They didn’t speak as Dominic programmed the hospital into his GPS and pulled a U-turn in the first intersection. Once he was pointed in the right direction, he broke the silence. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“I don’t know anything! Only what was in an article stub Gabe showed me, and a voice mail from my mom. It said my brother was hit by a train, which makes no sense. I mean, sure, he got his Pilot turned off, but it was still working. Even if he was walking on a train track for some stupid reason, he should have known there was a train coming. He should’ve been aware. I don’t get it.”
“A train? Holy shit. He’s okay?”
“The article said ‘stable.’ That means okay, right?”
“I think, yeah. Yikes.”
“Yikes,” echoed Sophie. “Anyway, thanks for taking me. I really appreciate it. I don’t often get frustrated that I’m not allowed to drive, but this is one of those times.”
Dominic dropped her at the visitor entrance. She hadn’t been to this particular hospital, but she was hospital level: expert. She’d never been on this side of things, was all. Never rolled up on an information desk on her own to ask where David Geller-Bradley was, yes, she was immediate family. Never slapped a visitor sticker on her chest instead of an ID bracelet around her wrist.
She rode the elevator to the fourth floor, medical surgical, and followed the room numbers. His was a double room, but the first bed was empty. David was in the second bed, David with an IV and several monitors, but no bandages on his head, David awake and smiling a not-quite-David smile at her.
Val rose from the chair beside the bed and flung her arms around Sophie. “I didn’t know if you got my voice mails.”
“I just got them. I’m sorry. Have you ever considered text messages? They’ve been all the rage for my entire life.”
David snorted, and Sophie turned on him. “Oh, sure, laugh, train boy. What happened?”
“I’m still trying to work that out,” he said. “Everything is fuzzy.”
“But you’re okay? You look surprisingly okay.”
David nodded, then gestured at himself. She followed his hand down the bed. A sheet was draped over his legs, but something was wrong with the shapes.
“Oh,” Sophie said, trying to sort it out.
“The foot they had to amputate is the left, but it looks like it’s the other way around because the stump is all bandaged. Ma says they did a bunch of scans and brought in a vascular surgeon but they couldn’t save it.”
“Oh,” she said again. He was remarkably blasé for a guy talking about his own emergency foot amputation. “Does it hurt?”
“Probably,” he said. “But whatever they’ve got me on is pretty amazing. It even cuts the noise.”
He smiled again, and she realized why his smile looked funny. He didn’t look like himself without noise behind his expression. Something about it made her feel like crying, but she didn’t want to cry in front of him if he was taking it so well. She swallowed it and smiled back.
Julie’s voice arrived in the room before she did. “I brought ice cr—” Her voice trailed off when she saw Sophie. She hesitated in the doorway, her hands full of ice cream bars. “I can leave if you want.”
Sophie shook her head. “I’m still mad at you, but not the kind of mad where you have to leave.”
“That’s what I said, too.” David smiled his un-David smile again. “Truce and ice cream.”
Julie looked at her hands. “I only have three! I can go get another.”
“Sophie can have mine. I don’t need one.” Val’s expression was easy for Sophie to read; she didn’t care if she never had ice cream again if her whole family was in one room and talking to one another. It was strange to have everyone talking and laughing, and nobody mentioning the train and the foot and whatever David would have to deal with in the coming months. The weirdest reason for a reunion, or maybe bad reasons were sometimes necessary for family to come together.
* * *
• • •
Sophie had spent a lot of time proving to her parents that she was an adult, not the kid in the back seat, but now that nobody was making her feel small, there was something comforting about riding in back with her moms in the front. Heading to the house that felt like home, on a night when home was a comfort, too, not an idea she had to push back against. God, she was tired of pushing.
She didn’t mean to cry. It started as quiet tears, which she thought she was hiding, until she heard a sniffle from the passenger seat, and then Julie was bawling, and they were all crying, and the crying turned into laughter, because it was all so ridiculous.
“Only David could get hit by a train and only lose a foot,” Sophie said. “How does anyone walk through the world with that much luck?”
“Ssh,” said Julie. “It’s bad luck to talk about luck.”
That set them all cry-giggling again, although Sophie was pretty sure Julie was serious.
CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR
VAL
David had kicked everyone out toward the end of visiting hours. Sophie rode home with them, and didn’t ask why Val ducked into her room ahead of her, which Val was grateful for. When Val carried her pajamas and clothes into their own bedroom, Julie gave her a look of such joy she forgot for a moment what had made her so angry she’d moved into their daughter’s room.
It meant she had to settle things in her mind quickly, so she didn’t confuse Julie. Was she back because she was ready to forgive, or because she missed being comforted by her wife? Her person. She absolutely missed that.
She settled for echoing their children. “I’m still upset, and I think I will be until I’m sure you understand what you did that I found so hurtful, but I miss you, and I need to be with you tonight. Is that okay?”
“You’re looking for my permission to come back to our bed? You know you’re welcome.”
“I just want to make sure you know it isn’t done just because I’m here.”
Julie sighed. “I understand.”
When they got into bed, each of them settled on the far edge, their backs to each other, not touching. After a few minutes, Julie shifted so the bottoms of her feet grazed the back of Val’s calves, and her breath got quiet like she was afraid that if she moved, Val might withdraw permission for the contact. She didn’t; it was solid, reassuring contact, and she’d happily admit she’d missed it but she didn’t want to admit it first.
Val was almost asleep when Julie whispered, “Is it my fault?”
“Is what your fault?”
“All of it. David. His foot.”
There were a few possible answers, and Val chose carefully. “Some parts, maybe, but not the foot or the train. He made choices. Maybe we could have helped him deal better with whatever he’s dealing with if he’d been here, but I don’t think we know that for sure.”
“So you don’t blame me?”
“Not for this.”
* * *
• • •
She woke before Julie as she always did, but stayed in bed. No run today. Not because she heard rain on the window behind the drapes, but because she’d missed the simple pleasure of lying beside someone she loved and watching her sleep. She had to remind herself she was still angry, but then she wondered why she needed to hold on to that. Julie knew what she needed to fix; maybe that knowing meant Val could let go and see what happened next. She closed her eyes again and put an arm around Julie, and Julie nestled into her.
When she woke again, Julie was gone. It took Val a minute to remember what day of the week it was—Saturday, no alarm—and then everything came back. She heard raised voices from downstairs, and sighed, resigning herself to another round of family drama. They hadn’t even been able to maintain a day’s truce.
Except as she rounded the corner to the kitchen, she realized they weren’t shouting at each other. It was a sh
ared anger.
“What’s going on?” Val asked, yawning.
Julie shoved her tablet into Val’s hands. “This.”
Val rubbed sleep from her eyes and focused. It was a news aggregation site. The clickbait headline was You’ll Never Guess Which Celebrity Jumped in Front of a Train This Week. She frowned, fully awake. “Do they think he did it on purpose?”
“Some imply that. Also, their definition of ‘celebrity’ is debatable,” said Sophie.
“There are more.” Julie took the tablet back and paged through her open tabs. “BNL Expresses Sympathy for Troubled Ex-Spokesperson. Ex-BNL Spokesperson Hit by Train Shines Light on the Dangers of Pilot Deactivation.”
Val looked from Sophie to Julie. “I don’t understand.”
“Yesterday there was a piece on a local news site saying Local Man Hit by Train,” Sophie said. “Some gossip outlet might have recognized his name, but it seems unlikely, since most people know him as ‘hey, you’re the guy from that ad.’ It seems really weird they’d make that connection.”
“Not to mention they know an awful lot. How did they know he wasn’t working there anymore?”
Val considered. “It probably only took one person connecting his name. If they called BNL for a statement thinking he still worked there, BNL would have said he didn’t. Maybe it all rolled from there, with others running with the story.”
“Okay, fine, but how did they know he didn’t have a Pilot anymore? He still had it when he left BNL,” said Julie.
“No, he didn’t,” said Sophie. “He’d had it turned off already, but the light was still on.”
Julie frowned. “You knew he’d had it turned off?”
“I went with him to do it. He was chicken and left the light. I’m not sure exactly when he lost his job, but I’m one hundred percent certain it was before he had the light turned off. He left it on to keep that stupid job.”
Val slumped into a chair, fighting the urge to walk out. “When did I get this oblivious, and when did we all start hiding things from each other? Pilots on and lights on and Pilots off and lights off and lost jobs and ten million secrets and I am so sick of all of it. You don’t need to tell me everything, but at some point somebody needs to tell me something.”
“I’m sorry.” Sophie put a hand on her shoulder. “I wasn’t hiding things on purpose. It wasn’t mine to tell.”
“I hid things on purpose that I definitely should have told you. It wasn’t right. I’m sorry, too.” Julie sounded sincere, and the apology was for the right thing. Driving David out was bad, but hiding it had been the part that had hurt Val more. If Julie recognized that, they had some hope.
Val reached for Julie’s hand and squeezed it. “Apology accepted.”
“Oh, thank God,” Julie said, and then they were kissing, and Val put everything else out of her mind.
“This is all very touching, Moms, and kinda gross, but let’s get back to the part where your son’s in the news. And, um, what’s the visitor policy at that hospital? If these rags know his name and what hospital he’s at, what’s to stop them from going to his room to get an interview while he’s loopy?”
Julie looked at her daughter with an expression of both horror and respect. “Oh no. You’re right.”
“There was a local news van reporting outside the hospital when we got there the other night, but they didn’t stop us,” said Val. “I didn’t even consider they were probably reporting on David. I was so worried I barely registered them.”
“I noticed, too, but I figured it was because of the hit-by-a-train part.”
“It probably was.” Sophie waved her phone. “I’m sure it started that way. They monitor police frequencies, so maybe they started out reporting someone was hit by a train, and then they followed the ambulance and reported from the hospital, and then got his name somehow, but I don’t think his name was as known as his face, so I don’t know how they got from there to the other stuff about him being a BNL spokesperson and especially not the stuff about him not having a Pilot any—”
Her mouth stayed open but she didn’t finish her sentence. She jumped to her feet, calling back over her shoulder, “I have to go. You should go make sure David isn’t telling his life story to some reporter while they have him on painkillers.”
Sophie disappeared from the room, leaving her mothers staring at each other. Val couldn’t remember getting orders from Sophie before. It reminded her of the Sophie she’d seen at the FreerMind meetings: confident, in control, correct in her assessment of the situation. She’d realized something midsentence, but whatever it was, she wasn’t hiding it, just acting on it. Val and Julie wordlessly stood to get dressed and do exactly as their daughter said.
CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE
DAVID
The nurse who changed his dressings told David there were people downstairs waiting to talk with him. Did he want visitors?
“You mean my family?”
“No. That’s why I’m asking.”
“My friend Milo?” Milo hadn’t visited yet, but he’d called. David assumed it’d be a while before he came; he was solid in emergencies, but squeamish in other medical situations.
“No. Sorry—I think they’re all reporters.”
The nurse reached the bottom layers of bandage and David started counting dots on the ceiling tiles. He had never been squeamish himself, had watched his sister’s procedures with avid interest, but he wasn’t ready to look yet. “All?”
“There are a bunch of them. I didn’t see how many.”
“Why?”
“Maybe because Man Versus Train is an exciting story? I don’t know. It’s been a busy shift. I haven’t actually talked to them.”
“Ah. Um, I don’t think I want to talk to them, either.”
“Cool. I’ll let the desk know. This wound is looking good, by the way.”
“Thank you. Wait, ‘thank you’ is a weird thing to say. I’m glad it looks good?”
“I took ‘thank you’ to mean ‘thank you for doing such a nice job keeping infection out.’”
“That, too.” David laughed. Whatever painkiller they had him on made him giddier than Quiet. It did the same job, so he wasn’t complaining. Without either, this place would drive him out of his mind: the machines monitoring him, each with its own cadence; someone else’s machines, on the other side of the wall; a smell he couldn’t identify, and another smell; the television; the ticking clock behind the television; the nurses’ station outside his door, with its laughter and alarms and telephone; the forced air through the vent; the running toilet.
As it was, he catalogued each of those things separately, with great focus, to avoid paying attention to whatever the nurse was doing at the foot of the bed, where he would not look, even if it looked good and uninfected, which he would not think about, even if it would matter soon, because right now it hurt only very far away. It might be smart to ask what they had him on, to take a more active role in his care, to pay attention; he’d do that sometime soon, maybe.
The nurse left, and he watched television for a while, some combination home improvement and paranormal show, where people renovated purportedly haunted mansions during the day and slept in them at night. Everyone on the show had a Pilot, the better to keep an eye out for ghosts while stripping linoleum and exposing the hardwood underneath. The house had good bones, the host said without a trace of irony, or maybe it was irony and David was standing outside of irony right now, unable to recognize it.
He had never cared for television. He’d watched when they had family movie night, but otherwise he preferred games. Games let him be part of the plot, but also occupied more parts of his brain than TV. TV was usually background as far as he was concerned, one of too many inputs. Except this show was funny, whether or not it was meant to be, and without noise he found himself able to enjoy it in a way he hadn’t for years.
A phone beside the bed rang, surprising him. He hadn’t noticed the room had a phone. Who would know where to call him, and why hadn’t they called his cell phone, and where was his cell phone? He tried to remember where he’d seen it last. He remembered a flash in the dark, grainy footage, something else, but maybe that was just the television show, and wow they were keeping him really high.
The phone rang again and he answered it. “BNL, this is David Geller-Bradley,” he said, though that wasn’t quite right.
“Um.” He’d confused the voice on the other end. “This is the visitor desk downstairs. Your nurse said not to let in any reporters, but I have someone here who says she works with your sister?”
He looked at the clock. Seven minutes left in Haunted House Hunters. “Send her up in eight minutes.”
“Fucking celebrities,” the voice muttered as he hung up.
David turned his attention back to the television. They were replaying the moments leading to the discovery of the bones.
“Knock knock?” a voice called from the hall.
He turned, annoyed.
“Can I come in? The receptionist said it was okay.”
It had been a while since he’d had any use for his Pilot, but David wished he had enough brain to finish his show and talk to whoever was standing in the doorway.
He sighed. “Come in.”
The woman who entered wore a navy business suit and a pale blue silk blouse. Her makeup was porcelain-doll pale except for blue lipstick, an intimidating look. He checked for her Pilot automatically, but didn’t see it. Oh. His sister’s coworker. She looked more put-together than he’d pictured for an activist; maybe he was being narrow in his stereotype.
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