Piece of Mind

by Michelle Adelman

  When I was gone, I imagined he might have circled around the apartment a few times, searching; slept in my bed—there was evidence of his shedding; lay his head on the pillow and dreamt, his paws batting at my image. He might have imagined that he’d have to fend for himself.

  He mewed until he saw I had no answers, and then he recoiled into the closet.

  I followed him, picked him up, and squeezed him until he squirmed from my arms.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  As we sat in the dark, I contemplated hibernation. It made a lot of sense actually, to shut away the world for months at a time—no thoughts, only sleep, only self. I could be a bear.

  If only I could sleep. I missed Nate. And Dad. And Mom. If I didn’t have Nate, maybe I could have them back—in spirit at least. The two parents could come together and form a protective circle around me, shielding me from every harm. Ghostrents. I took out my sketchbook and began to draw.

  _________

  I HAD MOMENTARILY FORGOTTEN about the headache I’d woken up with, but now it was an 8 on a scale from 1 to 10, and I rarely slid past 6. The slightest move intensified the pressure, like someone was sitting inside my face, playing the drums against my temples and nasal passages, against the back of my head, adding more weight and tension with each beat.

  I tried imagining myself in the pool with Gus, or in Mexico with Nate, but I kept ending up back where I started, on the couch, spinning around the center of the room, floating around the fringes, alone.

  If I was going to be alone, I had to take care of myself. That was what Enid had said, and Byron. So I could take care of my pills. I could find things in my home. This was my home now.

  I began rustling around the cabinets, and sure enough, after going through each drawer, I found my refills. I swallowed the pills dry, and then I noticed another baggie full of other pills I didn’t immediately recognize.

  Up close, I could see what they were: Ritalin and Dexedrine. I used to take those, for greater focus, and metabolism, but they had to keep upping the dosage until it was too high, and then my doctor weaned me off. There was still a bottle of that stuff somewhere. I hadn’t thrown it away. I guessed I had wanted it just in case—

  It dawned on me all at once.

  Nate.

  Those were the pills he had been popping. Those were the refills he was getting for himself. Just a couple at first, to keep himself going, and then . . .

  I threw the bag at the trash. Of course I missed. They scattered everywhere. Asshole!

  How could this have happened? Sure, he smoked a little pot, drank a little too much. But this? Who did this? Who was he?

  I envisioned him in a hotel room then, a terrycloth robe, with piles of my old pills encircling him. He was hollow in his cheeks, sickly, and he had constructed a wall of capsules around him to block out human touch, to repel telepathic energy.

  I had never imagined the day when Nate was as messed up as I was.

  Was it my fault? Probably. I wished I could push him back in time, to his life before my invasion of it. It wasn’t fair that this was who he was now.

  What if he was getting worse out there? I wished I could call him to check in.

  I looked to Harry for consolation and found him at the window. I sat with him for a while and looked for my pigeon. Every day that pigeon had parked itself and waited, predictably, beautifully almost. I could count on that.

  But now the pigeon was gone.

  Almost as soon as I realized it, Frank called.

  “Hi,” I said. I wasn’t in the mood to talk to him. I was distraught about the pigeon, and about Nate and his drugs. But I’d already missed his earlier call.

  “I wanted to see how you were feeling,” he said. “Do you need anything? I tried calling you earlier from the drugstore, but I guess you didn’t hear.”

  “Oh, yeah. I had a really bad headache.”

  He didn’t say anything. I could hear him rustling some papers.

  “I took my pills, though, so I’m sure I’ll be fine soon.”

  “Good,” he said. “Should I get the wedding spreadsheet?”

  “Now?”

  “We need to talk about the wedding.”

  “Frank—”

  It was a great idea, in theory, to pour myself into an event that could turn all of the darkness and doubts into sugar and Champagne. Poofy dresses and makeup to hide the flaws, slow songs to conceal shuffling feet.

  Maybe the ceremony could stop time for a night, and halt all the hoping and waiting and holding of my breath. Maybe brides could be declared invincible.

  Maybe. But even if I’d somehow made it through the aisle and the first dances and cake unstained, what would happen when the party ended? It would just be Frank and me and Harry, alone. Maybe that was all I needed. But what if it wasn’t?

  I didn’t want to think about it then, or talk about it. I wanted to go back to sleep.

  “I’m a little preoccupied right now.”

  “Well, we can’t move forward until you tell us what you’d like,” he said. “That’s what Mom says.”

  “Frank, what does that even mean?”

  “You should know,” he said.

  “Well, I don’t!” It was too loud. “Sorry, I didn’t mean that. Frank?”

  He hung up without saying goodbye.

  29

  THE NEXT DAY I DECIDED TO GO STRAIGHT TO THE SHOP. I HAD to see Frank after the abrupt end to our conversation. Who was he to be mad at me? That seemed unfair. I wanted to let him know that. Plus, I was determined to see Enid again, to tell her about everything that had happened, and to ask her for her insights. I hadn’t seen her since she had stomped off, and I needed to make sure she was okay, that we were okay.

  When I got to the counter, Frank barely acknowledged me, but it was a busy day, so I ordered my coffee and took my spot in the back, waiting for signs of Enid. I was armed with Belle, and a few lines to impress her: “Would you say her coat was more a caramel or cappuccino color?”

  At first, I tried to refrain from doing any more work on the dog before I saw her, but after a while I got bored. Frank was ignoring me, the jazz rotation was all instrumental, and I had already read even the driest sections of the paper.

  So I went to work on the drawing, shading and coloring and guessing all the way, convinced I was making things worse with every stroke. By the end of the day, I knew I had to trash it, but I didn’t want to lose the evidence of my effort. I wanted Enid to see, so I waited for her until closing time.

  She never showed.

  “You didn’t see Enid today, did you?” I said to Frank when everyone else had finally gone.

  “No,” he said. “But she wasn’t my main focus.”

  “That makes sense. Are you hungry?”

  I was starving, and in his brown shirt, his arms looked like pretzel sticks. I imagined him salted, knotted at the ends.

  “Chinese?” I said. “Or you can pick the place if you want.”

  “I have an online game scheduled for tonight,” he said.

  I watched his back contract as he swept the surface with paper towels. I hadn’t noticed those muscles before. They were so delicate, yet strong.

  “Is it a pay tournament? I’m really good at poker.”

  “No,” he said. “I told you I don’t gamble.”

  “Sorry,” I said. “I was only asking. What’s with you today?”

  He stopped cleaning and stood up straight.

  “Do you really want to marry me?” he said.

  I looked at the ring, which was still gleaming somehow.

  He turned around to face me. “Did you hear me?”

  “Frank, I’m really hungry right now.”

  “I asked a question.”

  He locked the door and turned out all but the front lights. We stood at the threshold, in the shadows.

  “About the wedding,” he said.

  The only thing I’d had that day had been the coffee, and the milk that went in the coffe
e. How had I managed to sit for that long? All at once the wooziness hit, and I was missing a chair to lean on.

  “Is there any food left in the back?” I said.

  “No,” he said, though I knew there was.

  Why was he doing this? I was trying to read him, but he had that blank look about him. If only he were a dog or bear. Then I’d be able to feel him.

  “Can we go somewhere else?”

  I pushed on the door, but it didn’t open.

  He locked my eyes. “Mom says she worries you’re not really in this.”

  “She said that?” I turned away, searching for crumbs. “The other day I told you I loved you, didn’t I? I didn’t just say it in my head. I said it to you.”

  “I tell you all the time.”

  “Well, maybe we’re different in the way we say things, like it’s some brain thing that isn’t turned on in me that is in you, or maybe it’s the opposite; I don’t know. Can we talk about this over food?”

  “I need to think about it,” he said.

  “I said I’d go anywhere.”

  “I don’t like Chinese.”

  “We can go wherever you want.”

  “I want to get married,” he said.

  “I know!”

  His eyes were glossy, almost beautiful in their translucent glow.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  He loved me. That was probably more than what most people had. More reliable than Nate and Dad, more understanding and admiring, so why couldn’t I give him what he wanted?

  “I just—why are we having this talk now, in the dark?”

  His voice began to crack. “Can you imagine your life without me?”

  I didn’t know how to answer. My whole life had been imagined without him.

  “Well?” he said, opening the door for me to leave.

  “I don’t want to blurt out the first thing that comes to mind because—”

  Now there were tears at the creases.

  “Please don’t do that,” I said. “You’re crying? You’re making too much of this. I don’t even know what this is right now.”

  He looked down, locked up, and turned out the final light. When we got outside, he started walking, fast, rushing away from me.

  “Frank!” He halted for a moment. “Where are you going?”

  He let me catch up to him before he started moving again.

  “You said you’d take back the question,” I said. “Can we go back to that? Please?”

  “No,” he said. “It’s too late for that.”

  “But why? It’s not like I want to date anyone else.”

  “It’s not enough,” he said. “If we can’t move forward, we’re stuck.”

  “Is that what your mom said?”

  “It’s true,” he said. “Isn’t it?”

  I wasn’t sure what the right answer was, what I was supposed to say, what I was actually feeling, what was happening, so I just watched him leave.

  But how could I let someone who would serve me heart-shaped coffee and pastries for eternity walk away?

  I couldn’t.

  By the time I reached my door, the fog of confusion had transformed into irritation. Why did he get the final say? Was I even involved? How was that fair?

  As I began to turn the key, I envisioned the cover of darkness, and I thought about how I’d grown accustomed to contact that summer, life beyond Harry. And I got it, kind of—the fuss about other people. Intimacy. I’d felt it, for a second, and I had appreciated it. Relationships. Romance. Companionship. What if I had pushed them all away?

  I wasn’t ready to lose everything.

  Before I finished opening my door, I closed it again, and I took the train straight to Frank’s.

  As I knocked, I could hear game noises emerging from his computer, pings of people joining in and messaging each other. He had a community.

  “Can I come in?”

  He stepped aside, and I moved toward the loveseat, but he didn’t join me.

  “Am I interrupting? I could come back.”

  “No.” He turned off his screen and sat at his desk, as far away from me as possible. “But I don’t get why you’re here. I didn’t invite you.”

  “Am I a vampire?”

  He was confused. “I never said you were a vampire.”

  “No, it’s a thing—with vampire mythology? They can’t come in unless . . . Forget it. You wouldn’t know that.”

  “Why? Because I’m stupid?”

  “No, because you don’t watch TV, or movies, or read books. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. It’s just you.”

  “I don’t know if you mean that as a compliment.”

  “Let’s forget it,” I said.

  “Fine.”

  We sat in silence for a minute.

  “So this is it?” I said, after what seemed like an hour.

  “I guess,” he said.

  “We’re breaking up?” I said.

  “We have to,” he said.

  “Why?”

  “You don’t want to marry me.”

  “But it’s not you—I don’t think. It’s marriage. In general. I don’t think it’s for me.”

  “What we have is not enough,” he said.

  “Why?”

  “You don’t love me enough.”

  “I’ve never loved anyone before. I don’t know what enough is.”

  “It’s not enough.”

  “According to who?”

  “You’re the first one I want to talk to when anything happens,” he said.

  “I know,” I said. “I appreciate that.”

  “When Nate left, you didn’t call.”

  “I didn’t call anyone.”

  “Did you even think of calling me?”

  I couldn’t answer. I thought of Byron, Sabine, of Enid for a minute, of Nate of course. Nate was the one I wanted to call, but I didn’t think of Frank until he showed up.

  “It hurts too much,” he said. “When you look at me like you don’t want to be with me, like you’re not excited to see me, like you want to kill me sometimes.”

  “Isn’t that what marriage is?”

  “No,” he said. “That’s not what it’s supposed to be. It’s not supposed to sting when you see someone, like you’re not good enough.”

  “No, that’s not what I mean for it to seem like, Frank. That’s never what I wanted.”

  “Well, maybe you can’t help it, but that’s how it feels.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  His face tensed, and he reached into the drawer inside his desk. For a moment I panicked: Was he going to pull a gun, or a rock to throw at my head?

  It was a folded piece of paper, just like his proposal note, which I realized then that I would never have the chance to hear.

  He cleared his throat and began to read.

  “‘Are you sorry for how much you hurt me? Or are you sorry for never giving us a chance?’”

  “When did you write that?”

  “‘Are you sorry because it means you won’t get more coffee?’”

  “Was I supposed to say I was sorry again?”

  It was starting to hit me—hard. I had gone in knowing this was inevitable, but I didn’t know how it would feel. My eyes were filling. I couldn’t contain them.

  “‘Are you sorry because I loved you every day, and you never loved me?’”

  “Who wrote this? Did your mom say that?”

  “‘Are you sorry because you couldn’t say no? Or are you sorry because you ever said yes?’”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, tears streaming out.

  I hadn’t cried in ages. Weepiness from the stints of depression, but not real tears of pain. Not at Dad’s funeral. Not when Nate left. Not since Mom had died. But this time, I let it go—all of it—because I knew we were over.

  “You can keep the ring,” he said. “My mom wanted it back, but I told her I got it for you.”

  “I never asked for it,” I said. “I don’t want it.�
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  He looked down.

  “I don’t know what else I’m supposed to say now,” I said.

  I took a deep breath and used the back of my sleeve to wipe my face. “I don’t know why I can’t force those feelings. But I know I don’t want to say goodbye.”

  “The ring is yours,” he said.

  “No,” I said. “Forget the ring!”

  I wanted to throw it at him, but of course it wouldn’t slide off.

  I went into the bathroom and used the soap and water to loosen the grip. Don’t fall in the drain. Don’t let this be tragic. Don’t give his mom another reason to hate me. Just let this be painless and easy and—it was off without a fight. That had to mean something.

  I washed my face and inhaled deeply. Then I brought it to him wrapped in tissue.

  “Here,” I said, placing it on his desk.

  When I gave it back, I had hoped to feel lighter, but I only felt sicker. This pain was physical. My stomach ached, and my throat was closing in.

  I’d never had the chance to say goodbye to anyone who mattered.

  “Can I sit down?” I said. “I can’t stand right now.”

  “Okay,” he said.

  I was supposed to be hungry, but I didn’t feel like eating anymore. I thought of the coffee, all the time we spent together, Enid, how all of it would be lost.

  “Can I still visit the shop?” I said. “Sometimes?”

  He looked away, his ears crimson. “I think that would be confusing.”

  There was a tightening in my chest, and then another wave of nausea. “I feel sick.”

  His eyes were red. I could see that, though he refused to make eye contact. He kept touching his nose, and when he turned his back on me to reach for the tissues, I could almost feel the hole inside me expanding, breaking through the seams, all the extra tears pooling in the void inside.

  “I guess you want me to go,” I said.

  He opened the door for me. “I never wanted you to go.”

  I could tell he wanted to hug me, but leaving first was easier. As I made my way through the threshold, I almost bumped my elbow against the lock, but I pulled it back in time, managing to just skim it.