it’s easy enough to correct. With glasses, I’m confident we can bring your vision back up to twenty-seventy. Maybe even better.”
“Wait?” Dad said. “That’s the bad news?”
“Yes,” Dr. Carpenio smiled. “The good news is that you’re not showing any form of disease. Bloodwork, MRI, exam—everything is normal. That’s not to say that you can skip your next screening, of course.”
“Of course,” I gushed, breathing for what felt like the first time in a year.
Here’s the part that sucks as much as it was amazing: Mom’s relieved tears over her crinkled-paper face hollowed me just as fast as the smile on Dad’s sunshine face filled me up.
Everything was normal.
After the doctor’s appointment, we all went to dinner at this restaurant that had an arcade, and we spent a couple hours and way too much of Mom and Dad’s money playing racing games. On the way home, we stopped at a roadside stand for ice cream, which made me feel like a little kid, but it was nice.
Dad and I were still working on our ice cream cones—rocky road for him, birthday bash for me—when Mom ditched her black raspberry swirl for coffee flavored. She always does that, trying at least a few flavors before she settles on which she likes most. Sort of reminds me of a fly, flitting from plate to plate.
Dad turned toward me with his face drawn into the first serious expression any of us wore since Dr. Carpenio’s office, and I guessed the two of them plotted Mom’s sudden need for another cone.
“Ryder,” he said.
“Richie,” I corrected. Dad sort of flinched.
“I haven’t been here, not like I should’ve been
.” Dad stared at his melting ice cream but didn’t eat it, not even as it dripped down his hand. “I don’t just mean because of work. I mean, as a father. I’m not … I’m not so good at it.”
“Dad—”
“No, Richie, listen. It should be so easy, you know. So normal and natural. But it isn’t for me. I love you, kid. Completely love you an almost frightening amount, but I’m not—”
“Dad,” I interrupted a little louder, “I get it. Gramps, he told me about how when your mom died he sort of shut down. You didn’t exactly have a great role model. But it’s cool. We’re good.”
“No, we’re not.” Dad shook his head. His ice cream had totally dissolved, covering his hand in muddy-looking rivers. He took a deep breath. “We’re going to change things. I mean it. Mom said there are spots at the Natural History Museum for researchers like me. I’ll be local and—no arguing about this—we’re going to have to figure out how to deal with things instead of running or ignoring them. Maybe get some help—”
I had to put the big guy out of his misery. “All right.”
“Thanks, Ry … Richie.” Dad let out a long breath and flicked some of his melted ice cream off his hand onto the grass surrounding our picnic table.
I licked around my cone, thinking about Miss Singer and the notebook she carried around. The blank one she gave me. “My bio teacher, she says she writes down her … feelings. Maybe I should do that. She seems pretty normal.”
Dad nodded. “That’s a great idea.” He took a deep breath. “Your mom thinks we should hook you up with a therapist, too. Now, don’t argue—”
“Cool,” I said. “I think that’d be nice.”
The sun was setting by the time we pulled into the driveway. I saw the curtain flick in the front window of the house. “Did anyone let Gramps know? You know, about my results?”
“Oh!” Mom said. “I didn’t think …”
“I’m sure the old man’s fine,” Dad said, with a nonchalant air.
I remembered what Gramps said about the day Marlene told him she was sick. About how he remembered every detail. Had he been thinking about that all day, because of me? I pushed the thought aside.
“Hey, Gramps!” I said as I stepped over the General on the way inside. “Cancer-free!”
“Oh.” He was in his recliner now, all the way pushed back like he hadn’t just been peeking out the window, flipping through the channels. A shudder moved across his face but only for a second. “That’s good.”
Mom sat down on the other chair and I plopped on the couch, which finally had some give to it. The General hopped onto my lap. Either the cat was starting to like me or she figured this was the best way to keep tabs on my movements. I rubbed her behind the ears and she latched, her back legs ripping up my arm. Definitely the latter, then.
Dad sat on the edge of the narrow couch beside me. Funny, you know? He grew up in this house. It hadn’t changed a bit. Yet he was the one who looked uncomfortable being here.
“What’s the plan now?” Gramps asked.
“Well,” Dad said, “I finished the field aspect of my project. Now I’m going to launch into publishing papers, which can be done anywhere. Jenna’s going to help set me up with some place in DC, like her, for a while. I suppose we’ll find a home nearby to settle for a few months.”
“Wait! What?” I asked. “We can’t move.” Gramps’s face turned toward mine for just a second, then back to the TV. “I’ve—I’ve got school …”
“We’ll stay local until you finish the school year, Ry—Richie,” Dad said.
Mom didn’t say anything, her eyes flicking between me and Gramps. “What would you like to do, Richie?”
“Can’t we stay here?” I asked.
“You know your gramps. He’s stuck in his ways,” Dad said, like Gramps wasn’t sitting a couple feet away. “He doesn’t want us hanging around indefinitely.”
“Gramps?” I asked.
But the old man just got up and walked back to his bedroom like I never spoke.
“See?” Dad said. He grabbed the remote control from Gramps’s recliner. And I felt sick to my stomach.
Much later—after Mom and Dad had gone to dinner and a movie—I started to lose the whole not-going-to-die-yet good vibe and remembered that not all was fine in the life of Richie Ryder Raymond.
I had the girl I crushed on all year calling me “boyfriend” and suddenly I wasn’t all that sure I liked her that way anymore.
I had the guy who cared about everyone hating my guts.
And I had the ongoing issue of, you know, Artie.
Forget it, I told myself. Soon we’d be moving and that would eliminate problems one and two. But I couldn’t push the feelings away, no matter how hard I tried. It was like they banged around inside of me. Bam! Bam! Bam!
Too slowly I realized the banging I heard wasn’t coming from inside me. It was coming from the front yard. I pushed open the screen door to see Gramps. Next to him was a bucket full of tools. He held a huge hammer with two hands. Bam! Bam! Bam! Gramps started beating the crap out of the yard horse.
“What are you doing?” I ran to his side, keeping a few feet between me and the hammer.
Bam! Bam! Bam!
“What do you care? You’re leaving!” Bam! Bam!
“Gramps, what is going on?”
The clouds shifted, letting moonlight shine on Gramps’s face. Huge tears slid down his wrinkled cheeks and for a second I couldn’t breathe. “Gramps?”
“Set in my ways,” he grumbled. “Maybe I don’t want to be set in my ways. Ever think of that? Maybe I just push things away so much that the ways get stuck. I get stuck. Worse than a stupid stone horse.” Bam! Bam! Bam! “Dress it up all you like. Make it a joke. It’s still stuck.” A chunk of concrete fell from the horse’s shoulder. “That one eye’ll fall out if you keep staring, boy. Leave me alone.”
I almost did, too. Instead, I pulled another hammer out of the bucket. I slammed it against the horse, feeling the jolt of the impact up my arm. I slammed the hammer down again and again, on the other side of Gramps. It felt like each hit was cracking me to pieces. Maybe it was. At least, it splintered the parts of me I glued together myself—the parts that dammed up everything I didn’t want to feel. With each thud of the hammer on that stone horse, anger roared through me. Pain. Pity. Bam! Bam! Bam!
“I hate horses. Freaky beasts with freaky bulgy eyes,” Gramps huffed. “Stop!” he suddenly yelled at me. He rooted in the bucket for a second and handed me a pair of goggles. I slid them up my nose.
“I hate goggles!” Slam! Slam! “I hate glasses! I hate my stupid, freaky fake eye!” Slam! Slam! Slamslamslamslam!
“I hate going to bed alone.” Bam! “I hate waking up. Forty years and I still think she’s going to be there on the other side of the bed.” Bam! Bam! Bam!
A bit of the horse’s tail crumbled. Gramps moved onto the face.
I pulled back, holding the hammer with two hands and slamming into the yard horse’s hindquarters. “I hate needing help!” Slam! “I hate being different!” Slam!
“I’m tired of being a joke!” Bam! Bam!
More pieces crumbled.
“I miss seeing stars every night,” I said softer, but hitting the horse harder.
“I miss her laugh.” Another chunk crumbled.
Vaguely, I realized Jocelyn was standing there in the grass. I guess breaking apart a stone horse can wake up the neighbors.
“Hey, neighbor,” I joked. Bam! Bam! Bam! “I hate puns!”
Gramps laughed. A bit of the horse’s nose crumbled. “I want to date again. I like Rosie, darnit.”
Bam! Bam! I wanted to raise my arms and hit the horse again, but my limbs suddenly weighed a thousand pounds. “I’m tired of being funny.”
“Ah, you were never that funny, really.”
“Oh thanks, Gramps.”
Jocelyn stared at us for a minute. She picked up a wrench from the bucket.
“Go for it,” Gramps said, point
ing to the side of the horse opposite me.
I whacked the horse again. “It’s not fair,” I grunted. Then I hit it again, harder. I was a volcano, a tornado, a hurricane. “It’s not fair!” I yelled to the stupid horse. To the stars. To the world. “I just want to be normal!”
A strangled sort of whimper escaped from Jocelyn. For a second, I thought maybe she had hit her thumb or something, but she kept right on swinging at the horse, too. “It was raining,” she said. Slam!
“They gave me ice cream after,” I grunted. Bam!
Gramps sat in the grass, his head in his hands.
“It was my idea to light the heater.” Slam!
“I’m scared all the time.” Bam!
“It’s my fault he’s dead.” Slam!
“I’ll never not be scared.” Bam!
“I’ll never be okay.” Slam!
I don’t know how long we pelted that stone horse, but by the time we collapsed next to Gramps, whole chunks of it had crumbled to the grass. But we weren’t able to knock it over. We lay in a triangle, faces staring up at the sky and covered in sweat.
I couldn’t push back what was in me. It was too close to the surface now. Too real. I was too tired to fight it, though. So I just felt it. I let the fear and anger and self-pity roll through me. It sucked. I’m just being honest, here. It felt just as awful as I always thought it would. But maybe it was hearing Gramps’s quiet sobs next to me and feeling that electricity zapping again between where Jocelyn lay, out of breath, on the other side of me, letting me know I wasn’t alone—that they were just as wrecked as I was.
Somehow I knew they’d be all right. Even though they felt as pelted to pieces as me—as that stupid yard horse—I knew they’d be okay. And if they’d be okay, well … maybe I’d be okay, too.
Yes, I’d be okay.
A piece of the horse fell to the grass behind us.
Quietly I heard Jocelyn’s voice: “It was raining so we couldn’t go to the fort. We went to the shed instead. It was cold, though, in the rain. I had dandelions. I said we should make them into tea, that it’s something Indians would’ve done.”
“You’ll be okay.”
