Suspended Sentence

by Janice Morgan

  Why in the world had Mike and Linda and I all thought back then, before any of this started, that Dylan could make it at a bigcity campus like this? Didn’t he need a more protected environment? Would that have saved him from all the craziness that happened here?

  I recalled going with Dylan to visit a small liberal arts college. On the idyllic campus with real ivy growing up the brick buildings, we strolled through a beautiful small quad with giant oaks. Dylan met with an advisor and also a clear-eyed professor who, I’m quite sure, correctly identified him as a wayward youth on the way to meet adulthood at some as-yet undisclosed location. “No, Mom,” he told me later, “I’m not like those other Goody Two-Shoes students you see around here. I can’t be like them. This place is too small for me.” Yep, that’s Dylan for you. He always saw himself as an action hero in a place like Gotham City. Bigger than life.

  Are you learning now? Who is learning?

  Amid fast-moving traffic, it was time to get left quick or risk getting stuck in a logjam further on. I powered through the torrent, taking note of the BMWs, the Lexuses—I’ve been trained by riding with Dylan to do this. Suddenly, a silver Jaguar convertible glided ahead of me, the driver’s short hair bristling in the wind, as if the wind itself were part of an electric current pulling everyone forward to some unknown destiny.

  Before long, the sign for Blue Ash exit. Yes, Blue Ash, there among the corporate campuses, that’s where the meditation teacher had an office. I took Dylan there several times. A young woman of Indian descent welcomed us: instruction, a mantra, then a ceremony with white cloth, blessings, flowers. “How are you feeling now, Dylan? How did it go?” So many teachers, so many lessons. This could be the answer, I thought back then. This will help him be more mindful, less in conflict with himself. Will this be the key that opens the door?

  But wait, I need meditation lessons, too! Don’t you see how hard all this is on me?

  Yes, we were problem-solvers in my family, but all I really wanted was some kind of peace of mind. For all of us. That goal seemed so simple, and yet so impossible to achieve, the very thing I was least likely to find in the same sentence with my son, Dylan—as if the only time I could truly relax when thinking about Dylan was if he were in some protected zone, in a special community somewhere. Not jail, exactly, no. But maybe a monastery, or maybe a retreat like Gampo Abbey in Nova Scotia, studying with Pema Chödrön for six years.

  Is there not a place somewhere away from this rushing river to find a little peace? If even sages need retreats, then how about us lost folks and sinners? Don’t we need them, too?

  At that moment, I was still in the midst of a multi-lane traffic stream going at full speed that seemed it would never end. I hung on to the wheel, memories blazing. Who knows where all these cars were going? Yet each one was commandeered by a driver who had a special destination in mind. Each of us would end up somewhere different, but for now we were all here, in this intense stream, this unstoppable flow. While you were in it, you felt it could go on forever. Only the green sign markers reminded me I was still on course.

  Before long, making the long arc west, I saw a sign for Fairfield. Yes, Fairfield Mount Mercy Hospital! Another flashback: September 2008. I casually answered the phone early one evening, as I always did back then, because I never knew what was going to happen. Anything could happen. This time, a nurse from Mount Mercy was on the other end, asking for me. Her soft voice seemed hesitant, reluctant to inflict harm. My gut clenched. What is wrong? She told me my son was in the emergency room up there; his shoulder had been dislocated; there was blood on his forehead. He was in pain; he was faint. No, he couldn’t talk to me. It seemed he might have been shot. All of a sudden, I couldn’t breathe, I had to sit down. No, this can’t be happening … this can’t be real . . shot? In the head? My God! … She told me they would take care of him and she would call again later with more information. There was nothing more I could do. It was all so far away; I was helpless, in shock. I could only wait.

  I felt total numbness until almost an hour later, when another phone call came in from the ER. It was Dylan’s voice; he could speak. Relief. He could tell me he was going to be OK. He told me the physician at Mercy Hospital set his shoulder, too; his arm was in a sling. He wasn’t feeling queasy anymore, just weak. They were going to release him in a short while. That was right after the assault, the time Dylan fought a guy off to keep his money, but the other man had a gun and fired it as they wrestled on the ground. The bullet went right by Dylan’s head, grazing his scalp. When the doctor cleaned up the blood, that’s what they found. Nothing a surgical staple or two couldn’t fix. But I didn’t know that for the hour I was waiting in total turmoil, waiting to know if he would even survive.

  Dylan claimed all this was a life-changer. No more trusting Nick. No more of the “shady life.” What shady life? What is he talking about? Was Dylan involved in some kind of hustle? I asked, but I didn’t get any straight answers. Ha, Mom will be the last one to suspect anything. Even then, did he know that somehow I’d believe him, believe in his better angels, no matter what?

  I hear his voice again. “Mom, I have to go now. I’m going to report this to the police. They’re here now. I’ll talk to you later. Don’t worry. A friend will drive me home.” Click.

  Maybe Dylan thought he was a cat with nine lives. So which one was he on now, #6? Or was it already #7? Maybe he actually thought he was the Houdini of escape artists. Lock him into a chest and throw him into the sea. He was always sure he could get out, no matter what. But at least Houdini trained for his stunts. Dylan didn’t train for his; somehow he’d make a plan and then think that the laws of gravity wouldn’t apply to him. He was high on schemes and dreams, low on risk analysis. And meanwhile, I’d be looking for the key, the way to crack open the lock on that mysterious vault of his mind so he would change.

  Following the assault, I had gone up to the city to help him get ready for the fall term. John met me partway and we went together. With Dylan looking like a pirate, wearing a sling for his arm and patch on his head, we went to the new IKEA store in West Chester, just north off this same highway. We bought a desk, a chair, and a lamp so he could have what he needed to get back into civilized student life. He said he didn’t want to leave the city—not even after such a violent event. He wanted to go back to school. He could do it with help. I was only too happy to inject a dose of normalcy into his life, which always seemed on the verge of spinning out of control. Dylan said he was leaving all that behind, all the bad stuff. He wanted to keep trying. He was like some crazy kind of valiant warrior. Did I attach myself too tightly to his dreams because I felt guilty that he hadn’t had a better childhood? A better adolescence? That he’d been sent away when he needed help, and none of us understood what was wrong? Yes, that could be in there, too. The whole stewpot of it.

  Was I really helping you then? Am I helping you now? How can I be sure?

  Where is the exit I need out of here? I felt I was on the verge of breaking down; it was too much. Why on earth did I think I could go through this city and still hold together? But the traffic was like being in the middle of a tidal wave. I couldn’t think fast enough or react smoothly enough to get out of the surge. I could only look ahead and hope to see an exit for the route I needed to take, Route 27 for Indiana. It had to be close. I steadied myself: just breathe and watch.

  Finally, there it was, coming up on the right. I rose on the off-ramp, finally out of the maelstrom, easing up on the gas pedal. At the stoplight, I looked around for a place to turn off the road. I spotted a small shopping center nearby, next to an empty field. Turning into all this sudden calm, my car came to an unceremonious halt, as if I’d been flung out of some distant spiral galaxy—my space capsule just fell out of the sky and landed there. I couldn’t even get out of my flame-charred tin can yet, though. My eyes brimmed; I couldn’t hold back the tears anymore. I crossed my arms over the wheel and just cried.

  By the time I stopped, I had no id
ea how much time had passed. I was still shaken, but there was a release, too. The raspy sound of my breathing mingled with the tumult of thrashing winds in my chest, in my mind. Gradually, it was all slowing down. Like a thousand demon birds had just let go and flown away to their mysterious lairs.

  Let’s get out of here.

  My eyes still burning, I half-crawled out of the car. I had to stretch, move. My whole body ached as if I’d aged by twenty years. “Look at what you’ve come through,” I said to myself. “What we’ve all come through.” I felt twisted and stiff as heavy rope on a cargo ship.

  And yet I wouldn’t have believed I could take in so much pain, so much disappointment and heartbreak, and still be alive, still be here. My mind flashed back to that tree in Jamaica I saw once, the one in St. Elizabeth Parish near the ocean, the one that’s been through hurricanes but is still standing. Coming near, you see it’s three feet thick, with a gnarled trunk that gives the impression of being bolted into the earth like a live corkscrew, its twisted roots bracing and coiling themselves to resist the next devastating wall of water from sky or sea.

  So now I wonder: how could my family have gone through all this and survived? So much of who I was, or thought I was, had been built around making good plans, seeing them through. So how could I deal with my son, who seemed to be the exact opposite of me? How could I make plans for that? These coiling roads I’d been through: how many painful lessons had been taught in this place? Had I learned any of them? What if all the goal setting and careful planning now, just like then, weren’t going to work? What if Dylan had his own ideas, his own timetable for what he was going to learn and when? And from whom? Then what?

  Somehow, real life was always escaping from my management concept, and so was my peace of mind.

  No, I saw now: I could plan to my heart’s content, but there was no way I could ensure what I considered a good outcome. There was no assurance of that. None. What if the learning curve here took a few more loops up and down? What if the life-story dance steps were always going to be two steps forward, one step back—or maybe three steps sideways?

  I swung my arms high over my head, twisted back and forth, breathed in, surveyed the open field. I was still searching, still feeling my way through this. In no way was I ready to get on the road again, even if I wanted to keep on my journey. I decided to take a walk, even in this unlikely place. I remembered a conversation I had with Dylan about things. I’d said to him, “Well, you know, maybe you’d do better to just make peace with your anxiety, make peace with the bipolar—just accept it.” And he’d replied, “Make peace with it? No way!” Wasn’t his method of dealing with the situation to keep it all at bay, try to medicate it away, use chemistry against chemistry so he could keep up the image he wanted to maintain for himself? So now was he learning a different way? Or was he just using Drug Court as a special kind of obstacle course to get through now until later on, when he would be under less scrutiny?

  What if the plane I’m in takes a nosedive? What if Dylan doesn’t graduate from Drug Court after all? Gets sentenced, has to serve time in jail? Then what?

  Truth to tell, I couldn’t take my own advice. I wouldn’t be able to accept this situation until I had one hundred percent certainty that things were going to turn out fine—as in, no more storms. Security, that’s what I wanted. The solid rock of security. Ha! I shook my head. I could already hear Rita’s quiet voice coming from right next to me at our monthly NAMI meeting: “Good luck with that,” she’d say. She’d been there, too—all of us had. Might as well tell the St. Elizabeth tree, “Don’t worry! There will never, ever be another storm on this beach.” Good luck with that.

  When my stroll took me past a deli, I suddenly realized I hadn’t eaten for a long time. Walking out with a cold roast beef sandwich and an iced tea, I headed for the edge of the open field. I still craved space, even if it meant eating my sandwich standing up. Eventually I sat down on the field side edge of the sidewalk and took a few sips of tea. Its cold bitterness was bracing, and I realized how thirsty I was. I bit into the sandwich; it was better than I thought it would be, probably because I was starving. Well, at least there were a few comforts in this world you could count on.

  By the time I finished my sandwich, dusted the crumbs off my cargo pants, and went back to sipping my cold tea, I started to feel better. I looked back over the torrential interstate I’d just left, the one that had swept me through the mythic landscape of a thousand traumas. I realized that the city in all its sprawling splendor was that particular way for me—it was today and had been for a while now. But apart from me, the city had its own rhythms, its own patterns. Today was just another day, with many different lives unfolding within its streets and byways. Even at this very moment, someone else was probably getting a traffic ticket, a car impounded, meeting an alluring new girlfriend or boyfriend, meeting up with a smooth, fast-talking acquaintance. And even among the rush of events, there would still be quiet moments, too: lovers meeting to take a walk in the park, a dad playing ball with his young son, a college student setting up a hammock between two trees to read a book. Who could count how many projects were afoot in this place? The sheer puzzle of it all was far beyond the scope of whatever I had imagined lay out there when I crossed the bridge and saw the metropolis as a landscape I was entering for the first time.

  So can I just accept my place now on the edge of all this, just take it in, then let it go?

  Somehow I needed to be able to appreciate the successes and the good times—and these were very good—without blindly counting on them to go on forever, because I knew everything could turn over in an instant. I needed to be prepared to handle a recurrence, a crisis, a relapse, even an arrest, without falling apart myself. I had to have empathy and love for my son, yes, but I had to set boundaries, too. I had to figure out when I could trust him and when I couldn’t, and to know that sometimes the best thing to do would be nothing, straight up. That, or just ask a question. It was his job to unlock his own doors, find his own keys. Life experience would be his teacher, as it had been mine.

  I started to feel as if some kind of heavy weight was lifting from me, that godawful responsibility of being a parent. Not completely—that would be far too much to assert—but there was a shift, a space opening up. The bond between my son and me was still there, but I was holding on with less tension, less expectation. Call me ridiculous, call me backward, but I can tell you the fact of it was surprising. Let’s say I was starting to see myself as just one little boat in this mysterious stream passing through, and my son was another, over there. And everyone else had their own boat, too, and they were just moving along, doing what they thought they needed to. I wasn’t going to have any special powers just because I was a mom. Forget all that secret mission stuff, all that “Mission: Impossible” bravura. I’d played my part on that stage, for sure, and I had made my share of mistakes. But now … ? I wanted to forgive myself, forgive my son, and let go.

  Come to think of it, even the new young priest at St. Alban’s Episcopal recognized the limits to what he could do, and he was half my age. “Look, I can do forgiveness. I can preach love and understanding; I know I can do that,” he told me once, flashing his winning smile, standing tall in his long, white robe. “But as for saving people? I’m afraid that’s a little above my pay grade.” He shook his head. “I have to defer to a higher authority on that one.”

  I glanced at the sky—slightly overcast, but with intermittent sun—then toward the road ahead. I knew I would have cornfields and a number of small towns to pass through before late afternoon. I had to get going again soon. Enough of the past for one day. Breathe. Take in all that’s good. I took out my cell phone.

  “John, I made it through Cincinnati. There were so many memories! It was an ordeal; it was like the Fourteen Stations of the Cross at St. Alban’s before Easter.”

  Being a hereditary Episcopalian, he knew exactly what I was talking about.

  “So, are you still standing
? Are you OK?”

  “It was tough, but I’m all right now. I’ll make it. I even found my exit here for the way north—a bit harrowing in the traffic, but I found it. I can tell you more later. Right now, I’m just glad the hard part of the drive is behind me.”

  “Good, well, enjoy the country roads. Take your time. Don’t forget to eat some lunch. Maybe you’ll find some fresh corn up there at a roadside stand. There should be some this time of year.”

  “Yes, it’ll be nice. I still have plenty of daylight left to get to Jen’s house. I’ll let you know when I get there. Miss you. Bye!”

  I put my phone away and took one last look around, taking the measure of the place. Then I got into my car again and turned in the direction I’d be taking up the road.

  CHAPTER 31:

  LOOKING OUT THERE TOGETHER

  There’s a photo of my dad and me that I keep in a special folder. I knew it was from a while back, but I had forgotten the exact period. When I turned over the photo, I could barely read a blurry date: February, 1985. It went back further than I thought, when I was in my early thirties, before Dylan was born. And it wasn’t the North Carolina beach in summer. Instead, judging by the sunset, I must have gone with my parents to the Gulf Coast of Florida. That was unusual for us. Suddenly, I realized that this trip must have been taken during my family’s first Christmas after my brother’s death. Staying at home would have been too painful for my parents; I remember they decided it would be best for us all to go to a new place that year.

  My mom loved the beach. She had taken the photo. The three of us were walking on the sand together, and you can see how the sky is orange with a glowing sun about to drift down past the waves on the horizon. A trail of light is reflected on the surface of the water, reaching all the way to the shore. Of course, the lighting was so amazing that I would say to my dad, who happened to have his ever-ready Olympus camera slung on his shoulder, “Let’s take a photo of this!” My mom did the honors.