Till it Stops Beating

by Hannah R. Goodman

  I feel myself get hot and I shoot good ole “B” a look.

  But Cliff apparently doesn’t let anything slide because he puts his glasses back on and says, “Hey, now. Don’t get mad at your sis. That woman loves you more than you will ever know. Listen to me, because like your sis, I’ve been through total hell and I— both of us—have hit the dirty bottom.”

  The heat inside me bypasses anxiety and goes straight to anger. “I don’t drink or do drugs, Cliff. I don’t have a ‘bottom’.” I put air quotes around the word. “Dirty or otherwise.”

  He gives a hearty laugh and throws a knowing look at my sis B (makes me want to puke). “Everyone, little sis, has a bottom.”

  I cross my arms. “I’m not and never will be your ‘little sis’.”

  “Maddie,” Barb or, excuse me, B, gives me a nudge in my shoulder. I shake her off and glare at Cliff who smiles in that way that condescending adults do to kids when they are thinking oh she thinks she knows everything, just wait…

  “Listen, Maddie. I’m telling you that everyone has a bottom and you seem to be hitting yours. Do you know what happens next? I mean you should. You’ve seen B here a few times at the bottom.”

  God, she has told him everything.

  “What happens, Maddie, after you hit bottom?” Barb asks me softly with tears in the corner of her eyes.

  I shake my head because I don’t want to open my mouth because now all of the sudden, out of nowhere, tears clump in my throat. My bottom is rising to the top. And I hate it. Almost as much as jelly doughnuts.

  Cliff leans down so we are almost face-to-face. I refuse to tilt my head to look at him. “You look up. Maddie, once you reach that bottom, that’s it. Then you have no choice but to look up.”

  I don’t move or say anything.

  . . . . .

  After everyone is gone and I take a brief nap, I’m at the computer checking my email. Alyssa Yoo is in my inbox. I do the happy dance and click it open:

  Dear Maddie, I’m happy to take a look at your work for your senior project. In fact, maybe we can set up a schedule to follow? Let me know the details about deadlines and such, and then we can create a writing and feedback schedule for your work. Mrs. Dubois has told me about the work you’ve done for the literary magazine and school newspaper (she sent me one of your stories “The Ticking Boy” about the girl who falls for a boy with Tourette’s. What a touching piece!). Anyway, I’m excited you contacted me, and looking forward to working together!

  Best, Alyssa Yoo

  I’m smiling so hard my lips tingle. I email her back with the deadline date of the rough draft and final draft. I attach all the other paperwork that Mrs. Dubois emailed to all the seniors in September.

  I’m looking up.

  Chapter Nine

  Back to Life

  The whole rest of the week I focused on writing and running on the treadmill every day. At night, Bubbie and I checked in with each other and gave each other pep talks. I tried little trips to the supermarket (not driving, just tagging along) and drug store. By the weekend, my parents didn’t even have to ask. I was going back to school. It’s the perfect week to do it. Just three days to Thanksgiving.

  Sunday night I lay out my back to school outfit—jeans and a turtleneck sweater—and take a long hot shower before bed. It’s been a good day. I went for a run on the treadmill and wrote almost thirty pages of my book. They may not be the greatest pages, but I’m writing. I even replied to Alyssa and sent her all thirty pages.

  In the morning, I get up and dress quickly. My mother hands me my lunch and a travel mug of tea. My father drives me to school and says he would pick me up right at 1:40. None of us are comfortable with me driving yet.

  Peter and Susan meet me in the lobby and then hustle me down to the senior corridor. “You have to get back into your life, Maddie.” Susan says as we stop at my locker.

  “Yeah and we are here, and you will let us help you.” Peter does his stern father routine and waits patiently as I turn the lock of my locker.

  “It’s not that bad, guys,” I tell them and rub the bottle of Rescue Remedy in my pocket.

  I leave them to meet with Mrs. Dubois, and we decide my duties as school newspaper editor will be taken over by the girl who will become editor next year, a fresh-faced junior who has buck teeth and very straight hair. She has no personality but knows more about independent and dependent clauses than Mrs. Dubois.

  Every move is robotic. I hurry on stiff legs back down to Mrs. Dubois and sit in class and listen to her talk about Odysseus’ return to Ithaca after the Trojan War. His wife and son thought he was dead. He returns after ten years, and it is not the sweet homecoming he wished and thought it would be. As I watch Mrs. Dubois scribbling all kinds of notes on the chalkboard—none of which I write down—I daydream of a similar type homecoming after going away to college. I come home to my room transformed into a pink and frilly gift-wrapping room for Mom. Peter and Susan send me emails saying they are taking semesters abroad or saving the whales or something, and they aren’t returning home.

  My heart pounds. My chest tightens.

  I look at the clock and see class has just begun. I do what Mrs. Dubois had instructed me to do during our brief chat this morning. “Just get up and go, if you have to. No big deal.”

  I slide out the back door of the classroom. No one even looks over when my chair scrapes against the floor.

  My heart slows down as soon as my clogs hit the linoleum. I don’t have a hall pass. The smell of breakfast is still in the air mixed with some kind of cleaner. I feel my jeans pocket. Cell phone. Check. Rescue Remedy. Check.

  My heart steadies. I go to the sink and splash water on my face. Then I go into one of the stalls. When I finish, I stand up in mountain pose and do some breathing. Gotta get through the day. Don’t want to disappoint my parents or Susan and Peter.

  I feel my phone vibrate in my jeans. I pull it out and look at the screen but don’t recognize it. Must be a wrong number. I stuff it back into my pocket and take another deep breath and go back to class.

  . . . . .

  “You made it!”

  We stand together outside of school. It’s sunny and warmer than it should be. Peter puts his arm around me and squeezes.

  “It wasn’t that hard.” I lie.

  “Really?” Susan loops an arm through mine.

  “I’m fine. I got through it.”

  I lean against the stonewall that’s in front of the entrance to school. I know my dad will be a little late.

  “Let us take you home,” Peter says as he pulls out his shades.

  “Yeah, maybe we can go for coffee?” Susan says.

  I watch Peter clean his glasses and make his irritated noise like when he orders a bagel and it has poppy seeds on it.

  Susan narrows her eyes at me.

  A year from now we won’t be doing this.

  “Maddie?”

  “Hey? Do you want to sit down?”

  “I’m fine.” I cross my arms and shift my weight. I want to go home and crawl under the covers.

  Susan and Peter hover closer to me.

  “When was the last time you went for a run outside??”

  I don’t respond to Susan

  “Why don’t we all go home and go for a run around the neighborhood together?”

  Now I laugh. Susan is as athletic as Peter. Neither do more than exercise their enormous brains. Peter lifts weights a little and uses his parents’ home gym. But Susan? Ha! She takes classes here and there. She follows the trends. This month it’s—

  “…belly-dancing class wi
th me tonight?”

  Now I have to join in. “Peter, you up for that?”

  He throws me a dirty look. “Oh, ‘cause I’m gay?”

  We all laugh.

  As we giggle and Susan belly dances for us I hear, “Madeline?” I look out into the parking lot and see—

  This is not happening…again? Sean? Really? He has this way of always just appearing.

  My heart pounds but not in an anxiety way. Peter and Susan’s voices fade away. Then, way too loud and clear, I hear, “Hey, sweetie. Sorry I’m so late.”

  There’s my dad with his crazy hair sticking out of the window of his car.

  “Oh, Dad… “

  Sean leans out of his window and waves at me.

  I look from my dad back to Sean. “Hang on a second,” I tell him.

  I run to my dad’s car. “Dad,” I’m out of breath. “Is it okay if I go home with Susan and Peter?” I don’t know why I don’t just tell him about Sean.

  He looks past me to Susan and Peter who get that invisible signal I send off and come to car. “We have a project for AP English, Mr. Hickman. I can drive Maddie home.”

  “Oh, well.” His face says relief. He thinks this means I’m back to normal. “School was good then?”

  “Yeah, it was good.” I push my lips into a full smile.

  “Good. Peter, just have her home in time for dinner. You two can stay if you want? Mrs. Hickman is making lasagna.”

  My awesome best friends both shake their heads.

  “Gotta work on my senior project,” Peter says.

  “I have an AP Chem test tomorrow.” Susan is as believable as Peter.

  “Another time. Have a good time with your project, kids.”

  We wave to my father as he leaves. As soon as he is out of sight, I turn back to Sean and see him hanging out the window smiling. Susan and Peter each hug me. “Go have a fun afternoon,” Peter whispers in my ear.

  I nod and say back, “I will.”

  . . . . .

  I click my seatbelt in and say to Sean, “You seem to have a way of just showing up.”

  “Is that bad?”

  “No…kind of supernatural. Just when I’m feeling really shitty, you pop up and all the stress fades away.”

  “Glad I can be of service.”

  We drive down the long driveway out of school.

  “Why so shitty?”

  “Just a lot of stuff going on…” I want to tell him that this was my first day back to school since I lost my mind, but this time around I will opt for withholding...a little.

  “Family?”

  Easy way out, so I nod.

  The car slows to a stop. Cars are bumper to bumper as we approach the exit.

  I reach for something in my mind to talk about that’s not too crazy. So, I blurt out, “I’m writing a book. For senior project.”

  “Really?

  “Yeah, it’s fun.” I’m so lame. Fun?

  He laughs. “You say that like it’s skiing or something.”

  I laugh.

  “Now my senior year, I totally coasted. Thought I knew it all.” He glances at me. “You don’t seem to be coasting with writing a book and everything.”

  “I’m doing okay.” I nibble on my cuticle. “Actually, writing the book is kind of cathartic.” I stop not wanting to ruin this non-date date with my rambling.

  He clicks on his turn signal. He looks left and then right. “I didn’t freak out until I got to college. First semester. Total break down.”

  I watch his hands turn the wheel, trying to find the right way to react and wanting to scream, “Yay! Someone else not over forty knows what this feels like!”

  Instead I ask, “What happened?”

  He drives with one hand on the bottom of the wheel and the other on the shift in the middle console. “I went to UVM for the first year as a physics major, thinking it was a more practical idea than theater. I flunked everything. Went home at Christmas and crawled into bed for a month. Actually, cried when my parents said I had to go back.”

  “But you went back?”

  “Yep. Because I am always and forever, the best son. Didn’t want to burden them with my misery. But I decided that I wasn’t going to stay a physics major. Second semester I switched majors to theater and general science and reapplied to schools closer to home and now—”

  “Here you are.”

  “Here I am.”

  He asks where to go and the only place I can think of is Starbucks. Perfect for a non-date date. We drive along. The heater fills the air between us.

  Then he says, “I called you.”

  “When?”

  “Today. I know I should have called you before, like right after we saw each other. I hope you weren’t mad. I thought you might be because you didn’t call me, but then I was thinking you could be waiting for me to call you.”

  Maybe I should tell him about my own mental melt down. But I opt for: “Actually, I don’t have your number in my phone.” Which is true.

  I pull my phone out and look at the last number that had come up when I was in the bathroom. I read it to him.

  “Yep,” He grins. “That was me.”

  I highlight it and click ‘add to contacts’. “It’s official. You’re in my phone.”

  “It’s official.”

  We pull into Starbucks and as we get out of the car I ask, “Any tips on avoiding a ‘total melt down’?”

  Chapter Ten

  Catch Up

  “Catch me up? When we talked on the phone last week you said you’d seen Dr. Foster.”

  “Twice,” I hold up two fingers for proof.

  Josephine smiles. “Twice. And you returned to school?”

  “It’s been two weeks. A week and a half because of Thanksgiving.”

  “And you’re on some medicine.” She glances down at her pad of paper where a bunch of scribbles take up most of the page.

  “Yeah, I’ve taken it just a few times when I was having a full panic attack. I took the SATs this Saturday and took it then. But I rely on this—” I pull out my Rescue Remedy.

  Josephine laughs and reaches down into her purse resting by her feet. “Me, too.”

  “Should I be worried that my shrink is popping the same meds as me?”

  Josephine shakes her head. “No, you should be glad. That’s why I can do what I do.”

  Sufficiently warmed up, we get right into it. I relay all the events of the last few weeks. She listens as she usually does. Her hands folded in her lap and her head cocked to the side. Nodding and mmhhmmming to let me know she’s listening.

  “When I get panicked I just do the stuff you’ve taught me, or if it’s really bad, like I said, I know I have the meds. And sometimes just knowing I have it makes me calm down.” I pull my legs up and sit cross-legged on the couch. “And, Dr. Foster says I only need to come back to check in about every month or so. But he also said that if I’m seeing you, I don’t have to continue with him.”

  “Are you seeing me?”

  “Yes. Yes. I’d like to see you.”

  “Weekly?”

  Even though I nod, the panic crackles through.

  She cocks her head. “Will that work for you?”

  “Yeah,” but my voice is a little weak.

  “What are you thinking?”

  “I don’t know,” I whisper.

  We sit silently, just the faint click of the small clock on the table next to m
e. I know what she wants me to do right now because I know how she rolls in moments like this.

  “I guess,” I search for words or thoughts, but everything is kind of blank. “I guess I’m afraid.”

  “Of?”

  My mind fills now with just these far away images of me in a cap and gown, of me driving away from home. It makes my heart pound.

  “Leaving.” I say it and can’t believe how true it is.

  “That’s pretty normal, Maddie. Going away to college for the first time is a major milestone.”

  “I know but it’s definitely hitting me harder than my friends.”

  “Maybe. But you don’t know because it’s not something that you all are going to talk about necessarily.” She pushes a stray, short, black strand of hair out of her face. “Tell me about now. What’s going on right now in your life? Focusing on the now will help you not feel so anxious about the future.”

  And, of course, she’s right because I tell her all about Sean and instead of my heart pounding in fear, it pounds with excitement.

  When I leave and get into my car—I started driving myself over the weekend— I check my phone and see that Sean called. This is where I will be from now on, in the present. Not the past and not the future—no matter how scared I am.

  . . . . .

  And when I check my email that night, it’s from Alyssa and proves to be the message/sign that I can and will move forward, that I can leave my fears behind.

  Dear Maddie,

  I read your pages last night and wanted to respond to you as my thoughts are fresh. In a nutshell, I want to say that I’m impressed. Your dialogue and the voice of Mya are spot on and your writing is clear and honest. What’s most impressive is the way you seem to be able to portray Dylan even though the story is in first person and, therefore, limited in perspective. But you use that dialogue and the contrast between the two characters (their differences, oy vey!) in relating to the world around them. Really splendid job. Despite his bad boyness, despite all the pain these two have caused each other, it’s clear that they have a deep connection and an unstoppable electrical charge between them…I’m definitely rooting for their success.