If

by Nina G. Jones

  The paintings up close were just a blur, but from this distance, they formed one massive picture. It was me and Jordan dancing, bursting in light. I finally saw the golden bursts of my laughter that Ash always described. Ash even painted himself from behind, holding the guitar. I was like a fourth spectator, watching the scene from a hidden corner. I remembered this night vividly. It was one of the happiest of my life. After being made to feel ugly by those girls in the bathroom all those years ago, I had never felt more beautiful. I didn’t have much, but I had all I needed in that room.

  I don’t think Ash ever intended to show this piece. I think he made it for me.

  ASH

  Miller looked tired when he picked me up from LAX. He and Ella just had their third child. I wasn’t very close with my nieces and nephews due to geography, but I also just let Ella continue to have her space. I wasn’t even sure if she still disliked me, now that I had stopped being a loser. But a manwhore booze hound for an uncle still wasn’t a very good role model, not that they knew all that. I kept my vices quiet.

  “The prodigal son returns,” Miller said. He was trying to be light and funny, but I could tell he was stressed.

  “So what’s the deal with dad?”

  “He’s stable. They’re doing tests on him. He’ll be there a few more days for observation. Man, I thought we had lost him. He and mom were at my place, we had a little grill-out, out back.” Another family event that I wasn’t around for. I had rejected enough invites for them to stop asking. “He was laughing, and then he started coughing. He said his arm and shoulder hurt and then he collapsed.”

  “Shit.”

  “Yeah. And he went blue and I did CPR. EMTs came just in time, bro.”

  “So he’s up now? That’s good, right?”

  “I think so. But this all just happened a couple of days ago. He’s still getting his strength back.”

  We pulled into Miller’s driveway.

  “Ella’s at her mom’s. It’s closer to the hospital and her parents could help her with the kids while I stayed with mom and dad.” He grabbed my suitcase from the back of his BMW and passed it over to me. “Guest house is all yours. You need anything? There’s all the essentials back there. No food though since it’s usually empty these days.”

  “Nah, thanks. I think I just need a shower.”

  “Cool.” He looked at this watch. “I’ll order some food. Mexican or pizza?”

  “Mexican. No point in trying pizza anywhere else when you live in New York. And I really miss my SoCal Mexican food.”

  Miller laughed. “Alright, just come to the main house when you’re done.”

  Stepping back into the guest house was like going back into time. Pale blue walls, crisp white sheets, white cabinetry, the small marble kitchen counter where Miller would leave me food and money. It was hard to ever believe I was that kid. That I had lived on the streets for a period of time in my life. I never saw myself as homeless, but I wondered if any homeless people do. It’s a shitty situation, not an identity.

  After the shower, I headed back out to the main house just as the delivery guy pulled in.

  “So, I’m thinking we should head to the hospital after this,” my brother stated casually as he sorted out the boxes of food.

  I glared at Miller. Did he think was just going to slip that in?

  “I never agreed to that. I just got here.”

  “You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me.”

  “And you’re delusional if you think you are going to pressure me into a family reunion.”

  Suddenly, Miller took his plate full of food and threw it against the wall. Shapes that matched the shattered glass all over the kitchen erupted in my vision.

  “You’re a selfish asshole, Ash.”

  “Fuck you.”

  “What are you punishing us for? Huh? What did mom and dad do?”

  “Punishing you? This isn’t about you, Mill.”

  “It’s not? Are you sure? I’m the one who has to deal with mom and dad asking about you all the fucking time. I’m the one who has to make up for both you and Sarah being gone. I had to watch your ass when you lost your shit over and over. Don’t tell me this has nothing to do with me!”

  This was not Miller. Miller never lost his temper like this. But I guess everyone has it in them.

  “Oh, and where the fuck were you when Sarah died? Where were you? You ran off to school as soon as you had a chance. You were barely home a week.”

  “I couldn’t stay home. I just couldn’t.”

  “Well, whatever you had to deal with these past few years, I promise was nothing like those months after Sarah died. It was like living in a fucking never-ending wake. Her body was gone, but the whole place was in mourning. Mom was a fucking zombie, dad was barely keeping it together, and I literally had just lost my mind! But you got to leave. You got your time to recover and find yourself.”

  “So that gave you an excuse to just leave us behind?”

  “Excuse? I had to go. I couldn’t even look at them. I was the person who killed Sarah. Do I have to spell it out for you? I killed Sarah!”

  I never said those words to anyone in my family, and they never said them to me. I think that’s what let the weight of it grow over time and become so heavy. That truth became a monster, sucking the life out of our family.

  “You think that, Ash? You think we think that? It was a fucking accident!”

  “No.” I pinched the bridge of my nose, desperately trying to prevent tears from emerging. “I killed her. I was out of my fucking mind on the road that day. I was manic. I was speeding, trying to make her think I was such a badass fucking driver in dad’s stick shift. I slammed on the brakes. I fucking killed Sarah!”

  Miller sank like the bravado of his tirade had been sucked out of him. “Bro, you think we couldn’t put that together on our own? It was our fucking fault. We ignored the signs for years, we just let you go through that and we just thought Ash is the sensitive one, Ash is the unique one. Mom and dad blame themselves, if anything. But at the end of the day, it isn’t anyone’s fault. We were all trying to do the best we could. You have a disorder, the things you say and do when you are in that state are not you. That was the first fucking thing the doctor told us.”

  I rolled my eyes. I hated accepting the fact that I didn’t have control over myself.

  “Didn’t you tell me that once? That it felt like someone else was in the driver’s seat and you were being taken for a crazy ride? What happened was an accident. It wasn’t your fault. Even if you were driving like an asshole, that truck was way too fucking close.”

  “I can’t face mom and dad after all the hurt I’ve caused them. I’ve fucked up in so many ways. It’s been too long now for me to come back.”

  “We all lost Sarah. It was horrible, but she was dead and we eventually had to accept it and move on. But none of us can accept you not being part of the family. I lost my sister, but I lost you, too. Mom and dad lost two kids. We all just want you back. And I know you think it’s too late, but it’s not.”

  Miller’s cheeks were wet with tears and my eyes burned from trying to keep mine in. I made a promise to Bird. I would never be able to keep that promise until I reconciled with my family. I would never be able to face my pain if I didn’t face them and if I didn’t fill the void that was created when I left them behind.

  “Dad needs you.”

  “Fuck,” I muttered to myself. I had been gone for so long, built this thing up for so long, that it was physically difficult to agree. “Alright, man.”

  We bear hugged, giving each other some good old brotherly back slaps. I felt lighter. I felt like I was pinned under a bunch of rocks and finally someone was moving them one by one, so that I could breathe again.

  “Shit,” Miller said, looking at the mess he had created. “Ella is gonna have my balls on a platter.”

  “Where’s the cleaning supplies?” I asked as he began to collect the fragments of porcelain from the ground. />
  “Uh, just down that hall, there’s small closet. It’s full of all that stuff.”

  I wandered down to the closet, grabbed a bucket, a broom, a mop and some random bottles with liquid that all seemed to have the same function but for some reason Ella needed to have about fifteen of them.

  I came back to the kitchen just in time to find Miller hanging up his phone. His face was flushed red before but now it was a sickening gray.

  “Dad’s . . . gone,” he said.

  BIRD

  I LEAPT INTO Jordan’s arms when he arrived.

  “Biiiiird!” he sang, swinging me around in a big circle. “What’s all this?” he asked, looking at the paintings on the floor as he let me down.

  “I was putting away some stuff in my storage room downstairs and I came upon some of Ash’s old stuff. I thought it might be time to dig it up. I’m going to get it framed and mounted. You can’t see it up close, but from far away, it’s us.”

  “Us?”

  “Yeah, remember that night when Ash took your guitar and played ‘Layla’ and we danced?”

  “Yeah . . . actually I do.”

  “Believe it or not, it’s probably worth a ton of money.”

  “Say what?”

  I told him the story of how I stumbled upon Ash in the New York Times. I didn’t get to the part about meeting him and having sex with him.

  “You sure it was him?”

  “Jordan, the show had the exact piece he painted on the roof when I found him before he broke the window at the art store.”

  “Wow. I just can’t believe it. Of course, the talent was always there, I just didn’t know if he could get his act together.”

  “I never doubted,” I said.

  Jordan dumped his bag on the floor and ran up to the loft to get the intended view of the paintings. “Oh my god. Genius. How the hell did he do that?”

  “Beats me. I had no idea. I had assumed it was some abstract thing all along.”

  Jordan came back downstairs and we sat on my couch. “That’s crazy, that he’s become some big-time artist. Are you thinking of maybe reaching out to him?”

  The question surprised me. I thought of all people Jordan would be the one to talk me out of meeting Ash after all these years, but his tone sounded like he was all for it.

  “Well, actually, that’s what I was going to tell you next. I asked around at the show and found his manager or something. She wouldn’t tell me who he was, even when I knew it. I could see it in her eyes when I said his name. Anyway, I gave up, thought it was stupid anyway. But after a show, he was there, waiting outside.”

  “Whoa.”

  “Yeah.”

  “What did he tell you?” Jordan asked.

  “He invited me to his place so we could talk. He swears he left me because he didn’t want to hold me back.” I paused and looked out the window, trying to disguise the sadness I still felt.

  “And?”

  “I don’t know, Jordan. I just can’t allow myself to accept that. He left me like I was nothing.”

  Jordan looked down and softly shook his head in sympathy.

  “I feel so stupid,” I said.

  “Why?”

  “Because I threw out everything I said I would ever do if I saw him again.”

  “Did you have sex with him?” Jordan’s eyes bulged as he asked.

  I looked down and nodded, but Jordan didn’t say anything. No reprimand. No judgment.

  “So what does it all mean?”

  “Nothing. That was a couple of weeks ago. I left in the middle of the night while he was sleeping. I left a note saying I wouldn’t let him hurt me again. He’s been sending me messages, but I won’t let myself get sucked back in.”

  “You really don’t believe him.”

  “I want to. I really do. But I was so hurt for so long. He just up and left. No explanation. He didn’t say goodbye. What if Danse had flopped? What if we hadn’t gotten the tour? What if I never got my break? Then what would be his excuse? We could have been happy. He made the decision for us. And I just can’t trust that he won’t up and leave when something gets hard again. He’s done it so many times. He did it when I thought he really wanted to be with me.”

  Jordan listened quietly, but his demeanor had changed. His eyes looked through me, like he was thinking about something else.

  “Tell me you don’t think I should give him another chance, because I am not getting the cheers I expected from you.”

  “Bird, I need to tell you something. But I think I might need some protective gear first.”

  His attempt at humor made me tense.

  “What?”

  “I just want you to know I did what I thought was best for you. I did it out of love. And I didn’t think telling you would make a difference until now.”

  “Spit it out.”

  “When you told me you weren’t going to do the tour because of Ash, I knew you were making a huge mistake. You weren’t seeing clearly because of the whole situation. You wanted to be there for him, but I knew that your judgment was clouded.”

  I sensed Jordan was getting to a bad place.

  “I visited Ash at the hospital. He seemed perfectly sound. He was in his right mind. And I told him. I told him what you would be giving up for him and that’s it.”

  It took a few beats for me to process everything Jordan had said. “That’s it?” I asked sarcastically.

  “I just knew that he cared about you and he wouldn’t want you to lose out on the opportunity either.”

  I shot up from the couch. “You told him to leave me?”

  “No, I never told him that. I just told him he should know. He understood on his own that as long as he was around, you would do anything you could to help him.”

  “I can’t believe you,” I sneered. “All these years you knew this and you didn’t tell me?”

  “I didn’t want you to be mad at me. He made his choice and he was gone. Telling you wouldn’t have changed that.”

  “Oh my god, Jordan,” I yelled, balling my hair up in my fists. “Why do you think he was out in the streets in the first place? He saw himself as a burden. And you went over there and you told him he was a burden all over again. Of course he would leave. You made him think he was hurting me!”

  “Wasn’t he?”

  “Not your call. Not your fucking call!” I jabbed my finger at him. “What is it with men making my decisions for me?” I asked myself in despair. “Do you even understand how dangerous that could have been? I don’t care how normal he seemed. There’s a lot going on up there. Someone with his issues can get to a dark place fast.”

  Jordan gripped his forehead. “I didn’t—he seemed fine again. You were my priority. I didn’t want you to have regrets.”

  I laughed sarcastically. “You think I didn’t have regrets after he left?”

  “If I told you right away, I was afraid there was a risk you might still quit and try to find him. Then time passed and I thought you had moved on.”

  “Those were not your decisions to make.”

  “When Ash left, you were able to fulfill your dreams. And now he’s back. Maybe this was meant to be. What good would it have been to tell you before now?”

  “It would have made me suffer so much less. So many nights I asked myself why? Why he lied, why he said he would be there and then he just left. It’s because of you! You meddled. You went behind my back! And then you lied about it for years. You are my best friend and you deceived me. You watched me suffer and you didn’t have the mercy to ease the pain.”

  “You lied to Ash, too. You didn’t tell him about the tour because you knew he would tell you to leave. Or maybe you knew he would leave himself.”

  “Don’t you put this on me,” I snapped.

  Jordan paused and closed his eyes, taking a big breath before opening them again.

  “I’m sorry, Bird. I am so sorry.”

  “You’re not sorry. You’re only telling me now because he might be back
in the picture.”

  “I’m telling you because I want you to have the full picture of the decision he made. I do think he loved you and I think he left because of that. I think that is the only reason he left.”

  “Whatever, Jordan.”

  “I really thought and still think it was for the best. Look at all you have.”

  “God, you are such a know it all. You don’t have all the answers, Jordan. You think you have it all figured out with your perfect husband and your little Asian baby.”

  “Nice. Very nice, Bird.”

  “Five years. You held in that lie for five years. You never wanted Ash in the picture. You had your mind made up early on.”

  “That’s not true. I liked Ash.”

  “At a distance. And you of all people should know what it’s like to live on the outskirts of society. For people who don’t even know you to judge you.”

  “Oh, so because I am gay I have to be the patron saint of homelessness?”

  “There it is, ladies and gentlemen. How Jordan really feels!” I announced to an invisible audience.

  Jordan rolled his eyes.

  “You made Ash feel like he was a problem that needed solving.”

  Jordan looked away in shame.

  I walked over the painting and pointed down. “And that’s what he thought of you. You manipulated him.”

  I don’t think I had ever been that angry before. There was always something that didn’t make sense about Ash leaving. It made me feel like I had imagined our relationship and how important we were to each other. Jordan held the answer to it all. He watched me suffer, and he continued to hold onto it. All along, he knew he was wrong for going behind my back.

  “I can’t hang out with you today. I just can’t,” I said, going upstairs. “You don’t have to leave, but if you did, that would be great.”

  “I’ll go,” Jordan said. “I love you, Bird.”

  I put my hand up to make him to stop. I didn’t want to hear the bullshit. I really didn’t.

  I went to the bathroom, ran some hot water and rinsed my face in an effort to gain some clarity. I heard the door to my apartment close as Jordan exited.