by Amy Reed
“Okay.”
“Having fun?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“How’s Sadie?”
“Good.”
“Is the work hard?”
“Kind of. Not too bad. I’m getting strong.”
“A little physical labor is good for everyone.”
“Yeah.”
Pause. Silence. There is nothing else we are allowed to talk about.
“How are you?” I venture.
“Oh, good, everything’s good. Work is busy. Mariners are doing awful this season. You know, the usual.”
“How’s mom?”
Intake of breath, hold. Remember how to say something while saying nothing.
“Oh, well, she’s tired, you know.”
“Is she there?”
“Yeah, well, honey, I think she’s sleeping right now.”
“Can you check?”
“No, I’m pretty sure she’s sleeping.”
“Oh.”
“Sorry, sweetie—maybe next time, okay?”
“Okay.”
“Alright then.”
“I have to go get ready for a party,” I say.
“A party! That’s great!”
“Yeah.”
“It’s great to hear you two are making friends!”
“Yeah.”
“Just great!”
I know things are bad when he starts talking with exclamation points.
“Bye, Dad.”
“Bye, honey. Say hi to Sadie.”
“Say hi to Mom.”
“Love you, kiddo.”
“Love you too.”
Hang up. Dial tone. An empty room full of dust. It floats around like the ghosts of sad fairies, catching the light only to show how dead it is.
You’re driving to the party, but we both know I’ll be the one driving us back.
Usually we wait to arrive at a party extra fashionably late so you can make your grand appearance and convince people you have tons of other places to be. But you couldn’t wait this time, and we’re on our way even though it isn’t even dark yet. The Weird Jesus station is on full blast, and the preacher is screaming so loud I can feel it in my bones, and you’re screaming right along with him, shouting “Amen!” and “Hallelujah!” out the window at the cows. I have no idea what he’s talking about, and I know you don’t either, but he says it with such passion and conviction I can see how someone might be scared not to believe him.
I didn’t tell you about the phone call with my dad. I know when it’s not a good time to bother you with my problems.
We follow the napkin directions past town into an identical expanse of corn and cows. The sun starts to set and everything glistens golden, including you. The angle of the light makes your cheekbones even sharper, your lips even fuller, your neck even longer, and I have that feeling I get sometimes when I read something so beautiful I have to close my eyes and take a deep breath, then read it again.
And then there it is: a big red barn in the middle of a field with a scattering of cars, mostly trucks, parked in the flattened grass around it. I turn down Weird Jesus, and the thin, tinny sound of electric guitars fills the air; whatever music they’re listening to has no bass. A few people circle a bonfire, red plastic cups or beer cans in their hands. If I squint my eyes just right, this could be any party, anywhere.
“Holy shit, is that a mullet?” you say as you park the truck. “A real live non-ironic mullet?”
It could be a mullet. It could also just be a normal haircut you want to believe is a mullet. To be honest, the people here don’t look all that different from people in Seattle. The only difference seems to be that they’re not trying as hard, they’re not as desperate to define themselves by their clothing.
“There’s Seth,” you say, waving. He walks over, his face immediately turning a deep shade of red. A few people look at us curiously.
“Thanks for coming,” he says.
“Our pleasure,” you say. “Now, where can I get a drink?”
You drink. And you drink. At first there’s only beer, and I feel momentary relief, but then older people arrive with bottles of liquor, and I switch into super-vigilant take-care-of-Sadie mode. It doesn’t take long for you to turn the whole party into your audience, all the boys in rapt attention, all the girls huddled around the bonfire silently plotting your demise. You brag about Seattle, and you keep calling it “the City,” like it’s New York or San Francisco, even though no one ever calls it the City. You keep telling everyone how you live only minutes away from the house where Kurt Cobain killed himself, and they all ooh and aah as expected.
It is just like any other night from our old lives, but instead of wannabe indie rockers, we’re hanging out with high school football players and ex–high school football players, and instead of smoking weed in the park, we’re drinking cheap beer next to an old barn. Instead of city lights, there are stars all around us. The music of the fields mixes with the drawls of the boys’ voices and smooths out your sharp edges just a little. But I’m still sitting here quietly, watching you flirt with boys I know you don’t even like. You’re still putting on a show, wrapping these strangers around your finger. I don’t know what I was expecting, but I guess I was hoping that a summer away from our lives would somehow be a summer away from this. I did not figure that no matter where we go, we take ourselves with us.
Once again, I am watching the Sadie Show. This is a special episode, on location in the middle of Nebraska with a whole new set of extras, except the plotline is identical to all the other episodes. You get drunk, I stay sober; you do your little song and dance, I stand by ready to catch you if you trip; you disappear, I freak out; you reappear with messy hair and slurred speech and proceed to say inappropriate things. This is when it’s my turn to shine, whisking you away before you get into too much trouble, a thankless job half of the time because you won’t even remember.
It is barely dark before you run off into the corn with some guy with long greasy hair, a tattoo of a shotgun on his forearm, and a bottle of rum. I do my best to make small talk with the people at the party, telling them over and over again where I’m from and what I’m doing here. I keep looking at the wall of corn where you disappeared, illuminated by the twirling light of the bonfire, shadows like an experimental movie projection at one of those weird “noise” shows you pretend to enjoy.
Finally you emerge, glassy-eyed and grinning, your hair tangled with weeds. The greasy guy follows, slithering off into a huddle of boys in the shadows. You seem to have forgotten him completely as you run into my arms.
“Max!” you say. “This is a fun party, right?”
“It’s okay.”
“I need to sit down.”
Most of the party is gathered around the bonfire, so that is where I take you. I figure you’ll be safer in the light, where I can share the task of watching you with others. I try to prop you up on a milk crate, but you have a better idea. “Hay bales!” you exclaim. “I want to sit on a hay bale!”
A girl wearing way too much makeup rolls her eyes as she scoots over to make room, and my heart drops into my stomach. You did not see her, did not see the judgment and disgust in her eyes. But I did. So I feel it for you, feel the embarrassment and shame you would be feeling if you were conscious. People are looking at us and whispering; even the fire seems to be laughing. You are laughing too, but you don’t know that you are the joke.
“Max,” you say, leaning into me. Your lips are wet with spit. “These are like the people in that movie Boys Don’t Cry.”
“No, they’re not.”
“Yes, they are! They’re going to kill that girl with the big teeth.”
“Sadie, shut up.”
“What’s her name?”
“Hilary Swank.”
“Oh my God, they’re going to kill Hilary Swank!” Heads turn, and you are oblivious.
“Sorry,” I say to the crowd. “Sadie, I think it’s time to go,” I say to you.
“Seriously, let’s go.”
“I can’t believe they think that.”
“Sadie.”
“How could they? Don’t they know how nice you are? Don’t they know you’re the best person in the whole world?” You are getting worked up. You are yelling at the bonfire.
“Someone shut that girl up,” a shrill voice says, and my heart shatters in my chest, sends shrapnel cutting through my ribs.
You are trying to stand up. You raise your arm in the air as if declaring war. I try to pull you down, but you can be so strong when you want to be. “Why do you think my Max is going to hell? What is wrong with you people?”
A few people away, Seth laughs, still charmed by you, still playing along. “Why are you going to hell, Max?”
“Because she’s bisexual, you rednecks,” you announce to the entire state of Nebraska. “She fucks chicks!”
Oh. My. God.
Shocked silence and a few nervous giggles. I am stone. I can only see the ground, dead grass, bottle cap, cigarette butts, crumpled-up piece of paper, my feet in sandals, chipped orange nail polish, one blond hair on my right big toe.
I hate you, Sadie. I hate you so much.
Then someone says, “So what?”
I look up, look around at all the faces, expecting to see the burning hatred in their eyes, but no one’s even looking at me. Most have returned to previous conversations, some are still eyeing Sadie with annoyance, but no one’s even looking at me. No one’s going to gay bash me. No one’s going to call me a sinner. No one’s even going to show the customary straight-guy interest in the bisexual threesome fantasy. And I don’t know which is worse—being hated or being ignored—but here we are, the two of us, unwelcome in our opposite ways.
“Let’s go, Sadie,” I say quietly.
“Okay,” you agree, because despite how drunk you are, I know you can tell that they’ve already decided we’re gone.
I help you walk to the truck, and no one says goodbye, not even Seth.
You pass out as soon as I pull onto the road. The silence is a relief. Your head is on my lap and you are curled up on the seat in the fetal position. This is when you are most beautiful—when you are still, when you have let go, when you are mine to take care of. But somehow it feels different tonight, in this place that is so different from our usual haunts, with these people who have not been trained to love you. Somehow it doesn’t seem like such an honor to be your best friend, your other half, the one who completes you. I suddenly feel so exhausted, so tired of this job I’ve had for so many years. So tired of your messes. So tired of always being the one to clean them up.
But you reach out your arm and wrap it around my stomach. You burrow your face into my leg. I feel your warmth through my bones, and my anger melts away, leaving only a trail of sadness, a feeling so less sturdy.
We have been in this position so many times, with me as the chauffeur of your regret, both of us silent on the ride home from an event we will never talk about. But I remember. I always remember. One of us has to.
I pull up to the house and park the truck. I help you out even though you insist on staying. “I can sleep in here,” you mumble. “It’s soft. It has doors.” I do most of the walking as I drag you to the path that leads to our trailer. Your face is pressed against mine. You smell awful.
The night is so still that when I hear the murmur of voices across the lake it sounds amplified. The stars are bright enough that I can make out two figures in the darkness. They are coming out of the half-finished yurt near Dylan’s at the end of the row, the one no one lives in. I stop and squint my eyes, adjust my arm around you so you don’t fall. One of the figures is Marshall. His giant body and shoulder-length curls make it obvious. The other figure is smaller, a woman. Marshall leans over and kisses her. She is wrapped in a sheet, her shoulders bare. It is not his wife. Not Skyler’s mother.
It is yours. It is Lark in Marshall’s arms.
Sadie, tonight is full of so much heartbreak, and you don’t even know it. And I will not tell you. It is my job to hold it for both of us.
Something is very wrong.
Even after your worst binges, your hangovers never last this long. It’s been four days since the party, and it just seems to be getting worse. I’m used to you complaining that you’re tired, but this time it doesn’t seem like an act. You can barely get a shovel to break the earth. Yesterday you fainted while picking tomatoes.
“My throat hurts,” you croak as we walk to breakfast. We’re late. Some people have already finished eating and are heading out to the fields. It took me forever to get you out of bed this morning, and I’m trying to hurry you to the house, but you refuse to go much faster than a slug. “Feel my forehead,” you say. I am losing my patience. I am starving.
“Fine.” I put my back of my hand on your forehead. You are burning up. “Shit,” I say.
“It’s hot, huh?”
I nod. I don’t know what to do. This is something I can’t fix.
“I can’t work today,” you say. “I’m sorry.”
We stand there for a moment, in the middle of the trail, not talking. Are you asking for my permission? Are you waiting for me to say it’s okay for you to go back to bed?
“You should get some rest,” I finally say, and it feels a little like defeat, like you won this round. Sadie: 1; Max: 0. “I’ll find Lark and tell her you’re sick.”
“Thank you.” You seem relieved with your victory. “I’m sorry, Max.”
“I know.”
I know it’s not your fault that you’re sick, but I can’t help being a little mad at you. It’s always something, isn’t it? Something to make you a little less accountable, something to force me to take up the slack.
I find Lark cleaning up in the kitchen. I see a flash of her and Marshall from the other night, her naked shoulders painted with moonlight, her hair wild with the aftermath of sex, and I get a sick feeling in my stomach. But it passes, and I just see you there in the dark. Anger is replaced by a kind of apathetic sadness, a halfhearted disappointment. Of course Lark is cheating on Doff. She’s your mother, isn’t she?
“Darling!” she says when she sees me. “Where’s your other half?”
“She’s sick. Really sick. Like I think she needs to go to the doctor.”
Her face falls, but not like a mother’s who is worried about her daughter. “The nearest clinic is almost an hour away,” she finally says. She is annoyed. This is an inconvenience for her. “It’s probably the flu,” she says, a hint of guilt showing in her eyes.
“But her throat hurts too. She says it’s swollen. It could be something worse. She might need antibiotics or something.”
I can tell Lark doesn’t know what to say, and I suddenly get it. I understand how a mother could abandon her child and run off to have her own adventures. Maybe Lark doesn’t have the gene or whatever it is that makes you want to take care of someone else, to think of someone else’s feelings at all.
Her usual carefree confidence dims. She is unsure of herself in this unfamiliar territory. I must take the lead. “Call the clinic,” I tell her. “Tell them we’re coming. I’ll get Sadie.” Lark nods, and she looks like you when you’ve done something wrong.
When I get back to the trailer, I find you shivering. You have pulled all the blankets off both of our beds and are wrapped in a cocoon in the corner, with just the fuzzy pink top of your head sticking out. “I’m freezing,” you say, but it’s already at least eighty degrees outside. When I pull the blankets down, your face is drenched with sweat. “Everything hurts,” you moan, and you start to cry.
I manage to get you dressed. You insist on wearing as many layers as possible and bringing the blankets with us. Your skin is hot and slippery with sweat, but you’re shaking like you’re naked in the snow.
It takes a while, but we make it to the house where Lark is waiting. “Mommy!” you cry and shove yourself at her. Sh
e doesn’t quite know what to do with the giant crying ball of blankets, but she puts her arms around you as best she can.
“The clinic’s expecting you,” she says to me.
You pull the blankets off your head. “You’re coming, aren’t you?” You stare at your mother with a child’s heartbreak, and the beginnings of tears push the fever from your eyes. Lark’s eyes go wide with fear and shock. She had no idea she was supposed to even consider such a thing.
“Oh, um, yes, of course,” she says. “Of course I’m coming with you.” She glances at me for a split second, as if checking to make sure she got away with the lie.
I drive. You lie across us with your head on Lark’s lap. She runs her fingers through your hair but says nothing. It is a long, silent drive. I don’t feel like listening to the radio, don’t want to hear sad twangy songs or someone yelling at me about my sins. At one point, you burst awake and shove the blankets off you almost violently, tearing off your layers of clothes until you’re wearing only a tank top and underwear. “Open all the windows!” you cry. “I’m melting!” You hang your head out the window the rest of the way there, panting like a dog.
The clinic is just past Hazeldon, not much more than a little house with a sign. Lark and I wait in the tiny lobby on plastic chairs while you go with the doctor. A middle-aged woman sits across from us reading a People magazine from two years ago. She looks up when we sit down, purses her lips, and goes back to her magazine.
“You’re a good friend, Max,” Lark says.
“Thanks.”
“What do you think is wrong with her?”
“I don’t know. I’m not a doctor.” I realize that must have sounded bitchy, but I don’t really care. Lark is quiet for a minute. I pretend to look at a wrinkled edition of Crafting Quarterly magazine. I still haven’t eaten.
“I’m going to find a store and get something to eat,” I say, standing up. “Want anything?”
“No, thank you.”
I move toward the door, but Lark grabs my hand. “Wait,” she says. “Sit for a minute.”
“I’m starving.”