Geese Are Never Swans

by Kobe Bryant

  Did she put this photo of me up before or after Danny died? I suspect after, and a wave of pride stamps my heart with a fierceness I don’t even try to suppress. Because this photo says there’s still a way for me to be better than him in her eyes. For me to replace him, bit by bit, memory by memory.

  A sick grin crosses my lips only to vanish as my stomach weakens. I know what’s going to happen and I let Winter slip from my arms to the bed before lurching to the master bath in search of a place to vomit, which I find. But I also find my mother. She’s sprawled flat on the tile floor, her face pale, her eyes rolled back, and blood’s pooled around her head.

  With a whimper, I go to her, to do what I can, but I don’t know how or even what’s wrong. Her breathing’s labored, raspy, and her skin’s hot, and now I remember the flu medicine I never brought back. It’s still in the car where I tossed it after deciding to follow Lainey. This is my fault. All my fault. My eyes sting and finally, I fumble for my phone, dial 911, and whimper something tragic until they tell me help is on the way, that they’ll be there, that, sir, they need me to calm down.

  Then I wait with Winter and I hold her close, as close as I can, because I need that, the closeness. More than she does, even.

  78.

  The sirens wail.

  I rush downstairs to greet them. I repeat what I know, which isn’t much, and they take it from there. I mostly feel numb because I’ve done this before and I’ll probably have to do it again some other time. We’re a family of tragedy. Doomed, you could say. But at least help is here and the first responders who show up are actually doing something. Assisting my mom and talking to her. Not like last time when it was already too late.

  “She’s dehydrated,” one of the EMTs, a woman with dark hair and glasses, comes and tells me after a few minutes of checking vitals and running tests. “Probably passed out and that’s how she cut her head. Her lungs sound pretty rheumy, too. Might be pneumonia.”

  “She’s had the flu. She was at the clinic yesterday.”

  “It’s going around. Bad this year.”

  “Is she going to be okay?”

  “She’s stable but needs fluids. Stitches. Maybe a breathing treatment and monitoring for any secondary infection. We’ll take her in to John Muir, and the doctors there can give you more information once they’ve had a chance to evaluate her condition.”

  I feel panicky. “But what am I supposed to do? Don’t I need to do something? Do I come with you?”

  She glances at Winter. “What’s your name?”

  “Gus.”

  “How old are you, Gus?”

  “Seventeen.”

  “Do you have any family you can call?”

  “No.”

  “Neighbors you’re close with?”

  “Not really.”

  “And whose baby is this? Is she yours?” She smiles at Winter, who curls her head against my chest and hides her face.

  “She’s my sister’s kid. But she’s . . . she’s not around.”

  “What about the father?”

  I shake my head.

  “Then I’ll call Child and Family Services for you, okay? They’ll come out. They’ll know what to do.”

  My legs feel weak. “They won’t take her, will they? They won’t take her away?”

  “They’ll make sure you’re both safe.” Her voice is soothing, firm. “You doing okay, hon? You don’t look too good.”

  “No. I don’t know.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  I shake my head again. The numbness inside me is giving way to something else. “It’s my fault. I . . . I was supposed to get her medicine last night and I didn’t. I went out and I didn’t come home and now this happened!”

  The EMT’s expression shifts from sad to startled to helpless. All in an instant.

  “It’s not your fault,” she says.

  “It is!”

  She sighs. “I remember you, you know. From last spring. I was on that call. That was hard, what happened to your brother.”

  I nod.

  “I’m real sorry you had to go through that alone.”

  My whole body’s shaking now. I grip Winter tight like she’s the one holding me together. “I deserved it, though, didn’t I? Having to find him like that? This kind of proves it.”

  The woman turns and walks away from me. No doubt she’s sick of my shit the way I’m sick of it, too. I watch her talk to her partner and they get my mom loaded into the ambulance and switch the lights on, but not the siren.

  Then she comes back to where Winter and I are huddled by the staircase. She stands closer than I’m comfortable with.

  “Your mom’s going to John Muir now,” she says.

  “Okay.”

  “But I’m going to stay with you two until CFS arrives.”

  “You will?”

  “Sure. Do you think that baby will let me hold her?”

  “Her name’s Winter.”

  “Pretty name.” Winter peeks out at the woman, her smiling face, her open arms. It takes her a moment, but she goes to her. And it’s weird how it’s a load off my arms but it also makes me feel like crap. Like nobody wants me.

  Like nobody ever will.

  “Thank you,” I say, because no matter how deep my self-pity, this woman’s doing me about a million favors. “For everything.”

  She smiles. “I figure it’s the day for that.”

  “What?”

  “It’s Thanksgiving,” she says. “Today. You know that, right?”

  79.

  The ambulance leaves, and I watch it go and I feel awful. It’s not that I want to be with my mother. I don’t, in fact. Not one bit.

  But I also don’t want her to be alone.

  Not now.

  Not like this.

  Part

  Three

  80.

  Fuck.

  81.

  You want to know what I really and truly hate about my life?

  Everything.

  82.

  “Sit down,” the EMT says when I won’t stop pacing the living room, the hallway. I obey by flopping my ass down on the couch beside her and Winter, who’s watching something on the Disney Channel. It’s obnoxious but I envy her this distraction because my mind won’t stop spinning, a sickly turn of memories that wash over me, again and again, ensuring that I remember every mortifying detail of the night before. The party. The girl. The coach.

  My mother.

  A moan escapes me and with that, I’m up again, wringing my hands, marching back and forth. If being still with myself isn’t the answer, something else sure as hell must be. That’s what I’ve always believed; that no matter how close to the bottom you’re scraping, there’s always hope, if you rely on your own wits. There’s always a way out.

  Winter laughs at some talking animal on the screen and a clammy sweat breaks out on the back of my neck. What if CFS tries to take her from me? What if I lose her? Maybe I should just take her and go right now. We could get in the car and start driving to Mexico, like in some bad indie movie. We might make it, although hell, the cops would probably be after me in an instant—not just for kidnapping, but when they find out what I did in Alamo last night.

  I grab my phone and call the hospital to get an update on my mother. No one at the front desk will tell me anything, and I freely tell them how much I think they fucking suck. It’s not until after two p.m. that a doctor finally calls back and says my mother’s being treated for pneumonia and a mild concussion.

  “But she’ll be okay?” I ask.

  “She’s stable at the moment. We should know more tomorrow.”

  “Will she be there long?”

  “At least a few days.” She gives me the extension to the room where my mother is staying, although I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do with
this information. It’s not like I plan on calling her and I’m fairly certain the sentiment goes both ways, although I realize my mother must’ve authorized the phone call from the doctor. But is this kindness on her part?

  Or a power play for my well-owed guilt?

  My stomach cramps and as soon as I hang up I have to run to the bathroom to puke again. I barely make it but there’s nothing left in me. The endless retching just leads to pain and more pain. Soon I’m kneeling on the floor, with sweat running down my face, and my bastard mind starts listing off the lethal options lurking in the medicine cabinet above me. No, this isn’t the first time I’ve had thoughts like these, but I’ve never acted on them. Well, not really. And it’s one of the ways I know I’m a stronger person than Danny.

  Then again, maybe I’m not.

  The front doorbell rings. I strain to listen as the EMT answers. She murmurs something I can’t make out as my stomach heaves again. It could be the cops for all I know, but I’m bent over the toilet and I can’t move and for once in my life, I’m resigned to my fate. Someone knocks on the bathroom door and I don’t say anything. Whoever it is will break it down, I figure. They’ll get to me. Only they knock again and then the door just opens. I turn to look, bracing myself, only it’s not the cops or CFS.

  It’s Coach Marks.

  83.

  “What’re you doing here?” I’m vaguely horrified to see that a woman I recognize as Coach Marks’s wife is with him. She looks . . . unnerved.

  “What do you think we’re doing?” he says gruffly as he kneels beside me, holding me steady. “You’re coming to stay with us.”

  That’s not a question and I can’t run away from him like I did last night, so I just nod. It takes time, however, before I can stand again without feeling queasy and in the interim, Coach Marks does nice things like bring me water and put a cool washcloth on my forehead. He also tells me about his first hangover and how his father made him get up at six a.m. and mow the lawn as punishment. I wish I could say his kindness made me feel better or cared for, but the opposite is true. When I am able to move around again, I agree to pack clothes for myself but have to confess to being unable to go upstairs and get stuff together for Winter.

  Coach M’s wife appears startled by this admission but tells me not to worry about it. My eyes water when she says this because she has to know what I did to her house last night. She has to know how awful a person I am.

  Coach Marks is in the living room talking with the EMT when I return from packing. The conversation between them looks intense, but I can’t make out their words. I mumble that I’m ready to go or whatever. The EMT nods and tells me she’s leaving now, and I let her hug me, even though I hate hugs, and I thank her because I really and truly am grateful for what she’s done.

  “What were you two talking about?” I ask Coach Marks after she’s gone. “What did she say?”

  His tone is cool. Chilly, even. “She says you need help.”

  84.

  Then we’re in the Markses’ car, heading back to Alamo. The sun is shining on this Thanksgiving Day. Blue sky everywhere. California warmth and radiance.

  I want to close my eyes but don’t. My father died on this road seventeen years ago. He died scared and alone and not knowing his unborn son’s fate. The worst sort of tragedy, but I’ve always loved him for caring enough to drop everything and come to where I was, to make sure I was okay, even when there was nothing he could’ve done to save me even if I’d needed saving. But today, for the first time ever, I’m glad he’s gone. I’m glad he’s not here to know me.

  To see who I’ve become.

  85.

  Well, in addition to being an asshole who didn’t bring medication home for his ailing mother, I’m also a coward, because when we get to the Markses’ house and I see the broken window and the decorations for a Thanksgiving dinner that’s gone cold and the small crowd of family waiting politely for our arrival while pretending they’re doing normal things like watching football and playing Balderdash, I want to hide.

  “I need to lie down,” I say pitifully. Coach M nods and gestures for me to follow and leads me to a guest bedroom on the second floor that is wide and spacious and overlooks their lush backyard and glittering blue pool.

  “This okay?” he asks, and how could a question like that not make me feel terrible after what I did? But he probably likes watching me squirm. I know I would if I were him.

  I whisper that it’s fine, but all the other things I long to say, like I’m so, so sorry and Thank you and How can I make this right, are wedged tight within me. They won’t come out. I’m broken that way, I guess, although I don’t know if that’s a reason or an excuse.

  Coach M also shows me where the bathroom is and what towels to use and where Winter will be staying—they’ve got a spare crib, courtesy of grandchildren who’ve since outgrown it, and it’s as if my baby niece belongs here. As if she’s always deserved better than me and my mother and the whole universe knows it. We return to the sunny bedroom and Coach M is still talking. He’s telling me when they’ll be eating and how I’m welcome to join them but that if I want to rest, they won’t wake me up unless they hear something from my mother. This is code, I think: Stay the fuck in your room and let us be. Well, I can do that. So I nod obediently and then Coach Marks just stands there looking at me, with this mopey sort of expression, and hell if I know what he sees.

  “I’m sorry about your mother,” he says.

  I grunt in response.

  “You were the one who found her?”

  I look away, my gaze returning to the window, to the warmth outside and the sparkling pool below. Anywhere but here. My knees feel weak and my head throbs, a strange rhythmic pounding as I focus on watching the sunlight dance along the water’s surface. What Coach M is asking isn’t something I want to talk about. It’s not something I want to remember, either.

  Coach Marks says something else. Something about tomorrow and where he’ll be taking me and how he thinks it’ll be for the best.

  “Wait, what?” I ask. “What did you say?”

  “Just sleep, Gus,” he says. “Okay? And don’t . . . don’t worry about last night right now. I’m glad you’re safe. That’s what’s important. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  86.

  The door closes behind him and I do what he says. Or at least I try. I lie down. Close my eyes. But sleep is elusive. For as much as I rail on the failures of others, I’ve never been immune to my own, and they come to gnaw at me, chewing at my conscience, my sense of sanity. Last night replays in my head—every moment—not just neglecting my mom, but stalking Lainey and being a creep at the party; trying to talk to Vince in the hallway and having him ignore me while that girl was hitting on him; running from Lainey the moment she found me when being with her was the first time in six months that I felt good. Not to mention everything I did by coming here. I destroyed my future. I know that. Coach M will never work with me again and I don’t blame him. He barely wanted to work with me in the first place.

  My actions were all self-sabotage. I realize this, although realizations are useless when they happen after you’ve fucked up. The only thing they’re good for then is misery. Self-pity, too, which is just another mechanism of defeat. Only I’m not like Danny. I don’t give up when I’m down.

  I can’t.

  Sleep comes hours later, as the day dies, lured in by the warmth of laughter and conversation slipping through the floorboards beneath me. Regardless, my dreams are all nightmares. Tinged with guilt and laced with longing. There’s horror there, too, in images I can’t bear to see but did and always will.

  This is what it means to be haunted. To remember, over and over, exactly what it is you wish to forget. To know that your worst moments will stay with you.

  Define you.

  No matter what.

  87.

  My eyes fly o
pen to darkness. I gasp, limbs thrashing, and sweat soaks the sheets wrapped around me. I’m in a bed but it’s not my bed and there’s this sound I hear but can’t locate. It crashes through my soul, again and again, a thundering drumbeat of dread.

  Throwing off the covers, I sit up. Swing my legs to the floor. Moonlight fills the room with a cool blue glow and I have to be dreaming. This isn’t my life I’ve woken to. It can’t be. None of this is what I wanted. None of this is who I am.

  On trembling legs, I crouch on the window seat and stare out at a strange world. A place I don’t belong. All starlight and shadow. The clock on the nightstand tells me it’s three a.m., and my heart whispers the truth.

  I found her.

  Followed by

  It’s all my fault.

  I abandon the bedroom and make my way downstairs through a house that’s dark. Silent. I know I’m in Coach M’s place—the house I walked into only hours earlier. But nothing looks familiar. There are walls where there should be doors and rooms I don’t recognize.

  My stomach’s hollow and I roam this foreign land, discovering first a living room, a dining room, then finally a massive kitchen with stone countertops and a greenhouse window filled with plants. Opening the refrigerator’s French doors, I find that it’s packed with Thanksgiving leftovers. Plates and Tupperware containers filled with turkey. Stuffing. Potatoes. Gravy. Pie of all kinds. I grab what I can, dumping it on the counter and stuffing my face. My fingers grow greasy, my stomach swells, but I keep eating until I gag on fresh cranberries, which are tarter than I’m prepared for.

  I put back what’s left but need something to wash it down. Back to the fridge, where open bottles of wine call to me. I pick something white and sweet that goes down easy. Then I finish off a bottle of merlot and that’s plenty, I tell myself. I don’t need to get sloppy or stupid. Not again. I take my time cleaning up, carefully stacking the empties in the recycling bin beneath the farmhouse sink and trying not to make a shit ton of noise while I’m at it.