Stronger

by Jeff Bauman

  We woke up late. It was so late, in fact, that our breakfast was lunch at Taco Bell. “You need to find a way to deal with your emotions,” Erin said, as she watched me crunch into a taco wrapped in a Dorito.

  “I know.”

  “You can’t let everything build up.”

  “I know,” I said. “I’m sorry.”

  It was a long ride back to Chelmsford, especially since the radio wasn’t working. It had broken when I punched it, something I only hazily remembered. There were a lot of details I didn’t remember from the night before: things I’d said to Erin, things I’d said about the bombing and my legs.

  “You need to talk to me,” Erin said. “And not just when you’ve been drinking. You need to talk with me when you’re sober, too.”

  But I didn’t. I couldn’t.

  Back at the apartment, Erin packed her things. Before we left for the comedy show she had already planned to stay at her parents’ house for a few days. Our house closing was supposed to be the following week, but it had been pushed back for the third time. When Erin heard the news, she said she needed to go home. For a haircut. Her friend was getting married the next weekend, and she was in the wedding. She had to get her dress fitted, organize our overnight trip, coordinate reception details, and help me with my outfit. Because of the bulkiness of my sockets, none of my long pants would fit over my thighs.

  “I’m wearing my penguin shorts,” I finally told her. “Who is going to complain?”

  I knew things were unresolved when she left, and I knew that was because of me. I sat in Mom’s apartment for most of the next two days, mostly alone, playing Battlefield 4 and thinking on and off about Manchester. Erin wanted me to be more open with my emotions, but I’d never been that way. Before Erin, I hadn’t even known it was possible to trust someone that much.

  I’d always kept my emotions to myself.

  “I’m the only one he ever gets mad at,” I heard Erin tell someone once.

  It was true. And Erin was the only person I was ever sad around, too.

  With everyone else, I tried to be the positive one, the person who picked up the mood, who assured the world that everything was fine. With Erin, I realized, it had always been the other way around. On top of everything else, I had relied on her to do that for me.

  It was a heavy burden; I knew this from experience. Especially after five months of carrying it. Especially now that my legs weren’t fitting right, and I couldn’t walk stairs, and I was beginning to wonder if I’d ever live another day without pain.

  Could Erin really be happy with a husband like me? Could we ever really have a normal life together?

  I didn’t want to think those thoughts. I didn’t know how to handle them. So I sat on my bed with my PlayStation, shooting enemy soldiers in the back of the head and trying to let the frustrations—with my legs, with the situation—fall apart around me.

  Eventually, I had to get up. I had a fund-raiser that night for the Never Quit Foundation, a charity that benefited children with cancer. I dragged myself out of bed and into the shower. I made myself look handsome and happy.

  Let’s hit it, I texted Big D and Sully, when my boys were finally off work.

  An hour later, we rolled up to the House of Blues, where the charity event was being held. The publicist, who had talked with Erin about a hundred times, was waiting for us out front.

  “Park right there,” she said, indicating a no-parking zone right next to the door. “You have a handicapped sticker, right?”

  “I’m not handicapped,” I said.

  “Oh my God, Jeff, I am so sorry. That was so stupid. I just…”

  “I’m kidding,” I said, as Big D cracked up. “I am totally handicapped. But I haven’t gotten around to getting a sticker.”

  It was a Hollywood Square–style event, featuring a tic-tac-toe board with nine local celebrities in the squares. It was sponsored by Red Sox pitcher Jon Lester, who was diagnosed with cancer during his rookie season in 2006. He and his wife were the contestants. Several Red Sox players were in the squares: John Lackey, Ryan Dempster, Salty. The event was held on a Monday, since that was the team’s only day off for weeks. They had played an away game the night before, and the team plane had arrived back in town at 4:00 that morning.

  “I only got three hours’ sleep,” Salty told me, as we chilled at the bar. I didn’t tell him that for me, three hours was a good night.

  The bar was free, so Big D brought me drinks, while I sat in my wheelchair in a crowd, shaking hands. Carlos and I were the “celebrities” in the bottom right square (the other rows weren’t wheelchair accessible), and I needed lubrication to make jokes in front of a crowd of a few hundred people. By the time we took our seats, I was nicely toasted.

  “Why does everyone have a last name except Jeff and Carlos?” Dempster said as he looked over the game board. “It just says ‘Jeff and Carlos.’ ”

  “Yeah,” I joked. “If they can fit ‘Saltalamacchia’ on Salty’s sign, they can fit anything.”

  “In this town,” someone replied, “Jeff and Carlos don’t need last names.”

  Three rounds of Hollywood Squares later, we hit the after party. It must have been sponsored by Smirnoff or something, because the vodka was flowing. I was laughing and having a good time when Big D grabbed me by the shoulder.

  “Don’t eat the nachos,” he said, before rushing off to the snack table. I looked over and saw Sully, smashed on free vodka, trying to shovel a handful of chili-cheese chips into his face. Topping was falling off the chips back into the pile, and the whole wad collapsed out of his hand just before Derek could drag him away.

  “Don’t eat the nachos,” I yelled to Salty. He was standing next to me, but the music was loud.

  “Why?” he yelled.

  I shook my head. “You don’t want to know.”

  “Centerfolds,” I yelled to Big D a few minutes later. He was in the corner with his arms crossed, watching me. It sucks to be the sober driver.

  Salty and the other Sox begged off, because of their late flight and lack of sleep, so Sully, Big D, and I ended up on our own at Boston’s most famous strip club at 1:30 on a Monday night. I told Erin this might happen, since I’d had free Centerfolds passes for weeks. She’d given her blessing to a boys’ night out.

  I still can’t believe they let us in. I couldn’t stop talking smack. “Nacho Man Sully Savage,” I kept yelling at Sully, who was passed out in the backseat. “Wake up, Nacho Man!”

  It looked like Sully was down for good, but his adrenaline kicked in when he saw the pole. I wrangled a handful of ones, passed them around to my friends, and zoned out. It was only my second time in a strip club in my life, but I liked it, maybe too much.

  The fact is, I had seen something in Erin’s face on the drive back to Chelmsford, something I was trying to ignore. It wasn’t that she was exhausted and overwhelmed. I already knew that. It was that she was afraid.

  She wasn’t afraid of me. She was afraid for me.

  No, she was afraid for us.

  When we woke up on the morning of the Boston Marathon, Erin and I had known what our lives would be like. Not the details, but the general outline.

  Now… we didn’t know anything. How long would my recovery take? How healthy would I ever be? How were we going to manage the kids, the cars, the jobs, the emotions? How would we deal with the daily grind of the rest of our lives?

  Of course Erin was afraid. So was I.

  And I didn’t want to think about that. I wanted to play Battlefield 4. I wanted to listen to a functioning radio. I wanted to spend two hours handing dollar bills to nearly naked women. Strippers don’t make you feel uncomfortable about your legs.

  “Nacho Man Sully Savage,” I yelled across the room. “You need some bills, Nacho Man?”

  Sully smiled, gave me a thumbs-up, and nearly passed out.

  40.

  When I was twelve, Aunt Karen, Big D’s mom, was diagnosed with esophageal cancer. It was devastating
, especially because it happened so fast. We were out for dinner one night, and Aunt Karen had trouble swallowing. When it didn’t get better, she went to her doctor. The next day, she was admitted to Brigham and Women’s Hospital. Two weeks before, she seemed fine. Now she was going to die.

  Her illness was one of the reasons Mom and I lived with Uncle Bob for a while, and why Big D and I spent a few months living in Aunt Jenn’s condo. My family had always taken care of each other. Not just Mom when the money was tight, but also her special-needs sister, Caroline, who lived with Aunt Jenn and who gave me the best back rubs while I was in the hospital. As soon as we heard the cancer diagnosis, everyone changed their lives around so we could take care of Aunt Karen and her family.

  She survived, but she lost her vocal cords. For ten years, Aunt Karen has barely been able to make a sound. At first, that scared me. How could something so horrible happen so fast? How was I supposed to respond when I couldn’t understand what Aunt Karen was trying to tell me? I loved being with Aunt Karen, but it made me uncomfortable, too. She was different now—she was different from the rest of us, but also from herself—and every time I talked with her, I was reminded of that.

  Those days are long gone now. These days, it’s easy to communicate with Aunt Karen. We’re used to her limitations, so we don’t notice them, and she’s developed a way to communicate with whispers, hand gestures, and facial expressions.

  These days, Aunt Karen is an inspiration. She texts me all the time. I’m proud of you, she writes. I’m proud of the way you are handling this.

  We don’t talk or text about what it’s like to be different. I know it bothered her at first, to be out in public without her voice. She was self-conscious. Waitresses would ask for her order, and she’d struggle to respond. A stranger would ask for directions, and she could only point and shake her head. People stared at her as she struggled, like she was some sort of freak.

  But if they do that anymore, Aunt Karen doesn’t notice. She’s comfortable with who she is. Someone asked me how it was around her now, and I shrugged. “I don’t think about it,” I said. “It’s normal to me.”

  That’s what inspires me. When I see Aunt Karen, I realize that one year—if that’s how long it takes me to walk—isn’t that long. Right now, I don’t feel comfortable with myself. I feel self-conscious. My legs hurt. But that doesn’t mean I won’t feel comfortable in the future. If it takes a few years to accept myself, then so be it. That’s no big deal. I just have to keep working. I may be frustrated this week, but I’ll be fine next month. Or tomorrow.

  I’ll always be different. That’s my life. But that doesn’t mean I’m not normal.

  Sometimes, in this process, this public life, I feel like I’m being used. Did the Boston Bruins really want to do something nice for Jeff Bauman the human being? Or did they want him to be a prop? Something they could use to make a crowd of people cheer?

  Boston Medical called me around the time of the Nacho Man incident. Or more accurately, they called Erin, again and again, before finally getting to me. Kenny Chesney had given a large donation to the hospital for their work with bombing victims, and he was going to be in town for a charity benefit concert. They asked me and several other bombing survivors to meet with him.

  I have nothing against Kenny Chesney. I’m sure he’s a nice guy. In fact, I know he’s a nice guy, because his charity, Spread the Love, has helped me and a lot of other survivors, too. But I didn’t want to meet with him or attend the concert. I wasn’t in the right place at that time, in my mental or physical life.

  The publicist at BMC insisted. The hospital was going to film the meeting; she wanted me there. It was implied, almost, that I owed the hospital this for saving my life. It’s true, they saved my life. I love Boston Medical Center. But they are a hospital. Isn’t that what they do?

  But more than that, it was like I wasn’t even a person. Not a real person, anyway, one who struggled and became frustrated and sometimes wanted to withdraw for a while. I was just a gift they were giving Kenny Chesney, to prove his donation had been well spent.

  Look at Jeff, isn’t he adorable? Look at Jeff, isn’t he brave? Look at Jeff, he’s a symbol. He’s a marketing tool.

  I don’t mind that. I really don’t. Especially for a good cause like BMC. And especially for my city. I try to do as much as I can, as often as I can. But when it’s not my choice… when it feels like I have to, because I owe them, and if I’m hurting and unable, then I’m ungrateful…

  Sometimes, when that happens, I just want to quit. I want to disappear.

  But then someone will come up to me on the street and ask, “I don’t mean to intrude but… can I hug you?”

  Or Aunt Karen will text me: I’m proud of you.

  Or I’ll go to something truly special, like the ceremony on September 11 at the Massachusetts State House. Carlos was being honored with the Madeline Amy Sweeney Award for Civilian Bravery, and he asked me to attend. The award was named for a flight attendant on the airplane that had taken off from Boston and was crashed by terrorists into the World Trade Center. Her daughter, who was six at the time, was at the ceremony. One of the national guardsmen Carlos had been at the marathon to support helped present the award.

  “I accept this on behalf of everyone who has had a child die,” Carlos said, when they gave him the award.

  He was thinking of his own sons. But he was talking about me, too. Carlos has never thought of me as an opportunity. He has never asked anything from me. To him, I was always somebody’s son.

  That’s why I’ll do anything for him. Not just because we’re friends, but because he treats me like a human being. I don’t feel like a prop with Carlos, and I don’t feel like a guy who lost his legs. Do you know what I feel like?

  I feel like myself.

  41.

  Let’s go to the Java Room for breakfast,” I said to Erin. It was Wednesday morning, two days after my adventure at Centerfolds. She had returned late the previous evening, and of course I had been up. I’d been up all night, but this time, I’d spent most of it thinking.

  “Are you sure?” Erin said. I rarely suggested going anywhere, especially for breakfast. I wasn’t a morning person.

  “I feel like stretching my legs.”

  “Jeff…”

  I was supposed to wear my legs for at least an hour every day. But because of the pain, I hadn’t worn them in a week. Just seeing them leaning in the corner had depressed me.

  “Yep,” I said. “Let’s strap ’em on.”

  Mom had bought me some new shoes at the outlet mall: New Balances (not a pun) to replace my dark blue Nikes. They were wider, she said, so they would be better for my balance.

  I lifted one of my legs and looked at them. “I don’t like these shoes,” I said. “They’re ugly. I’m switching back to my Nikes.”

  So I did. I put the Nikes on my artificial feet, and the extra socks on my legs. Then we rode over to the Java Room in Uncle Bob’s Jetta. Both Erin and I had old cars in lousy shape, so she’d been driving Uncle Bob’s car since she’d moved to Chelmsford. His radio still played, but we couldn’t change the channel or turn down the volume. I knew I had to get it fixed. I went to the dealership for the repair, and I actually ended up buying Erin a used Volkswagen Tiguan, too. (Got a great deal.) So Uncle Bob got his car back in one piece, and Erin and I got our first big purchase together. Uncle Bob never knew I’d punched his radio to pieces. Until he read this book, of course. Sorry, Uncle Bob!

  But that was later in the week. On Wednesday morning, Erin and I were stuck with one station and one song. I can’t remember what it was, but it was perfectly awful.

  At the Java Room, I lifted myself out of the car with my crutches and walked across the parking lot. The Forefathers Burial Ground (founded 1655) was behind me, but I kept my eye on each step. Up the ramp to the sidewalk. Over the doorjamb. Erin moved chairs out of the way so I could get to a table. It took a while, one step at a time. The place was half full, and
I could feel people watching me.

  “Can you get me… do they have turkey sandwiches?” I asked Erin, once I was in my seat and arranging my crutches.

  “Well, it’s nine in the morning.”

  “Could you ask?”

  “Do you want coffee?”

  “I don’t know. Do they have orange juice?”

  I had never been out on my legs in public before. Surprising, right? I had walked miles, ten feet at a time, and I had walked ten minutes at a stretch, but that was only at Spaulding or Mom’s apartment. I had never subjected myself to my normal life before: the one I had been working toward and dreaming about and dreading for almost five months.

  It wasn’t so bad.

  Erin brought me the turkey sandwich and orange juice. She had a coffee. We sat in the Java Room and talked. I told her how much I appreciated everything she was doing for me. I told her how much I respected her. I told her that she wasn’t alone. Yes, I was afraid, just like her, but I was committed.

  “I want you in my life,” I told her, “not because you are here, but because you are the best and strongest person I have ever known.”

  We talked about how I could help her. We talked about expectations and responsibilities. We discussed the book. It was stressing everyone out, especially Erin. She wasn’t comfortable with the idea of sharing our life.

  “Does it have to be now, Jeff? It feels like we’re in the middle of this.”

  That was one thing the agent had told us. If I wanted to write a book, and I wanted people to read it, I had to write it now. While the memory is fresh, he said. He meant the world’s memory, not mine.

  “What if your… PTSD…”

  “I don’t have PTSD.”

  “What if things get worse?”

  I reached out and took Erin’s hand. “Don’t worry, my magical wonderful,” I said. “Things are going to keep getting better and better.”

  We talked about the bombing, and what we’d been through. That was the morning I said I wasn’t angry at the Tsarnaev brothers. I don’t think I’d ever said it before, or even realized it. There was a place inside, maybe, that I was trying to ignore. And when I finally reached down there, and I thought about them… it wasn’t anger that came up. It was empathy. We were all in this together, even the bombers, and it sucked for everyone.