The Hard Truth About Sunshine

  Leaning forward, I gripped my bottle tighter so I wouldn't spill any precious alcohol and reached under the couch. My mechanical knee bent but not as far as my real knee did, so I had to sort of lean to the side to get what I was reaching for.

  My Smith & Wesson .44 magnum revolver.

  When I sat back up straight, I took another long pull of beer before laying it on the table. Then I opened the cylinder to confirm what I already knew. It was filled with bullets.

  I had bought the gun about a year after I'd entered the Marine Corps from a buddy of mine who wanted to propose to his girlfriend. He had no money to buy a ring so he sold me his gun. She got a small diamond, and I got a pretty cool revolver.

  I'd always been into guns. You couldn't live in rural West Virginia and not own one, especially for hunting, nor could you join the military and not learn how to deftly handle firearms.

  The gun had sat in a shoebox in my closet for years, ignored and unused. The Marine Corps had given me a TOW missile and that was a way cooler gun.

  It hadn't been looked at until I came to Raleigh, where I had put it under my couch. I didn't do that for safety reasons, but rather because I was contemplating what that gun could actually do for me.

  I slapped the cylinder shut and laid the gun on my lap. It felt warm, heavy, and reassuring. Reaching over to the baggy, I pulled out a ten-milligram oxy and popped it in my mouth. I chewed it quickly, ignoring the bitter taste, and washed it down with swig of beer.

  It didn't take long for the high to hit me, which was why I chewed rather than swallowed, but what I had left in that baggy had to last me until next payday. Depending on how I would feel in fifteen minutes or so, I might or might not chew another.

  My gaze dropped to the gun, and I lifted it in my hands. Leaning back, I rested my head on the back of the couch and held the gun up to inspect it. That moment, before the true oxy buzz hit me, would have been the best moment to put it to my head. I was just starting to feel the effects, and my courage was bolstered. It would have been so easy to put the muzzle up against my temple and pull the trigger.

  No pain.

  No more misery.

  No more deformed body, phantom leg pain, hideous scars, or pitiful stares from strangers. No more loneliness. No more memories of a heartless girlfriend and a family that couldn't help me. No more memories of Jelonek getting vaporized, and certainly no more memories of the insidious pain I endured for months.

  No more anything.

  I wondered what my family would think when they got the news I'd killed myself. Would they be relieved? Would they be guilt-ridden? Or would they just ignore it the way they'd ignored me?

  I'd used legal services through the Marine Corps to make a small will to distribute my estate should anything have happened to me while I was deployed. Because I was smitten with Maria and was pretty sure we'd be married quickly when I came back, I'd left it all to her. I hadn't even bothered to fucking change it, so if I put that gun to my head and pulled the trigger, she'd get all my money.

  I wondered if she'd get my prosthetic leg too.

  I snorted at the thought, and then started laughing. It lasted only a second, dulled into chuckles, and then left nothing but a placid smile on my face. The oxy had kicked in, and I was feeling pleasantly mellow.

  Dropping the gun to the cushion beside me, I closed my eyes and floated.

  I wouldn't be killing myself today.

  Chapter 28

  Present day...

  Wow.

  Not feeling any pain and that's oh so nice. Whatever gas they're pumping into me via this mask on my face is working well. My head lolls to the left, and the anesthesiologist gives me an encouraging smile. I only know this because his eyes crinkle up, and I can see his jaw moving beneath the paper mask he's wearing.

  My head lolls right, and the nurse gives me a wink. She's cute. I think. Nice eyes.

  "Okay, we're ready to begin, Christopher," the doctor says, and I have to lift my head slightly to look down my body at the doctor. My torso, hips, and left leg are covered in a blue sheet. But my right leg is exposed, swollen, and bruised with open wounds running the length. Knobby protrusions indicate broken bone trying to poke through skin. I try to wiggle my toes, but they won't move. Then again, I'm not feeling any pain right now so maybe I can't control my leg.

  The doctor reaches over to a tray and picks up a butter knife. I can see an etched pattern on the handle, and I think my mom used to have a set of flatware like that. He holds it up and the operating room light glints off it, hitting me right in the eye. I wince slightly. But then the doctor moves the knife toward my thigh, and I focus in on it.

  "Um... Doc... are you sure that's sharp enough?" I ask hesitantly.

  "Of course it is," he says indignantly. "Your leg is barely hanging on. It should come off quite easily, and then we can butter our bread."

  No, wait... that sounded ominous. He drops the knife and presses the edge into my skin, right near the opening of a large wound. I feel nothing, even when he starts sawing. I watch in morbid fascination as the doctor puts all his muscle into the effort of trying to saw through my skin with a butter knife, but he isn't making any progress. Sweat pops out on his brow, and he has to repetitively wipe it dry with his sleeve in between cutting attempts.

  "Hold up," I cry out in frustration. "It's not working. You need something sharper."

  "We don't have anything sharper," the doctor says as his movement halts. He looks at me with guilt, but it is the women he turns to who surprises me.

  Jillian is standing in the corner of the room with Maria, and they are both looking at me with concern.

  "I'm sorry," the doctor tells them quietly. "I can't get it off."

  Jillian and Maria's eyes fill with tears as they nod their understanding and grasp hands in solidarity. They look across the room at me with pity.

  "I'm sorry, Christopher," Maria says in a pained voice.

  "But we can't stay with you unless that leg comes off," Jillian adds.

  My head whips toward the doctor. "Take it off," I shriek at him. "Take the fucking thing off."

  "I can't," he says in defeat, holding up the butter knife.

  "Take it off," I shriek again.

  My eyes pop open and I let out a tentative gust of air, terrified that I actually cried out in my sleep. That nightmare was real, vivid, and is still hanging around me.

  But Jillian is sleeping soundly beside me. I had apparently rolled onto my back at some point after we had fallen asleep all wrapped around each other. She's on her side with her face pressed up against my shoulder and a hand curled around my bicep. It feels warm and secure, but my racing heart feels anything but.

  I've never had a nightmare like that before. Maria's never entered one that I can remember, and to have Jillian there with her freaks me out. And I totally don't understand why them wanting to be with me hinged on my leg coming off. I would have thought they'd want me as whole as possible.

  It's so fucking weird and disturbing all at the same time.

  I'm wide awake now, my body actually tingling from the thought of my leg getting cut off with a butter knife and my hands shaking from the terror of it. I know there's no way in hell I'm getting back to sleep without a little bit of help, so I slowly slide away from Jillian and out of the bed. It takes me no time at all to get my leg on and throw on a minimum of clothes.

  Gym shorts.

  Sweatshirt.

  The matching tennis shoe to the one that's on the prosthesis.

  Reaching into my duffle bag, I grab the baggie of joints I'd rolled back in Colorado and a lighter from the side pocket. I head out the door as quietly as I can, gazing at Jillian's form still soundly sleeping on the bed just before I close the door.

  When I turn around, I almost trip right over someone sitting on the bottom step of the room-duplex we're staying in. I can't see who it is, but I immediately recognize the smell of marijuana and know it's Barb. We'd split the total haul of joints between u
s, and she had her own little baggie.

  "What are you doing?" I whisper.

  "Getting high," she says, and I watch as she inhales deeply on a joint. When she pulls it away from her mouth, she reaches her hand up to offer it to me. I take it and sit down on the steps next to her before I take a hit.

  When I hand it back to her, I ask, "Connor okay?"

  "Yeah," she mutters softly. "He was fucking whipped after today. Fell right asleep."

  I would imagine so. He jumped off a mountain and rode a raft down a foaming and frothing Snake River, his cries of joy echoing out as the raft dipped and plunged through the rapids. Jillian came on that adventure with us, and while it wasn't as thrilling as jumping off a mountain, it was better because she was sitting next to me.

  We smoke the rest of her joint in silence, but I light one of mine up next and we continue to share. The air is crisp and as the drug swims through my system, I start to mellow out and forget about my dream.

  "Did you think Connor looked okay today?" I ask, knowing he is the safest subject to talk about. I'd learned today that she has a soft spot for the kid.

  "You noticed it too?" she counters.

  "He looks paler, right?"

  "I noticed," she agrees. "And he was sweating a lot on the ride back here this evening. I asked him if he was feeling okay and he said he was, but I don't know. I noticed he took some Tylenol when he got out of the shower tonight."

  "Today was exhausting," I theorize. "Maybe it was just a little too much for him."

  "Maybe," is all she says, and we once again lapse into silence.

  When we finish the joint, I expect Barb to go back inside, because she's not a social creature. I'm not normally either, but I'm finding myself with a lot of patience for my newfound friends as well as curiosities, particularly about Barb since she's the most reserved of us. But she just sits there, staring out into the dark beside me.

  Since I'm floating on a good buzz, I tell her, "I'm going to ask you something really personal."

  "Go for it," she says, challenge in her tone. "Doesn't mean I'll answer."

  "You've tried to kill yourself since that first time in your parents' kitchen," I surmise. It's not really a question, but more of a statement. I've seen the additional scars on her wrists.

  Her head turns slowly to me, but there's enough glow from a nearly full moon that I see the surprise on her face. I'm equally surprised when she chooses to answer me. "Three more times. Two more attempts on my wrist. The third time I tried to OD."

  "How come you didn't succeed?" I ask curiously. I mean... I know why I didn't succeed when I'd held a gun to my temple. Ultimately, I didn't have the fucking balls to do it. But I'm curious if all suicidal thoughts are the same.

  She shrugs and turns her face away from me. "I guess I'm not really dedicated to the mission."

  "You want to live more than you want to die?"

  "I don't know if that's it," she says carefully. "I actually think more about dying than I do about living."

  "Why?" I press her.

  She turns back to me, crossing her arms and resting them on her thighs as she huddles against the cool air. "Let me ask you something... what did you see when we were paragliding today?"

  "What do you mean?" I ask in confusion.

  "What did you see?" she repeats. "Describe the scenery."

  My mind filters back through those few minutes of soaring among the mountains and the clouds. "Green valley with darker green trees dotting it. Mountains that looked silvery-green with white peaks. The sky had a cloudy haze to it, but there were pockets of clear blue."

  She nods and says, "Green, silver, white, blue."

  "Huh?"

  "You used colors to describe what you saw," she says quietly. "Want to know what I saw?"

  "What?"

  "Gray," she says. "Dark gray, light gray, medium gray. Nothing but gray."

  Fuck, that's depressing, but I guess maybe that's what depression looks like if described in colors. I've personally never seen the world like that. I know I've been depressed, but I've also come to learn that our problems are all apples and oranges. Our issues are varied and the ways our minds process them are unique.

  "Do you ever see color?" I ask her, needing to hear her say something hopeful. Because Jillian taught me the value of hope, and I don't really want Barb reminding me that it's possible to live a life without good possibilities.

  Barb pushes up from the steps and turns to face me. She shoves her hands down into her jeans pockets. "Yes, I see color sometimes. Not often, but it seems to come at odd moments, like when I'm at my lowest. At the times when I feel so utterly hopeless that I know death is the only cure for my problems. It's tempting, Christopher. When it's gray and dark, it's oh-so-fucking tempting to end it."

  "Maybe you need to find ways to get more color in your life," I suggest, which is my way of saying she needs counseling or medication or both to help her heal. I know this trip alone won't do anything for her... urine-soaked gravesites notwithstanding.

  Barb gives a sharp laugh and leans toward me. In a soft voice, she says, "I actually envy you sometimes."

  This takes me aback. How could someone look at me and be jealous?

  "I envy your ability to come on this trip, look past all the darkness, and learn how to laugh. I watch you laugh with Jillian and Connor, and I'm envious of all three of you. What you three have is genuine. It's real."

  "I've seen you laugh," I point out, desperate for her to realize she's got some normality going. Needing her to see that she has friends now. I need her to see it; otherwise, I might not believe it's real.

  But she doesn't answer me, just moves past me up the steps with a curt, "I'm tired. See you in the morning."

  I'm left sitting out there to wonder... did Barb refuse to answer me because she knew I'd be crushed to learn that her laughs are actually joyless acts to make people think she's going to be okay? Or did she refuse to answer me because it would crush her to admit that she can't be helped?

  Chapter 29

  It's been a hard day of driving, especially having just battled Portland rush-hour traffic to make it to the western side of the city on our journey to Cannon Beach. Even with the hour gained because of the time-zone change, it's close to nine PM when we make it to the campground because we had to stop at a grocery store to get some food and drink.

  When we pile out of the Suburban, Connor immediately heads toward the bathroom. He's not having a good day, and we're all worried about him.

  This morning, he came out of the room he shared with Barb looking even paler than before with dark circles under his eyes. Jillian immediately played "mom" and felt his forehead, declaring him to be hot to the touch. This prompted a stop to a drug store on the way out of Ashton to buy a thermometer, but it showed his temperature was very low grade at 99.1.

  Connor insisted he must have a bug, but given his only symptoms were being pale and running a low fever, along with the fact he said he felt a bit tired, I was doubting that. Regardless, he shunned off our concerns, including a surprise suggestion by Barb that we stop at an urgent care to get him checked out. Instead, he directed us to haul ass to Cannon Beach and he slept most of the time, curled up in the corner of the backseat, covered with Barb's leather jacket she'd draped over him. We made stops only to gas up, use the restroom, and grab food to eat in the car. Each time, Barb gently shook him awake, and he was all smiles for us. He'd go to the bathroom, eat a little bit of food, and then go back to sleep. Jillian must have felt his forehead a million times. I know she was worried, but she didn't say a thing. Barb was worried too. She shared a few concerned looks in the rearview mirror with me when I'd periodically look back there to check on Connor.

  Jillian meets me at the back of the Suburban, followed by Barb. With Connor well out of earshot, she tells me, "I'm going to sleep in the big tent with Connor tonight."

  This doesn't surprise me at all, as Jillian is a hoverer.

  What does surprise me is
Barb saying, "If you want... I'll sleep in there with him. That way you and Christopher can have privacy."

  Jillian narrows her eyes at Barb and snaps, "I don't need privacy with Christopher. I want to make sure Connor is okay."

  Barb narrows her eyes right back at Jillian and leans into her. "I want to make sure Connor's okay too. You're not the only one who cares about him."

  I really wish Connor were here to see this. Two women fighting over him. I bet it's a bucket-list item.

  "I have an idea," I say smoothly as I pull the large tent out of the back. "Why don't we all sleep in this behemoth thing? It could fit ten people. That way we can all be assured Connor is okay throughout the night."

  Jillian blinks at me, and Barb's shoulders relax as she says, "Good plan."

  I turn to look at Jillian. "Cool with you?"

  She doesn't say anything for a moment, but then she smiles at me. "Yeah... that's cool. Big ol' slumber party."

  "I'm not painting anyone's toenails," I tell her seriously.

  Barb snorts and pulls her pack out of the back of the SUV. Jillian giggles.

  I smile to myself, hauling the tent to a good spot and dropping it there. As I unzip the bag to remove everything, Jillian squats down beside me. "You think Connor's okay?"

  "I don't know," I tell her honestly. "I have no clue what it means to die from cancer. I don't know if his symptoms are a sign of that or if he's got a freaking cold. But he says he's fine. That's really all we can go on."

  "Maybe I should call his mom," Jillian frets.

  "Maybe you should let me be an adult," Connor says from behind her.

  She stands up and turns to face him. I know she wants to retort with "but you're not an adult," but she wisely holds her tongue. She knows damn good and well that Connor, at the least, should be treated like an adult if for nothing more than the grace with which he's handled his diagnosis.

  "I'm just worried about you," Jillian says apologetically. Barb walks up behind Connor, but she doesn't say a word.