"I'll explain everything in a little while," my father says to her. "Try to get some sleep, okay?" I hear the basement door close. I don't get a hug from my mother.
"Dad," I whisper, looking up at him pleadingly. "I threw a letter in the basement. Can you please go get it before she reads it?"
He nods and heads to the basement without question.
"Merit!" Honor yells. I look up just in time to see her marching down the hallway, letter in hand. She crosses Quarter One and looks like she's ready to attack me, but Sagan steps in front of her and grabs her arms. She struggles to get out of his grip, but when she realizes he won't let her past, she just chucks the pages at me. "You're a liar!" She's crying and I suddenly realize we're not at all attractive when we cry. I hate that I've been doing it for the past two hours.
I feel like I'm watching a movie. I don't feel like I'm in it, living it, taking the brunt of her anger right now. I don't even respond to her anger because I feel so disconnected from it.
"Not now, Honor," Sagan says, walking her away from me.
"It's not true!" Honor yells. "Tell them it's not true! Utah would never do something like that!"
I watch everything unfold as I remain curled up on the couch, wrapped in a blanket. Victoria is back, but Moby isn't with her anymore. Honor runs up to her and my father. "You can't make him leave, she's lying!"
Victoria looks at my father. "You can't let this slide, Barnaby."
"Mind your own business!" --Honor.
"Honor," --My father.
"Oh, shut up!" --Honor.
"Go to your room!" --My father. "Everyone! To your rooms!" --Still my father.
"What about me? Can I go back to my room?" --Utah.
"No. You leave. Everyone else to their rooms." --My father.
"If he's going, I'm going." --Honor.
"No. You're staying." --My father.
"I'll go with Utah." --Luck.
"You aren't going with him, either." --Victoria.
"You're seriously going to tell me what I can do? I'm twenty!" --Luck.
"Everyone just stay. It's fine. I'm fine. I'll go." --Utah.
"Why are you leaving? You didn't do anything!" --Honor.
And here it is. The moment of truth. The climax.
Utah's shoulders rise with his heavy intake of breath. Then they fall, like all great empires eventually do. He looks across the room at me. He stares at me, but doesn't use the opportunity to admit his guilt. Or even apologize. Instead, Utah walks to the door after it's clear my dad isn't going to relent. The slam the front door makes when it closes makes me jump.
Sagan slowly takes a seat on the couch next to me. He's popping his knuckles like he's angry, but I have no idea which person in this family he's angry at. More than likely me. Everyone is quiet until my father says, "It's late. We'll discuss everything tomorrow. Everyone go to bed." He looks at Luck and points at him. "You stay in your room. If I see you anywhere near my daughters, you're gone." He must have read the rest of the letter.
Luck nods and retreats to his room. Honor is staring at my father, her hands in fists at her sides. "This is your fault," she says to him. "You and your pathetic choices and your pathetic parenting. You're the reason this family is so screwed up!" Honor walks to her room and slams the door.
It's just me and Sagan now. And my father. A moment passes as my father gathers himself. He finally walks toward me, squatting down in front of me so that we're eye to eye. "You okay?"
I nod, even though this feels far from okay.
He looks at Sagan. "Do you mind keeping an eye on her tonight?"
"Not at all."
"I don't need a babysitter."
"I'm not so sure of that," my father says. "I need to go deal with Victoria."
He stands up, but before he's able to walk away, I say, "Why is Mom taking placebo pills?"
He stares down at me, the imprints of all his secrets gathering in the corners of his eyes. "I'm just thankful that's all they were, Merit."
He turns and makes his way into the kitchen, toward his bedroom. But when he passes by the kitchen table, he pauses. He grips the back of one of the chairs and drops his head between his shoulders. He stays like this for about ten seconds, but then he lifts the chair off the floor and throws it against the wall, smashing it to pieces. When he makes it to his bedroom, he slams the door.
Sagan releases a breath at the same time I do. He runs his hands down his face and we're both quiet. Speechless. An entire minute goes by and we're just staring at the floor until he says, "Take a shower. You'll feel better."
I nod. When I stand up, Sagan stands up with me. I think he can tell I'm still dizzy, because he grabs my arm and helps me to the bathroom. Once we're inside, he pulls back the shower curtain and picks up the razor. He slides it into his back pocket.
"Really, Sagan? You think I'll nick my wrist to pieces with a disposable BIC?"
He doesn't say anything. But he also doesn't give me back the razor. "I'll clean up in the hallway while you're in the shower. You want to stay in my room tonight or yours?"
I think about that for a moment. I'm not so sure I want him in my room, on my bed, where I tried to end my life. "Yours," I whisper.
He closes the door and leaves me alone to shower. But then he opens the door and walks back inside. He swings open the medicine cabinet and takes the two bottles of medicine off the shelves.
"Seriously? What could I even do with any of that? Swallow eighty gummy vitamins?"
He leaves without responding.
I spend at least thirty minutes in the shower. I don't do anything other than stare at the wall while the hot water beats down on my neck. I think I'm in shock. I still feel disconnected to everything that happened tonight. I feel like it happened to someone else.
Sagan has checked on me twice in the last thirty minutes. I don't know how long it's going to take me to convince him that tonight was a fluke. I'm not suicidal--I was drunk. I did a really stupid thing and now he thinks I'm in this shower trying to plot ways to off myself.
I don't want to die. If I wanted to die, I wouldn't have gone to Utah for help. What teenager doesn't think about what it would be like to die every now and then? The only problem when I thought of it was that my thought was coupled with my spontaneity. And alcohol. Most people think things like this through. Not me. I just do them.
I'm going to need a really big trophy after tonight. Maybe I can find an unwanted Academy Award statuette on eBay.
"Merit?" Sagan's voice is muffled from the other side of the bathroom door.
I roll my eyes and turn off the water. "I'm alive," I mutter. I grab a towel and dry off. Once I'm dressed in my pajamas, I enter his bedroom. The door is open, so I shut it. I want to block myself off from the outside world.
Sagan is making a pallet on the floor.
"You can take the bed," he says.
I look at the bed and notice he brought my pillows in here. I sigh with relief. I don't think I've ever wanted to go to sleep more than I do right now. I glance at his clock and it's after three in the morning. "Do you have to be up early?" I ask him. I feel bad. It's so late and everyone still has to wake up and go to work and school in a few hours. And I don't even know where Sagan goes every day, whether it's work or school. I know very little about the guy who has been put in charge of my life tonight. Thanks for that, Dad.
He shakes his head. "I'm off tomorrow."
I wonder if that's true or if he's just too scared to leave me alone. As bad as I feel for making him worry like he is, it feels kind of nice to be worried about.
I lie down on the bed and pull the covers up over me. His pallet is on the floor on the other side of the bed. I want to be as far away from him as possible tonight. I know myself all too well and as soon as those lights go out, I'm going to be trying to muffle my tears. The more distance between us, the better.
"You need anything before I turn off the light?" He's standing by the door with his hand on the switch. I shak
e my head, and right before the lights go out, my eyes catch a glimpse of the letter I wrote. It's sitting on his dresser, flipped to the back page.
He read the whole thing. I close my eyes as he walks back to his pallet on the floor. I wonder if anyone else read it. I pull the covers up tighter over my mouth. Of course they read it. I pull my knees up and curl into the fetal position. Why did I write it? I can't even remember everything I wrote.
It slowly comes back to me, paragraph by paragraph. By the time my mind recollects every single page, the tears are falling. I wad the blanket up and bite it, trying to stifle my sobs.
I still don't even know what I'm feeling, or if I even regret writing it. But this feels like regret. Maybe I regret swallowing the pills, but not writing the letter.
Maybe I regret everything.
The only feeling I'm certain about is that I am completely and utterly mortified. Which should be a feeling I'm growing accustomed to, but it isn't. I don't think it's something anyone could get used to.
I can't believe I did what I did tonight. Or even yesterday. I wish I could go back and not drop out of school and none of this would have happened. Hell, I wish I could go back several years and never have that moment with Utah. Or maybe I should have gone back ten years ago to the day Wolfgang showed up in our backyard. If I'd have just killed that damn dog, then we never would have moved into this church. Dad would have never met Victoria. Mom would have never gone crazy and felt the need to hide in the basement.
I bury my face in the pillow and try as hard as I can to prevent Sagan from hearing how sad I am.
But it doesn't work. I feel him lift the covers and slide into the bed beside me. He wraps his arm around me and pulls my back against his chest. He finds my hands still knotted in the covers and he squeezes them. And then he curls himself around me until his legs are wrapped over mine and his chin is pressed to the top of my head. His whole body is hugging mine and I can't even remember the last time someone in this house hugged me. Moby's hugs don't count because he's only four. My father hasn't hugged me in years. I can't remember the last time Utah hugged me. Honor and I haven't hugged since we were kids. My mother doesn't like physical contact, so a hug from her has been out of the question since her phobia reached its peak several years ago. Acknowledging that this is the first hug I've had in years makes me cry even harder.
I feel his lips press against the top of my head. "You want me to tell you a story?" he whispers.
I somehow laugh between my pitiful tears. "Your stories are too morbid for a moment like this."
He moves his head a little until his cheek is pressed against mine. It feels nice. I close my eyes and he says, "Okay, then. I'll sing you to sleep."
I laugh again, but I stop laughing when he actually starts to sing. Or . . . rap, rather.
"Y'all know me, still the same OG . . ."
"Sagan," I say, laughing.
"But I been low key . . ."
"Stop."
He doesn't stop. He spends the next few minutes rapping every single line to "Forgot About Dre." By the time I fall asleep, the tears have dried on my cheeks.
Chapter Eleven
Imagine the chaos a normal family must experience in the morning after one of its members attempts suicide. The phone calls to therapists, the tears, the apologies, the constant hovering and smothering and chaotic mess of everyone thinking, "How did this happen?" and "How did we not see the signs?"
I stare at Sagan's bedroom ceiling, painfully aware that everyone in the house other than Sagan left a few minutes ago. Or else, I'm assuming because I heard the door slam several times and no one bothered to check on me. I wonder what that must be like--to live in a normal family. A family where people actually give a shit. Not a family like ours, where everyone goes on with their day like I didn't just try to kill myself a few hours ago. A family like ours, where my father still wakes up and goes straight to work. A family where my mother still refuses to leave the basement. My twin sister leaves for school. My step-uncle leaves for his new job. And no one who shares any sort of blood relation to me sticks around to make sure I'm okay.
I get it. They're all pissed at me. I said some really hateful things in that letter and by this point, everyone has read it more than once, I'm sure. But the fact that Sagan is the only one here right now proves that nothing I said in that letter got through to them. Everyone is still blaming me.
I sit up in the bed as soon as Sagan's bedroom doorknob begins to turn with a knock. I'm disappointed--yet somehow relieved--to see my father peek his head in. "You awake?"
I nod and pull my knees up, hugging them. He closes the door behind him and walks over to the bed, taking an unsure seat on it.
"I, um . . ." He squeezes his jaw like he always does when he doesn't know what to say.
"Let me guess," I say. "You want to know if I'm okay? If I'm still suicidal?"
"Are you?"
"No, Dad," I say, frustrated. "I'm a girl who found out her parents were having an affair, so I took my anger out on a few illegal substances. It doesn't make me suicidal, it makes me a teenager."
My father sighs heavily, turning to face me full-on. "Either way, I think it's a good idea for you to see Dr. Criss. I made you an appointment for next Monday."
Oh my God.
"Are you kidding me? Out of all the people in this family, you're forcing me to go see a psychiatrist?" I fall back against the headboard in defeat. "What about your ex-wife who hasn't seen the sun in two years? Or your daughter who's one heartbeat away from being a necrophiliac! Or your son who thinks it's okay to molest his sister!"
"Merit, stop!" he says, frustrated. He stands up and paces the floor before coming to a pause. "I'm doing the best I can, okay? I'm not the perfect father. I know that. If I were, you would have never gotten to a point where you would rather be dead than live with me." He turns for the door, but then he pauses and faces me again. He hesitates a moment and then lifts his eyes to mine. His expression is full of disappointment, and his voice is much quieter when he says, "I'm doing the best I can, Merit."
He shuts the door and I fall back onto the bed. "Yeah, well. Try harder, Dad."
I wait for the sound of the front door closing before going across the hall to my bedroom. I change, brush my teeth in the bathroom, and then make my grand entrance to Quarter One. No one is there to greet me or tell me how happy they are that they were only placebo pills.
I walk to the kitchen and take a seat at the table. I stare at the marquee outside. It's the first morning it hasn't been updated since we moved in all those years ago. The same message Utah put up yesterday is still there.
IF THE ENTIRE HISTORY OF THE EARTH WERE COMPRESSED INTO A SINGLE CALENDAR YEAR, HUMANS WOULDN'T EVEN APPEAR UNTIL DECEMBER 31ST AT 11:00 P.M.
I have to read it a few times for it to actually sink in. Are humans really that insignificant? We've only existed for one hour out of an entire year?
Sagan walks into the kitchen from the backyard. He's holding a water pitcher. "Morning," he says, his voice cautious. I stare at him a moment and then look back out at the marquee.
"Do you think that's true?"
"Do I think what's true?" he asks. He walks over to the table and takes a seat with his sketch pad.
I nudge my head to the window. "What Utah put on the marquee yesterday."
Sagan looks out the window and stares at the marquee in thought. "I'm probably not the right person to ask. I believed in Santa until I was thirteen."
I laugh, but it's a pathetic, forced laugh. And then I'm frowning because laughter is only a fleeting cure for melancholy, which seems to be my constant state of mind here lately.
Sagan puts down his pencil and leans back in his chair. He stares at me thoughtfully. "What do you think happens when we die?"
I glance back at the marquee. "I have no idea. But if that marquee is true and humans really are that insignificant to the earth's history, it makes me question why a God would go through all the trouble to r
evolve an entire universe around us."
Sagan picks up his pencil and puts the end of it in his mouth. He chews on it for a moment before saying, "Humans are romantic creatures. It's reassuring to believe this all-knowing being who has the power to create anything and everything still loves the human race more than any of it."
"You call that romantic? I call it narcissistic and ethnocentric."
He smiles. "Depends on the perspective you look at it from, I guess."
He resumes sketching like he's done with the conversation. But I'm stuck on that word. Perspective. It makes me wonder if I look at things from only one point of view. I tend to think a lot of people are wrong a lot of the time.
"Do you think I only see things from one perspective?"
He doesn't look up at me when he says, "I think you know less about people than you think you do."
I can feel myself instantly wanting to disagree with him. But I don't, because my head hurts and I might be a little hungover from last night. I also don't want to argue with him because he's the only one still speaking to me at this point. I don't want to ruin that. Not to mention that he seems wise beyond his years and I'm not about to compete with him intellectually. Even though I have no idea how old he actually is.
"How old are you?"
"Nineteen," he says.
"Have you always lived in Texas?"
"I've spent the past few years with my grandmother, here in Texas. She died a year and a half ago."
"I'm sorry." He doesn't say anything in response. "Where are your parents now?"
Sagan leans back in his chair and looks at me. He taps his pencil against his notebook and then drops it on the table. "Come on," he says, scooting his chair back. "I need out of this house."
He looks at me expectantly, so I stand up and follow him to the front door. I don't know where we're going, but I have a feeling it's not this house he wants to get away from. It's the questions.
An hour later, we're standing in the antiques store, staring at the trophy I couldn't afford to buy a few weeks ago.
"No, Sagan."
"Yes." He pulls the trophy from the shelf and I try to take it out of his hands.
"You aren't paying eighty-five dollars for this just because you feel sorry for me!" I stalk after him like a tantrum-ridden toddler.