CRAZY GLUE: Irked? She's pissed.
SEXY LADY: Does anyone think this Gomez lady's hot?
LAUGH TRACK: Yes!
SEXY LADY: But I'm hotter, right?
LAUGH TRACK: Yes!
SEXY LADY: Okay, then.
"Jason, you don't have to speak if you don't want to."
Shelby huffs and leans against the wall, crossing her arms.
Dr. Gomez, both hands still in the air, directs one at Shelby, using her hand as a stop sign. "You don't have to speak, but please know you're safe in here. Despite Shelby's outburst, we're all pulling for one another in this group. Now"—she lowers her arms and settles her hands back in her lap—"I'm sure you have many things to say that would be helpful to the rest of the group."
CRAZY GLUE: I'm sure he doesn't.
I nod. "Yeah, okay." I think of my dad and the can of soup I left on the counter for his lunch. I hope he's eating it. "I'm—uh, I'm grateful for soup."
Pete and Haze laugh, but Shelby makes this teeth-sucking noise and lets out another big sigh.
CRAZY GLUE: Soup! Way to go, bozo.
LAUGH TRACK: (Laughter).
"Care to elaborate on that?" Dr. Gomez smiles at me, and this time it's her friendly, squinty-eyed smile.
CRAZY GLUE: No.
"Um, it's nourishing?"
Haze and Pete chuckle again, and Shelby shakes her head and rolls her eyes.
Dr. Gomez tilts her head as though trying to figure out whether I'm really this stupid.
LAUGH TRACK: Yes!
Then Gomez nods slowly as if she's understanding something very deep and, after another couple of seconds, changes direction. "Shelby, it's your turn."
Shelby raises her arms, then lets them flop in her lap. "Well, crap. I was going to say I'm grateful that Jason has joined our group, but now I don't know what to say."
"Well, I'm grateful," Pete says, and then Haze nods.
"Me too. Glad you're here, dude."
"Shelby," Dr. Gomez says, "why don't you tell Jason why you particularly wanted him to join us."
LAUGH TRACK: (Everyone's mouth hangs open in disbelief).
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: Didn't Old Silky send you here?
CRAZY GLUE: Yeah, to deal.
Have they all been talking about me?
CRAZY GLUE: And you thought you were invisible.
Shelby sits up and inches her butt away from the wall a little.
CRAZY GLUE: She's blushing.
SEXY LADY: She thinks you're a hottie.
I press my tongue extra hard against the roof of my mouth.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: Why don't you keep it there and save yourself some time.
CRAZY GLUE: You're sweating something fierce. You've got wet rings under your arms. Really attractive there, buddy.
Haze and Pete are staring at me as if my last forkful of spaghetti is sitting in a pile on top of my head.
"Well," Shelby says, "I thought you could tell us about your mother and, like, what happened to her and all, and how you dealt with her dying and how you got over it. I—I'm just glad to have someone here who's kind of in the same boat. I mean, my mom's dying. She'll be gone by the end of the school year. I just want to know what it's like." She shrugs and blinks her eyes several times. She turns toward Haze. "Haze, your parents are getting a divorce and that's really hard to go through, I know, but your parents are still alive, right? And Pete"—she glances at him—"your dad's doin' drugs again and it's bad, and it's taking a lot out of your family to care for him, and I know it's terrible, okay, but, like, I need to talk to someone who's been through just what I'm about to go through, someone who's lost his mom." She fixes her eyes on me. "I want to know that there's the other side of all this pain. I want to know that someday I'll make it to the other side and it won't hurt so much. I just want Jason to tell me this."
Now everyone's staring at me, waiting for me to say something, and I don't know what to say 'cause I'm so blown away.
CRAZY GLUE: I'll tell you what to say. Nothing! What pain? You're doing great. You didn't even cry when your mother died, and you loved your mother.
AUNT BEE: But aren't we supposed to cry when someone dies?
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: Don't go there.
CRAZY GLUE: Say nothing. You're doing fine. Your dad's doing fine. Everything's fine. There's no pain. What the hell is she even talking about?
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: The dad's not so fine.
CRAZY GLUE: Okay, so he stopped taking his meds after the mom died, but goob's dealing with it. The dad'll turn back around. He always does. Just give him time. It just takes time. They don't have any money; that's the real problem.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: That's because his dad hasn't worked since the stroke—since before that, even.
CRAZY GLUE: Big deal. We've been here before, when his mom was alive, and we managed. It's fine. It's great, Jason; you're doing great.
SEXY LADY: I'm with Crazy Glue. You're handling things just fine.
I really need some windows in here. I need fresh air. I don't feel well at all. I feel like something's splitting inside of me, ripping right down the center of my brain. I've got to do something to stop this feeling. My throat is so dry. I need air!
CRAZY GLUE: Didn't mean to stir things up, buddy. Come on—keep it together. You're fine, remember?
LAUGH TRACK: Isn't it a shame? He's falling apart.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: Just hold on, kiddo.
AUNT BEE: It's all right, Jason. It's going to be all right.
Everyone is waiting for me to say something. I put my fork down and I notice my hand is shaking. I look at Dr. Gomez. She nods.
"Well," I finally say, "I don't know." My voice is hoarse. I take a gulp of milk.
"What don't you know?" Shelby asks, leaning toward me.
"Patience, Shelb," Pete says.
I move my tray to the floor and stare down at the few green beans left in the dish. "I don't know what happened to my mother. I mean, one minute we're hiking up Mount Washington in New Hampshire and the next minute she's fallen on the rocks. But she didn't really fall; she had a stroke." I pick up a bean and squeeze it between my fingers.
CRAZY GLUE: You don't want to go there.
"Whoa! That's intense, man," Haze says. He leans forward, puts his hand on my shoulder, and kind of shakes me.
AUNT BEE: He's odd-looking and runs like a dork, but he's a nice young man.
"So what did you do?" Shelby asks. "I mean how do you cope? I think when my mom goes, I don't know. I think I'm going to want to go with her. I'm already in mourning. I cry all the time. I just can't see my life without her. I don't know how you can sit here like nothing's happened. I mean, your mom's dead!" Shelby shouts the word "dead" and it rings in my ears.
Everybody in the room says, "Shelby!"
Shelby turns and shakes her head at them. "What? I'm just being honest. Sorry, Jason. I need to know how you get over something like—"
I don't let her finish. I pitch the green bean onto my tray. "I don't know how you'll deal with getting over losing your mother. I mean, you just—you just kind of have to keep going, okay? What else can you do? Jeez!"
CRAZY GLUE: Your arms are flapping. Rein it in, buddy.
I drop my arms, then fall against the wall and draw my knees up in front of me.
CRAZY GLUE: Shut up! Just shut up! Shut up!
SEXY LADY: You knew better than to go there.
"Yeah, man," Haze says, nodding. He pulls a container of applesauce out of his lunch sack, pulls the foil off the top, and takes a lick. I see a big blob of sauce on his tongue before he pulls it in and swallows. "Yeah, like my dad, whoa! He drove his car straight into our garage last night—with the door closed! The garage door was closed, man. He sooo did it on purpose." He looks at all of us. "Wild, right? My mom's getting the main house in the divorce and he's totally freakin' over it. I swear." He shakes his head and tosses a potato chip into his mouth. "I mean, by the time they're through playing dueling ban
jos, man, one of them's gonna be dead in the bed, you know?" He chuckles and wags his head again, but he doesn't look too happy about it. Then he jerks his head back and pops his eyes wide open and says, "But, what the hell, like Jason says, what ya gonna do? You just gotta keep going. Right? Right?" He looks at all of us.
"Your parents are nuts," Pete says. He sits with his legs crossed and his back straight. He looks as if he's meditating. He runs his hand over his bald head. "Who cares about a house? He's got his life. That should be enough. Why isn't that enough?"
I stare at my knees and think about the leaks in our roof and the chunks of plaster that keep falling from the ceilings upstairs.
"You're right," Haze says. "Americans have too much stuff these days, man. My parents are doin' a tug of war over fur coats and the Lexus and who gets which house, and it's absotively, posolutely crap. It's all crap. Who cares? You know?"
"But do you really think that's what they're fighting over?" Dr. Gomez asks him.
Haze and Pete and Dr. Gomez spend the rest of the lunch period discussing power battles and control issues—that's what they call them—and I sit there just listening and staring at my knees.
I look up when Haze says, "My dad's acting like a complete lunatic," and I see Shelby staring right at me.
I look back down at my tray, and then after a minute or so I steal another glance at her. She's still staring at me with her Yankees cap tilted back so her brown eyes, her big, sad, nonblinking brown eyes, bore right into me. What's her problem? She's making my skin crawl.
SEXY LADY: It's love.
CRAZY GLUE: More like she's trying to figure out if the goob is really as dumb as he acts.
Pete tells us about his family's plan to do an intervention on his father and we all clap.
"I've been lighting candles and meditating on it a long time, now, and I think an intervention is the only option we have left," Pete says. He lowers his head toward his clasped hands and adds, "He'll die if he doesn't get back into rehab."
Shelby reaches over and hugs Pete, and everybody nods and agrees that an intervention is a good idea. I just sit there.
When the bell rings, we all stand. Shelby, Dr. Gomez, and Haze wad their lunch sacks and toss them into the wastebasket on top of my cling peaches, but Pete, who hadn't taken a bite out of his lunch all period, sets his sack on my tray. He says, "Real glad you're in the group, Jason." Then he gives me another one of those weird bows with the prayerful hands, and before I can think through what just happened and decide whether to give the lunch back or take it gratefully and give it to my dad, he's gone, lost in the throng of students making their way to their next classes.
Chapter Five
AFTER SCHOOL, I walk along the Potomac River, crunching through the ice at the side of the road. I'm on my way home from the bus stop and I'm thinking about the letter I just answered for the school paper.
Dear Mouse:
My parents forgot my birthday again. My brother had a big game and me and my parents went to that. After the game, we went out to eat to celebrate his victory. It's all about football in our house. Nobody notices me at all.
Unloved in Potomac Crossing
Dear Unloved:
That totally sucks! I don't know what you should do. I mean, jeez! Well, okay—you didn't say, but I have a feeling you never reminded them that you had a birthday coming up. Yeah, it's wrong that they're so into football and their own stuff to notice you, but maybe you should make a louder noise. So, like a week or two before your birthday, start talking about it a lot. Mention the date a lot, too. Tell your mom you're thinking of having a birthday party this year. Hand your parents a list of things you want for your birthday and ask if they would pick something out from that list. I mean, make a big deal out of it. If that doesn't work, then you've got A-Hs for parents and you've got to just drop it and find a group of friends who will treat you right. I mean, don't pick friends who treat you just like your family all over again. Then throw your own party with them. Anyway, that's my advice, for what it's worth.
Mouse
P.S. Speaking of friends who treat you right, A.R., maybe F.C. wouldn't have to lie to you if you treated her better. You treat her like a fungus on your butt. F.C., dump the dude already. Why do you let that loser treat you that way?
I write my letters on one of the library computers during study period. We don't have a hookup anymore at home. We don't even have a phone line anymore, or a cell phone, either, for that matter—it costs too much.
AUNT BEE: Oh dear. You've had to spend so much money to pay the hospital bills for your mom's coma.
LAUGH TRACK: It's such a shame.
CRAZY GLUE: Five months she was in a coma. You'll be paying those bills the rest of your life, jacko.
Can we get back on topic, please? I was explaining to You about the Dear Mouse letters.
CRAZY GLUE: So explain already. Who's stopping you?
Anyway, I don't send the letters from school; otherwise someone might figure out that the letters always come in during fifth period on Thursdays and come looking for me in the library, so I wait and duck into the library near our house to send them to our school newspaper. I can't believe they actually publish what I write. Even the faculty advisor on the paper doesn't know who I am.
CRAZY GLUE: A lot of kids think it's Pete Funkel.
AUNT BEE: And lots think it's a teacher pretending to be a student.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: When they find out it's you, you're going to have to move out of the country and go into the witness protection program.
CRAZY GLUE: Just think, if Pete ever gets beat up over what you've written, it will be your fault and you'll have to sit in that windowless room with him, staring at his broken nose for months. Then how will you feel?
AUNT BEE: Pshaw! I think it's wonderful. The whole school looks forward to the paper now. Dear Mouse is the first thing everybody reads. And these people who write to you need help.
SEXY LADY: If you ask me, I think the whole situation is hot!
CRAZY GLUE: And getting hotter. You stay in that group therapy and you'll get found out fast.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: Shelby's dangerous. She's making you talk.
CRAZY GLUE: Yeah, ditch it now, while you still can.
AUNT BEE: I should think it felt good to yell at Shelby and get a thing or two off your chest, and Pete and Haze aren't too bad. They're glad you're in the group, for some reason. And you do need a friend. You've been so lonely.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: I liked that Pete told Haze his parents were nuts and Haze didn't care.
CRAZY GLUE: Don't listen to Aunt Bee. You can't afford to have friends. Are we all forgetting about Dad?
I stop and look across the street at my house. It's a three-story, 1820s brick townhouse, the last house in a row of four. My grandfather painted the bricks on the house white and the trim a deep blue, the colors of the Greek flag. Now a lot of the white on the house has worn away on the top and the blue is peeling, too, as if the flag is waving at half-mast. These four townhouses are the final holdouts from the city's restoration of the downtown riverfront. On either side of us are old warehouses. One is now a gallery and arts studio, and the other is a bunch of shops and restaurants. Across the river is Washington, D.C.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: I think you're stalling. You don't want our new audience member to meet your father.
SEXY LADY: Just remember, you're a chip off the old block, and you're hot!
I just want to say in my dad's defense that when he's in his right mind, he's the best dad in the world. He taught me to paddle a canoe and to ride a bike and how to write Jason Apollo Papadopoulos when I was five so my teacher wouldn't keep making me stand in the corner. He told me the stories of the ancient gods and heroes of Greece. We read The Iliad and The Odyssey together when I was nine and ten years old.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: Ah, the stories.
AUNT BEE: You treasure that the most. Sitting together under those bushes in the backyard of
your old house, eating Oreos, drinking Cokes, and telling stories.
CRAZY GLUE: A totally cool, secret hideout—all those bushes, that
wide-open space underneath, and a nice, flat dirt floor.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: Stalling.
If only I could get those days back. If only he'd get better already.
CRAZY GLUE: I don't know, buddy. It doesn't look like he's getting any better. He's back on the meds and it ain't happening. And you're getting low on those pills. What will you do when you run out? You can't afford to buy more.
Just—just leave me alone. I'm handling it.
AUNT BEE: What are you so afraid of, dear?
Nothing! I'm not afraid. Everybody stop saying I'm afraid. I'm not. He's fine. I'm fine. It's all fine. And he's not going away again. Not on my watch. Not to some state mental institute where they'll tie him down again, or lock him in a room by himself. No way! No way! I put him there once; I won't do it again.
AUNT BEE: Now look what you've done. He's very upset, poor boy. You were just six years old. He was going to bury you alive! Oh dear, everything is very, very upsetting.
LAUGH TRACK: Isn't it a shame.
SEXY LADY: You're still hot.
FBG WITH A MUSTACHE: Buck up, kiddo, and get in there. Go on. Go take care of your dad. We're here. We're always here for you.
I cross the street. I taste tears and I didn't even know I was crying. I wipe the stupid mess off my face, walk up the steps, and open the front door.
There's no warmth in the house as I step into the hallway, no smell of dinner cooking, no sound of my mom's voice singing from the kitchen, or my dad's shouting "Hi-ya!" from his study. It's almost as cold inside as it is out. We heat with oil, and oil costs an arm and a leg, so we keep the thermostat set really low. There's a smell of mildew in the house, and wet plaster, and dad's B.O. It's quiet, too quiet.
CRAZY GLUE: Jeez, now what's your dad up to? Hope he didn't yank another tooth out of his mouth with that rusty set of pliers again.
SEXY LADY: Blood everywhere. And what a time you had on the bus getting him to the clinic. It was a mess.