by T. J. Klune
“Sorry,” he said. “Sorry, sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I’m—”
“I know,” I managed to say. “I know.”
HE SLEPT deeply in the ruins of his room. He’d laughed a little hysterically at the sight, clothes strewn everywhere, drawers hanging haphazardly, the hole in the wall. Otter had pushed his mattress back up onto the bed, pulling the comforter back and letting him crawl into bed, freshly showered and dressed in sweats. He’d turned away from us almost immediately toward the wall, pulling the comforter up to his shoulder and burying his face into the pillow.
“We’ll clean this up tomorrow,” I said, but he didn’t answer.
HE WAS angry. For a long time. He was selfish and rude and essentially a fucking asshole who I wanted to punch in the face. He said things he didn’t mean. He told us to go to hell, that he never wanted to see us again. That he hated us. He hated us so goddamn much. He didn’t mean it, he said after. He never did. He was sorry, sorry, sorry.
He refused to go to rehab. He said that wasn’t for him. He could do it on his own.
I reminded him he wasn’t on his own.
He glared at me for that but nodded slowly.
Later, he whispered in my ear that if I just believed in him, he knew he could do it.
Detox was something I would never wish on anyone. The less said about that, the better. He didn’t go cold turkey—we’d been warned against that—but he wasn’t given the amount he’d taken before, wasn’t given anything but the Klonopin, and then it was only half doses. But there were night sweats and vomiting and more time spent in the bathtub. The panic attacks were swift and vicious, almost coming without warning and lasting what felt like hours. His eyes would be wide and blank, skin slick and trembling, and he’d be gasping for air, face turning red, then purple, and there was nothing we could do but hold on until it passed. There were times I wished his lack of oxygen would cause him to pass out. He never did.
He was supposed to be taking some summer courses. We’d emailed his advisor about a medical emergency. She’d responded immediately, letting me know there were situations that we needed to discuss about Tyson’s standing at Dartmouth. Otter was there during the days, and I was there at night, given that I’d already agreed to teach some summer classes and couldn’t get out of it. We switched back and forth, and it was draining and tiring, and my colleagues asked me if I was okay, my students eyed me warily, but I pushed through it because I had to. We had to. There was no other option. And we’d already decided that if it didn’t work, if he was getting worse, we’d force him to go where he needed to go.
But it too passed.
He came out on the other side weak and shaking, eyes sunken and skin tinged yellow. He forced some soup down on a Saturday, hands trembling, but when he looked up at me, his gaze was clear, and he grumbled that he wasn’t going to drown in the soup bowl and that I could leave him alone for a little bit. God, why did I have to be so annoying?
I nodded, running my hand through his hair, and had gone out into the hallway and let Otter gather me up in his arms as I broke just a little.
He did go to an addiction specialist. Sometimes we sat in. Other times, we couldn’t. But we’d be in the waiting room, either one of us or both of us every single time. Without fail.
And we kept our promise. He didn’t do a goddamn thing without running it by us first.
He hated us for it, I think.
But I didn’t give two fucks about that.
“We didn’t get this far to crap out now,” I reminded him after he’d snarled at me for asking where he was going when he’d headed for the front door, backpack slung over his shoulder. “We’ve been through too much shit for you to do anything else like this again.”
He stared at me for the longest time before he muttered he was going to meet his study group at the library. He sent me a selfie later on showing an arched eyebrow and people sitting at a table with books spread out in front of them.
That asshole.
IT WASN’T easy. Nothing good ever is. Once an addict, always an addict, or so they say. His recovery was slow and arduous, and there were days when I thought he’d slip right back to where he’d been before, days when I couldn’t believe we’d missed this, that I’d missed this. Looking back, it was so blatant what had been going on, and the fact that I hadn’t figured it out on my own continued to gnaw at me. I watched him like a hawk.
He accused me of not trusting him.
I told him I couldn’t. Not yet.
I didn’t miss the hurt on his face.
So, no. He didn’t get better right away. Real life didn’t work like that. There wasn’t going to be a revelation of addiction and then everything was going to be all right. The Kid had been through the ringer and was only now finding his footing.
Everyone told us it’d take time.
“You just gotta be there for him, you know,” Creed said to me one night when Otter and Ty were out at one of Ty’s appointments. “Same as you’ve always been.”
“Yeah, because that helped so well before,” I muttered.
“Hey,” he said.
“Hey, yourself,” I said back.
“Don’t be a dick.”
I blinked. “What?”
“Don’t be a—”
“I heard you the first time.”
“Oh. Then why’d you say—”
“I’m not being a dick.”
“A little bit. You can’t control everything, Papa Bear. No matter how much you want to. There’s always going to be something that’s out of your con—JJ, what the—Jesus Christ, did you bathe in chunky peanut butter?”
“I was trying to make a sandwich!” I heard JJ holler in the background. “I couldn’t find a knife, so I used my hands!”
“How is it in your hair?”
“My head itched, Dad. But look! Look. It’s chunky peanut butter, right? I guess now I’m nuts!”
There was a beat of silence, and then Creed burst out laughing. “Dude! Holy shit, I love you. Fuuuuck, you are the coolest kid in the world. And don’t tell your mom I said fuck or shit. And don’t tell her about the peanut butter.”
“What’ll you give me if I don’t?”
“A dollar.”
“Two dollars.”
“Deal. Now go into the bathroom. I’ll be there in a minute. And if you touch anything on your way there, I am going to tell that monster in your closet that it’s open season on little boys tonight, you hear me?”
JJ screamed.
“Kids are so stupid,” Creed said fondly. “He looks like he just crawled out of someone’s asshole. God, I love him so much.”
“I don’t know if you’re the best parent, or the worst.”
“Eh. As long as he doesn’t grow up to be evil, I’m cool. Don’t tell Anna I said that.”
“What’ll you give me if I don’t?”
“A dollar.”
I snorted. “I’m not cheap like your son—and wow, I wish that hadn’t come out like that.”
“Gross, dude,” Creed said. “Stop calling my child a cheap trick. That’s fucked-up.”
“Shut up.”
“You’re going to get through this, you know?”
I sighed. “You think?”
“Yeah. If there’s anyone that can do it, it’s you, Bear. You—man, I know I don’t say this often enough, but you’re the strongest person I know, okay? Like, I don’t know that anyone could have done what you did. You’re aces in my book, dude. I love you. And if you tell anyone I got all gay with you on the phone… well. That’s fine. I’m secure in my masculinity. In fact, you can tell anyone you want. Because I’m sensitive.”
“I love you too.”
“Yeah, yeah. I know. You’ve got this, okay? You and Otter. Hell, consider it practice for when you finally stop being a little bitch and get my brother pregnant.”
I sputtered a long time after that.
IT TOOK him a long time—well over a year—before he came to us and a
pologized, eyes pointed toward his feet, hand twisting in his pocket. “I just—I’m going to get better. I’m going to be better.”
I cried a little.
He made fun of me, telling me I was getting soft in my old age, and if I worried any more, I’d lose more hair than I already had, and man, didn’t it look like my hairline was receding even more?
I threw a magazine at his head in outrage.
Otter rolled his eyes and said he didn’t know why he put up with either of us.
The Kid and I both said bullshit at the same time.
We both looked a little startled.
Then we laughed.
It was a start.
3. Where Bear Makes a Decision
FINALLY ONE April he came to us again, looking more nervous than he’d been in a long time.
“I had a thought,” he said as we sat around the kitchen table, the windows open, the spring air clean and warm.
“Don’t hurt yourself,” Otter teased him.
“I’m serious!”
“Hi, Serious, I’m Otter.”
We gaped at him.
“What?” he asked, arching an eyebrow at us.
“Did—did you just make a dad joke?” the Kid asked faintly.
“I don’t know if I’m turned on or frightened,” I admitted.
“Ew,” the Kid said, making a face. “What a terrible thing to say. We eat at this table.”
“I’m funny,” Otter insisted.
“Eh,” the Kid and I both said at the same time.
“I’m divorcing you,” Otter said. He glanced at the Kid. “And I’m putting you up for adoption.”
“Good luck with that,” the Kid said.
“If you tried to leave, you’d be sorry,” I said. “I’d find you wherever you went.”
“Ah, marriage,” Otter said. “If it’s not love, it’s threats.”
“We trapped you,” the Kid said. “Forever.”
Otter looked rather pleased at the thought, and not for the first time, I thought of the binder hidden away in his nightstand next to the bed. It’d been on my mind more and more lately.
“So, I’ve called you both here today to discuss my future,” the Kid said.
“This should be good,” I said.
“Remember when he was nine and did this?” Otter asked me. “He made me give him five dollars but refused to tell me what it was for.”
“And I never will,” the Kid said. “You will go to your grave never knowing what I—”
“He ordered Sea Monkeys out of the back of a magazine,” I said. “He said he needed to study how they built the castles like advertised. It was really rather adorable, how gullible he used to be. I miss those days.”
“Bear! You vile betrayer! You promised you would never tell anyone.”
“I found him in his room talking to them,” I said rather gleefully. “He was telling them how when they became sentient, he was going to become their supreme ruler, and that any dissent against him would be met with swift justice.”
“You bought Sea Monkeys so you could become a dictator?” Otter asked with a frown. “That’s… frightening. And really not unexpected, actually.”
“I would have been benevolent. A loveable dictator, like Thomas Sankara.”
“We have no idea who that is,” Otter reassured him.
“He overthrew the government of the African Nation Burkina Faso in the eighties and promoted women’s rights and launched a vaccination program to eradicate polio.” The Kid frowned. “Granted, he had his faults, like when he fired a couple of thousand teachers when they went on strike—”
“I don’t like him already.”
“—but he was still pretty awesome.”
“What happened to him?” Otter asked, because he couldn’t not.
The Kid waved a hand at him. “He was killed in a coup organized by his closest ally. Them’s the breaks, I suppose. I assume being a dictator is hard.”
“How did we get to talking about this?” I asked, staring up at the ceiling.
“We don’t ask that question anymore,” Otter reminded me. “Remember? Because it makes us sad.”
I sighed. “Right. Dammit. I’m a little sad now.”
The Kid scowled at us. “Okay, so you know when I call for a meeting and then you two do that thing where you banter back and forth and you’re in love and gross and nobody wants to see that?”
“Sea Monkeys,” Otter said. “We were talking about Sea Monkeys.”
“You weren’t supposed to think about how we got here,” I hissed at him.
“That’s the day I learned about the dark side of big business,” the Kid said solemnly. “That they could sell you lies and keep your hard-earned five dollars.”
“My hard-earned five dollars,” Otter said.
“Um, wow. Way to make it all about you, Otter. Thanks. Like finding out I’d ordered nothing but brine shrimp and that they wouldn’t wear fancy little suits and dresses and make dinners in a brightly colored castle wasn’t devastating enough.”
“Hey! That’s not—”
“Anyway, I had a reason for being here, but Otter—as usual—is attempting to distract us from the matters at hand.”
“That’s rude,” I told Otter, in case he didn’t know.
Otter looked grumpy at that. It didn’t help his case, whatever it was. “See if I ever give you five dollars again.”
“Oh man,” the Kid said, smacking his head. “I forgot to tell you guys. I had to have Corey spot me lunch yesterday because I forgot my wallet at home. All I have is my card too. Do you have any cash I can give him? I feel bad.”
“Sure,” Otter said, reaching for his wallet. “How much was it?”
“Five bucks.”
Otter started digging through the bills. Then, “You son of a bitch.”
“Dammit.”
“Should have waited a few more minutes,” I said. “Would have worked. He’s forty now. And you know they say the mind is the first thing to go.”
The Kid squinted at me. “Like you have any room to talk.”
“Worst meeting ever,” I muttered.
“We’ve only been here for eight minutes, and I already don’t like either of you,” Otter said. “That has to be a new record.”
Ty rolled his eyes. “Give it a bit. You guys will be back to embarrassing me with your disgusting displays of affection in no time. The elderly should not get caught making out in the pantry.”
“I was trying to make the grocery list,” I said. “Don’t you blame that one on me.”
Otter shrugged. “And you can’t blame me either. You know how I get when he makes lists.”
I grinned at him. “I’m so glad I married you.”
“Yeah,” Otter said, reaching under the table and squeezing my knee. “Me too.”
“See!” the Kid exclaimed. “You’re doing it again! That wasn’t even a minute. This is terrible. Everything about this is terrible.”
“Wanna go make out in the pantry?” Otter asked me.
“Yes. Yes, please. All of that.”
“Ugh,” the Kid said. “No one should ever have to see their older brother’s horny face. You’re going to make me more damaged than I already am.”
And the good mood went right out the window.
The Kid winced. “Shit. I didn’t mean it that way. Both of you need to stop looking at me like that.”
“You’re not damaged,” I said sternly.
“And you know we don’t like hearing that come from you,” Otter said. “You’ve come a long way in a short amount of time. It’s something to be proud of, Kid.”
“I know that. But—it’s. Argh. You don’t understand.”
“Then explain it,” I told him. “We can’t understand unless you tell us.”
“I resented you,” he blurted, then looked immediately horrified. And even though I knew I had to let him finish, it still hurt to hear. “Not like—god. Okay. I need you to listen to me, okay? Like, without in
terrupting me. It’ll be easier that way.”
“I never interrupt you.”
“Sometimes,” Otter said, patting my hand.
“Not when it’s important.”
“Sometimes,” he said again. “You’re just… forceful.”
“That was a euphemism, wasn’t it.”
“A little. It’s endearing. Mostly.”
“Fine,” I said. “I won’t interrupt.”
The Kid stared at me for a moment like he didn’t believe me. Then, “I want to go back to Seafare.”
And that wasn’t something I expected. And there wasn’t going to be a problem with me interrupting, because I couldn’t think of a single goddamn word to say.
“I know—I know it’s… weird,” he continued. “I get that. After… well. After everything. But I think it’s time, you know? It’s been almost four years, and I… I don’t know. I think I need it. And this isn’t spur of the moment, okay? This is—I’ve thought about this. A lot. Maybe more than anything else. And I know things are a little bit better, but I’ve still got this fog in my head, and I don’t know what else to do to clear it. I feel like I’m still floundering, you know? Like I’m out in the middle of the ocean, and I can’t seem to find my way back.”
Oh, yes, it whispered. You’d know all about that, wouldn’t you, Bear? Drowning in the ocean. It’s a good thing to know your crazy is apparently genetic. Either that or it’s a learned behavior. And Otter wants to have kids with you? What could possibly go wrong with that?
“I don’t know what else to do,” Ty admitted. “Sometimes I think I’m getting better, and other times, I feel myself sinking right back to where I was before. I’ll be lucky at this point if Dartmouth lets me continue at all. And that’s… I know that’s on me, but everything I do to try and make it better only seems to make things worse. I can’t focus in my classes. I can’t do what’s asked of me, and if I keep on how I am now, it’s going to just make things worse. There has to be a change, and I don’t know if I can do that here.”
“But you think you can do that in Seafare?” Otter asked. “No offense, Kid, but there’s not a lot of happy memories there.”