Night, Neon

by Joyce Carol Oates

  Clickbait on the internet. Crappy article in one of Mom’s magazines.

  Okay, I’m gonna take a chance. Passing on the right to get to the exit. Assholes gaping at me humping along the turnpike shoulder, must be passing ten, twelve vehicles. Fuck, it’s an emergency situation. Gotta get my mom to the clinic.

  Running over debris, part of a rusted fender, broken glass. Mom gives a scream like a little killed mouse. Me, I just laugh.

  Juuling is cool-ing. You just laugh.

  Each Thursday first week of the month early a.m. my mother has three hours of infusion—gamma globulin. Have to laugh thinking—Gamma goblin?

  Because something is wrong with Mom’s white blood cells: immune system.

  Best fucking thing vaping does for you, makes you immune. Best damn infusion.

  Special permission for me to come to school late on those days. Primary caretaker of my mother. I need you Jacey, please. Don’t abandon me.

  Christ! Embarrassing as hell. Mom pleading for me not to abandon her like her damn husband did. Somebody should shoot him.

  First hit of the day, best hit. Press your hand against your chest feeling the heart pound pound pounding inside the ribs like a fist.

  Feeling good in the car. Terrific sensation behind the wheel. The Lexus Dad left for Mom, I’m driving.

  Asshole’d have a meltdown, he knew who’s driving.

  Mom has the driver’s license, I’ve got a learner’s permit, it’s cool. Nothing illegal. Good I remembered to grab Mom’s purse on the way out. Wallet, driver’s license. Credit cards. Cash.

  (Loose bills in Mom’s wallet. Last time I looked, twenties, two fifties. Tens, fives. Helped myself to one twenty and one fifty, and guess what?—on painkillers Mom never had a clue.)

  Start off on a high. Wild!

  Brain buzzing, hive of bees. All good.

  Okay, Mom. You can open your eyes, we’re here.

  When the high wears off, feeling like shit. Air leaking out of a balloon.

  My size balloon: five feet eight, one hundred twenty-three pounds, shoulder muscles, arm muscles okay. Swim team, track team, JV football, but like the other guys vaping, kind of short of breath these days.

  Like, fucking panting.

  Coach stares at us, disgusted. Steve, Carlie, Leonard, Jacey. Coach hears us panting. Maybe Coach can smell us. (But you can’t smell e-cigs like you smell fucking cigarettes—right?) Like, Coach isn’t going to accuse anybody of anything. Even if he guesses what we’re doing behind his back. Knows he could get his ass sued by irate parents.

  Defamation laws. Slander, libel. Lawyers for the school district.

  So fuck Coach, who gives a fuck. Mom is in no condition to come to our meets anymore, Dad stopped coming years ago. And when Dad came and I set a county record for the four-hundred-meter sprint, he was on his fucking cell phone most of the time.

  Hey kid. I’m proud of you.

  Yeh okay, Dad.

  I am! I goddamn am.

  Okay, Dad. Cool.

  Like I gave a shit. Like I’m panting and wagging my tail like some sorry-ass little mutt for Dad to pet.

  That sprint was my best time. Still the county record.

  Why vaping feels so good. Turns them all mute.

  Why e-cigs are the greatest invention. Nothing like fucking tobacco cigarettes that stink and stain your teeth and you can see the damn smoke.

  Only (old) assholes smoke. Dad boasts how he’d quit, but he’s such a fucking liar, who can believe him.

  Have to laugh seeing teachers’ mouths move so seriously, but you can’t follow what the fuck they are saying. Fun-ny!

  Jacey, what’s so funny? Would you like to tell us?

  Trying to keep a straight face. Sputtering, hot. Friends in the class turning to grin at me behind their hands.

  Nah. I’m okay.

  You’re—“okay”? Are you?

  Let adults get the last word, that sarcastic tone, that’s cool. Like anybody gives a fuck what they think.

  Joke’s on them—teachers. Don’t know shit.

  Every few years they vote to strike. But then some shit happens, they don’t strike. Chump change they make for salaries, they deserve.

  In the beginning, last year, there were just a few kids vaping. And not in class.

  Now it’s right in class, and half the kids doing it. (Including girls.) Teacher turns his back, you take a quick hit.

  Inhale. Exhale. Cloud: chill. Laugh. Cough. The surprise of that head rush, so sweet.

  Almond nicotine. Good shit!

  Whatever it costs, it’s worth it. Clears the sad, sick crap in your head like Power Wash.

  Vaping Alert.

  Soon as you step into a building. Quick-scope where you can Juul without being detected.

  Any medical facility, NO SMOKING signs everywhere.

  Like at the Oncology Center.

  Nothing about e-cigs. Nothing about Juuls, vaping.

  Number one: restroom in the corridor (single occupant).

  Number two: men’s restroom, stall.

  (Yeah, I brought the Juul with me. Not intending to use but, like, to test my willpower.)

  Goddamn: the infusion nurse can’t find a vein in Mom’s arm. Tightening a tough rubber band around her upper arm, palpating her forearm, looking for a vein. A sight I hate to see. Makes me feel queasy. Shivery. Shaky. So fucking sorry for Mom but disgusted with her too. You end up blaming them—victims.

  Girls at school that guys have treated like shit. Should feel sorry for them, but fuck it, you do not.

  Mom’s trying not to whimper. Trying not to cry. Arms bruised, they’re looking for a vein in the wrong damn place. Try the left arm. Jesus. By the elbow. Young nurse keeps poking her, apologizes, only makes things worse.

  In vain, seeking a vein.

  They sought a vein, in vain.

  Yeh, I should exit the infusion room. Right. Should get out. There’s nothing for me to do but watch. I’m getting upset, telling the nurse to get somebody who knows fucking what she’s doing, which doesn’t help. My voice is loud, everyone is looking at me. Other patients in their chairs having their infusions. Other nurses. If I say fuck you, Goddamn fucking fuck all of you, the security guard will peer in the window, glaring like he did last time. If I don’t calm down, they will eject me from the Oncology Center. Then what will happen to Mom?

  Okay, it isn’t Mom’s fault. None of it is Mom’s fault.

  Still, I resent her. Leaning so heavy on me. Wanting to protest, I’m only fifteen!

  Three fucking years before I can leave home. If I’m lucky. If I can get into college, and if Dad will pay for it. Fucking if.

  Then it sweeps over me like dirty water in my mouth—What if Mom gets really sick, what if Mom dies?

  Lucky there comes another infusion nurse to the rescue. A guy, big, soft-bellied. Andy, his badge says. Weird, male nurses! But some of them are pretty good.

  Clumsy-seeming Andy, but he’s guiding the needle slantwise into Mom’s arm at the elbow. Just a pinch, ma’am. Sor-ry. But Andy gets a vein on the first try, which is pretty damn impressive.

  By this time my heart is beating so hard, it’s an adrenaline rush without vaping.

  When I return to the infusion room two hours later, the oncology doctor is waiting for me. Seems that Mom is in discomfort. Face white, wizened.

  It’s explained to me: your mother’s blood pressure is dangerously low. Her blood work is showing abnormally high white blood cells.

  Oxygen intake abnormally low—eighty-three.

  Christ!—eighty-three out of one hundred?

  Also, Mom has been complaining of lower right abdominal pain. So the oncology doctor is saying he is going to call the ER, prepare for Mom’s being brought to the ER, which he recommends immediately. Don’t go home first, go to the ER, and the office here will fax over the blood work, vitals, infusion record, etc., but Mom is pleading no, please no, she does not want to go to the ER. She is just agitated, she says. Gets high b
lood pressure in the infusion room, she says. Her pulse is high, she doesn’t breathe correctly in the infusion room. Once she gets outside in the fresh air, she’ll be okay. Mom pleads.

  Yes, but there’re markers in the blood work. Renal failure? Creatinine level high.

  How high?—I’m asking.

  Three point something. Shit—that is high.

  Mom refuses an ambulance. Mom walks leaning on me, then on the walker, swerving and skidding through the plate-glass automatic doors like a drunk woman.

  Just take me home, Mom says. No ER!

  So I’m saying okay, Mom, but first you need to get checked out at the ER, then if it’s okay we can go home. So I’m able to get her over to the medical center, checked in at the ER, start the process going. Turns out Mom’s blood work is pretty bad. Anemia, plus other shit. Chronic abdominal pain—the oncology doc has recommended a scan.

  While Mom is being examined by a (young, Asian-looking) doctor in one of the cubicles, I’m starting to feel really anxious. Maybe it’s withdrawal—(already?)

  What I’d resolved was not to Juul for, like, twelve hours.

  Problem is, when you’re high, you forget what it’s like to be not-high.

  When you’re high, no thought in the world for dickheads that crash.

  Don’t ever smoke, Jacey. Promise me.

  Yah okay, Mom. I promise.

  … the things it does to your lungs, your heart, makes you short of breath, plus your breath smells, teeth stain. Plus it’s expensive. Plus it’s disgusting, sucking smoke into your actual body, exhaling it to pollute the air for others.

  Okay, Mom. I get it.

  Last week at school. Decided to test my willpower, leaving the Juul at home, hidden in my bureau.

  Like, I am no addict. (I just like how e-juices taste.)

  First hit of the day, early morning in the bathroom. Fantastic!

  It’s the chill cloud, the chemical fruit smell. Like some kind of sci-fi.

  Actual fruit—strawberry, pineapple, melon—has a sickish smell, like rot. Like, you can smell the rot to come.

  But vapor, fruit-vapor, that’s pure. No rot, ever.

  But then by noon fucked-up and feeling like shit. Staring at the classroom clock. Mouth so dry, compulsively swallowing. Fuck fuck fuck fuck. Instead of going to lunch had to bicycle home from school, sneak into the house so Mom didn’t know, take a hit, one two three, savor the high, return on my bicycle to school at top speed, Spider-Man fast, but fuck it, ran out of breath on the Cedar Street hill, vision blotched and reeling, but made it, walked into geometry class while the fucking bell was ringing because of course I was going to get back in time, flying high.

  All that week I left the Juul at home. Goddamn determined not to bring it with me to school. Goddamn determined to exercise willpower. And all that week, middle of the day feeling so fucked had to bicycle back home two point six fucking miles and having a hard time pulling uphill.

  By Friday I was too fucked, tired. Just borrowed Carlie’s Juul.

  Hey okay. I owe you—okay?

  That’s cool, Jacey. No problem.

  The guys are, like, bemused with me. Everybody knows e-cigs are not addictive, so what’s the big deal?

  Not like we’re junkies. Pathetic loser addicts.

  First, kids at school that vaped were creeps. Losers. Then later, kids I knew, and some of the guys I hang with. Then, guys on the team.

  How I was turned on, last summer. At the pool with the other lifeguards. Observed them taking hits, e-cigarettes, weird concoctions—nicotine and fruit flavors—Christ! Sucking strawberry mist, not smoke, then exhaling—evaporating.

  That’s so cool, like magic, the way the smoke evaporates before your eyes.

  And Ben Marder says hey Jacey, want to try?—and I kind of sneered Nah. Why’d I want to do that shit.

  You’d tried cigarettes, your dad’s butts he’d left in ashtrays. Never got any nicotine rush but choked and coughed and felt like puking. Nasty-tasting tobacco shit.

  But then later, Carlie offered me, saying how cool it was, so I said okay, by that time I’d been smelling the chemical cloud a lot and was kind of envious, I guess. Figuring just one time.

  Carlie shows me how the e-cig works. You don’t “light” it—it’s battery-operated. Like, cutting-edge technology. Not crude shit like tobacco.

  Very simple, actually. One two three.

  Jesus! What a brain-fuck …

  Guys laughing at me. Must’ve been a weird look in my face. Je-sus!

  How I discovered there’s nothing like vaping. Nothing so cool, by far.

  Better than sex. (Everybody says. Not like I’d know.) Way easier than sex. And way cooler than sex—you don’t need another damn person.

  Whenever you can eliminate the other person, anyone you depend upon, anyone you need, that’s a bonus.

  Why vaping is so cool: makes you strong like Spider-Man.

  Why vaping is so cool: undetectable.

  Not like sloppy-ass cigarettes. Adults can smell the smoke on you across the room—breath, hair, clothes. Can’t keep cigarettes secret like you can vaping.

  And Juuling is best. Way cool.

  How much?—you don’t even think to ask.

  Because whatever it is, it’s worth it.

  Because whatever it is, if you can afford it or not, there’s ways of acquiring the means to afford it, like (for instance) your mom’s credit card she isn’t going to be using (much) anyway, sick as she is in the hospital now. Seventh floor.

  Notified me on my cell phone, your mother is being admitted to the hospital. Brought by gurney to the seventh floor, room 7731.

  So at reception I’m like, hey why’s there an extra seven?—and the receptionist looks at me like I am the weirdest white boy she’s ever seen.

  Tried to explain, see there’s an extra seven in the room number, shouldn’t it be just seven hundred, not seven thousand? So finally she got the joke, sort of, and laughed, like women laugh when they see you’re trying to be funny in some dumb-ass way. Because (maybe) (they can sense) you are a little nervous, anxious, and a woman or a girl will feel sorry and play along with you.

  Especially nurses, nurses’ aides. Jesus!—they have got to see everything there is to see.

  Who is the patient to you, are you a relative?—(eyeing me, like there could be anyone else my age and looking like me who’d be visiting my mom except a relative).

  Yes. She is my mother.

  (Weird that you would never naturally say Yes. I am her son.)

  (Because you only have one mom. While a mom could have more than one son. Is that it?)

  Handing me the ID badge, saying Have a good day. Like, if I didn’t know better, I’d think the receptionist was laughing at me.

  How I discovered that with an ID visitor badge you can wander through the hospital. As long as they see you have an ID, nobody looks at it closely or questions you. A hospital is a crazy busy place, especially in the morning.

  Depressing as hell in Mom’s room. Though it’s a single room with a view from the window of the city skyline. Also the sky—clouds to watch. Poor Mom with IVs in both her arms, scheduled for a kidney biopsy in the morning.

  Didn’t leave the Juul home today, figuring the stress would be such, in this place, I’d need to score a hit. Or two. There’s a lavatory in the room I can use, slide the door shut. No smoking in the hospital but—no vaping? Would they kick me out if they knew?

  Lucky, no smell that lasts beyond a few seconds. No ashes!

  Nurse enters my mom’s room, pushing a little cart to check her vital signs—(oxygen intake, blood pressure, pulse)—but I’m in the bathroom grinning at my face in the mirror and the smoke has evaporated and when I come out, I am ultra-normal, I am sure.

  So high, I don’t even hear what the nurse is saying. Is the oxygen intake improved or worse. Is the pulse fast. Blood pressure low? High? Mom’s hurt, scared eyes looking at me, but I don’t even see.

  On some doorfram
es, white sheets of paper with autumn leaves printed on them. Meaning?

  Hanging out in the visitors’ lounge, far end of the corridor by the elevators. Three, four people in the lounge and one of them crying, two of them crying, someone with a deep, gravelly voice trying to console a child, none of it makes the slightest impression on me, like, could be TV. Admiring the fantastic view of the city, late-afternoon sun like a broken egg yolk. My head is feeling dry like bone, but the taste in my mouth is good.

  Staring out the window toward the turnpike. S-L-O-W rush hour traffic moving out of the city like zombies. Land of the dead. Jesus!—it’s good not to be one of those zombies but Spider-Man, flying high above.

  Flying high. Above.

  Vaping Dreams.

  Long-term plan is: buy an assault rifle, online. Mom’s Visa Explorer.

  Scope out where Dad is living. Google Maps: 54 Roslyn Circle, Bay Ridge, NJ. Follow Dad to, like, the Bay Ridge mall. Asshole has got to drive to the mall sometime.

  Well—if he saw me in the Lexus. That’d end it.

  (If he saw, like, the license plate he’d recognize. I’d be wearing a hoodie, dark glasses.)

  If the kid is with him, the new wife’s kid with the asshole name Tyler, eight years old, or so Mom says, too fucking bad—collateral damage.

  Telling Mom, who told me, your father feels he has failed you, honey. He feels he cannot reach you. But with the new son, he’s gonna start over again.

  Mistakes he’d made when you were young because he was young, a young father, didn’t have the perspective he has now.

  Fuck him! The look in Mom’s face. I stomped out of the room.

  (Yeh Mom liked to hear it. Sure she did.)

  (Any bad-mouthing of my dad in Mom’s presence, if it’s her relatives, some friends, or me—Mom won’t seem to agree, but for sure, Mom is cool with it.)

  Plan is: no fucking camouflage gear. Hoodie, backpack. No black trench coat, etc., like those Columbine assholes. Baseball cap pulled down low over your eyes. Red joke cap—MAKE AMERICA FAKE AGAIN.

  Plan is: get high. Super high. Deep inhale, slow exhale. Brain buzz. Feel the strength surge through you like every pore in your body is on fire.