The Gatekeepers

by Jen Lancaster

  “You may be right,” I said with more conviction than I felt.

  “’Course I’m right. I’m right about everything! Who said to you, don’t buy the McQueen clogs, you’ll sprain your ankle, but you did anyway and then you hobbled around like a lunatic for three months. I know things, you have to listen to me—it’s the law.”

  “It’s not the law.”

  “Well, then, it should be. Anyway, do it. Doooo iiiiit. Then tell me all about it. Now I have to sod off, I’m knackered. Text me about all the dirty bits when you’re done. And lower your expectations!” With that, she disconnected the call.

  After Cordy and I talked and I thought about everything I’d said, I decided that today is the day. D day. Or, more like V day.

  “What else is sweet?” Liam muses. “You feel like a couple of Frappuccinos? We can get different flavors and trade halfway through. Or, if you want coffee and donuts, we can head over to Spunky Dunkers. Cake or yeast, glazed, powdered, sugared, your call. You tell me what’s sweet.”

  I tell him, “You’re sweet.”

  He grins up at me through his fringe of blond locks. “You’re pretty sweet, too.”

  I’m emboldened, knowing what’s to come, so I place my hand high up on his thigh.

  “Liam, for a brilliant guy, you’re just not that swift. When I said I wanted something sweet, I mean that I want you.”

  * * *

  Liam drops me on the corner at 5:00 p.m., like he does every day, a spot just out of view of my house. He lingers as he kisses me goodbye. We’re now tethered to each other in a way I could never before fathom.

  I wanted to stay there with him, wrapped in his arms, all snug and drowsy in his soft bed. I liked being in his room, surrounded by All Things Liam, from his books arranged by color on his shelves to the framed and matted snaps of him coaching youth soccer.

  However, we figured his mum would be back from the stable where she boards her horses soon. In this perfectly appointed home, a colder, far more tidy version of my own, it would be impossible for her to not notice the trail of clothing that began at his front door. So, reluctantly, oh-so-reluctantly, we extricated ourselves from one another.

  That was...like nothing Cordy described. I had my expectations, but they were tempered after our Skype talk. She was so wrong about the angel wings and the chorus of one thousand voices united in harmony, because it’s exactly how I felt.

  Walking down my block, I’m giddy and euphoric and drunk on the sense of having been so close. Liam made it so it wasn’t awkward, so that I wasn’t nervous, so that I was comfortable in every way. He made me feel beautiful and precious and cherished.

  Safe.

  Desired.

  The only sour note of the whole experience was when we were lying there afterward and he traced the tattoo on my shoulder blade. My mum, dad, and I have matching ink—Roman numerals of my birth year to commemorate when we became a real family. When I thought about that rainy London day we got them, I was overwhelmed with feelings of guilt. I hated the idea of doing something that would displease them, yet the draw of Liam was and is too powerful, too intoxicating.

  I’m addicted.

  I’d claim I could quit him if I wanted to, but that’s a lie; I’d OD on him in a second.

  When we were basking in the afterglow, before he touched my ink, he told me he loved me. I tried to make a joke of it, saying, “You’re supposed to say that before you get into my trousers,” but this was no laughing matter to him.

  He took my face in his hands and said, “I want to remember everything about this moment for the rest of my life. I want to file it away in deepest memory, for any time I’m upset or scared or angry. When I come back to this second, no matter what happens, I’ll feel calm and happy and whole again.”

  What else could I do but tell him I loved him, too?

  (Full disclosure, I also jumped on him again.)

  I probably need to slap this grin off my mug before I go inside. One look and my parents will know that everything’s different and then... I don’t want to even imagine “and then.” Would I even be in trouble? Can’t say for sure what trouble looks like. Yet the idea of them being disappointed just guts me and I don’t want that today, not after all that magic.

  Maybe I should invent some good news so that my reaction seems appropriate. Yes, that’s a fine idea. I’ll mention one of my photographs will be featured on the front page of the Round Table. Wait, they’d want to see it, would frame the copy. They’re proud like that. I’d have to con the editor into featuring what I’d shot, but I couldn’t say why, not the real reason anyway, so I’d have to invent something else, too.

  Damn it, lying is exhausting, as it’s never just one fib. Each new falsehood builds on the last, like bricks in a wall, all pieced together with interlocking accuracy, and soon there’s a whole fortress of fabrication, a temple of untruths, poised to come crashing down on a whole village of innocents at the most inopportune moment.

  Why can’t Mum and Dad just be reasonable?

  What could I do, I wonder? How do I convince them Liam’s not involved in anything untoward? Except for the untoward things he did today, ba-dum-bum! I tap out a rim shot on my imaginary drum set.

  Christ on a bike, sex has turned me into Louis C.K.

  I decide to pretend to be happy about an A on a pop quiz in my lit class. (If I said I’d written a theme, they’d want to read it.) This seems like the most innocuous lie I can concoct, the hardest to verify.

  Clumps of neighbors are standing on their lawns as I approach my house, deep in conversation here and there. Lots of outdoorsy people in North Shore, always running around in shiny Arc’teryx jackets, but it’s odd to see them standing in their yards when it’s basically dark and drizzly. A bone-chilling wind whips everyone’s hair around, but they don’t seem to notice. The gas lights lining the block cast anemic circles of illumination, making the scene even more ominous.

  I guess what’s so bizarre is that no one typically gathers here; that’s why I’m thrown. Our homes are spaced too far apart to encourage casual conversation. This scene is atypical and registers as wrong.

  I let myself in the front door and the second I see the expression on my Mum’s face, my heart drops.

  She knows.

  She knows and she’s devastated. How is that possible? Am I truly that transparent?

  Wait, has she been crying? Why is her face so splotchy? Come on, that’s not fair. I’m almost eighteen. I’m not a little girl. She’s the one who put me on the pill in the first place. They can’t expect me to stay in a state of arrested development. The mature thing to do is to talk this out and tell her everything. If I’m not adult enough to discuss sex, then I shouldn’t be having it. But I am and I have, so the horse has left the barn. I haven’t been handling myself like an adult with all of the sneaking around.

  Time for a serious discussion.

  I say, “Mum, listen, I have to talk to you about—”

  Before I can complete my sentence, she’s swept me into her arms and she begins to sob.

  “Simba, baby,” she says into my hair. “Simba, I’m so sorry. Your friend...”

  She struggles for a breath.

  “Mum, what? My friend what?”

  “He’s gone. He’s gone, Simba.”

  My blood turns to ice. “Oh, Owen, no,” I cry. I thought he was improving. We’ve yet to speak, but he did wave a few days ago. He even smiled. I thought he was rallying. I even saw him sitting at lunch with some other friends just today. That seemed like positive momentum.

  Why, Owen? Why didn’t you let me in? I wanted to be there for you. I tried, I really did.

  I feel soul-sick.

  My mum pulls back and looks at me with the most mournful expression in the world. “Honey, no. Not Owen. Your friend Stephen is
gone.”

  Then my heart shatters into a million pieces.

  30

  KENT

  “Don’t tell me it’s going to be okay, Dad.”

  My father is huddled across from me up here in my old backyard tree fort. He looks ridiculous in this context, like a giant next to all my half-scale furniture. He climbed in to try to make me feel better.

  But how can I feel better?

  How can it be okay?

  How can anything be okay ever again?

  Stephen’s dead.

  He’s gone because I wasn’t there for him. I checked out on him as a friend. What kind of shitty person does that? I should have been more on guard. I should have seen the signs, been more invested. I should have looked out for him. I should have made the connection after getting his final text. I’ve read it hundreds of times since that day, trying to parse out his meaning. Had he already made his decision when he sent it? If I’d responded differently, would we have a different outcome?

  All I know for sure is that my Spidey senses should have tingled.

  Should, should, should.

  I’m drowning in shoulds.

  Why was I so short-tempered with him? Why did I want to punish him for being a jerk? Why did I delight in him admitting I was right? Those were his final words, literally. u were right, kent.

  What a fucking microphone drop that was.

  I didn’t understand how dark it was for him and now it’s too late to be his light.

  I SUCK.

  I’ve been in the tree fort for hours, ever since we heard. I had to get away. I had to get out of that house. I thought my mother was going to suffocate me with her grief, like she was his best friend for the past fifteen years. Like she was the one who failed to protect him from himself. She collapsed, crumpled to the ground. And then wouldn’t get off the floor, she was wailing too hard.

  I couldn’t deal.

  I couldn’t make her feel better because there is no better.

  So I ran out the back door, no coat, no shoes, no idea of where to go, except away. Then I spotted the old clapboard fort in the cradle of the old oak in the corner of the yard, with its shingled roof and tiny balcony, the place where Stephen and I spent so many hours as kids.

  Dad had the tree house built when Stephen and I were deep in our Lord of the Rings phase, so we named it Rivendell. We were such nerds, we even conducted an official christening ceremony, breaking a bottle of sparkling apple cider on the balcony’s railing before we stepped inside for the first time. Mom had a Rivendell sign made. We hung it next to the front door, where it remained until a big storm blew it away a few years back.

  Stephen and I used to sit up here for hours, hanging out and debating everything, like whether Wolverine should have traveled back in time instead of Kitty Pryde or what could devastate a city more—Godzilla or hordes of zombies. As we grew older, our conversations started to include girls and college and the future. This fort was our special place; this was sacred ground.

  I remember how mad Stephen was when he found out Braden and I had hung out in here without him after we finished camp in sixth grade. (Braden had gone on and on about how he “hearted” the view of the lake from here.) We came up here only a few times on our own when Stephen wasn’t around, but that didn’t matter to him. Pitched a real fit, was downright hysterical. He couldn’t believe I’d take someone to our place, like he was my jilted wife or something. That pissed me off. I was all, “Pretty sure what’s in my yard is my place, dude.” Didn’t talk to him for two weeks after that.

  What I wouldn’t give for those two weeks now. Like gold in my hand. To be in here again with him.

  Instead, I’m with my dad. He’s still wearing his fancy business suit, which is now covered in leaves and a few cobwebs. He doesn’t seem to be affected by the dirt or decay. He left his consulting assignment in Minneapolis as soon as he heard, hopped the next plane and came directly home.

  Our dads were another thing Stephen and I had in common, both management consultants, both gone all week long, both leaving us to be tended to—and over-tended to—by our moms.

  Dad picks up one of my old camping lanterns and looks surprised that it still works when he switches it on. Not exactly a coincidence. I inserted fresh batteries last week when I snuck up here with Noell. Mom wouldn’t let me borrow the car because it looked like rain and she doesn’t like me driving on wet roads. Everyone was home at Noell’s place so we came here for some privacy.

  You know what makes zero sense?

  I felt guilty about bringing her up here, like I was somehow disrespecting Stephen, like I should have asked his permission.

  A wan glow flickers in the space between my father and me, casting ominous shadows behind us.

  He says, “Kent, I never lost my best friend, but I understand loss. I’ve been so burdened with sorrow before that I couldn’t get out of bed in the morning. I sympathize and I’m so sorry.”

  I already know what he means, but I ask anyway. “The babies?”

  He nods mechanically.

  My parents tried to have more kids for a long time after I was born. They wanted a big family, a house full of children. That’s why we moved to North Shore—because we’d have plenty of room here. They were planning ahead. They wanted a huge fireplace mantel, large enough to accommodate half a dozen Christmas stockings. They loved the idea of tall ceilings with lots of wall space, so they could take and hang a million family photos of us, all smiling in terrible matching sweaters. Maybe Dad could even finally talk Mom into a dog and we’d put him in a sweater, too. Dad told me that, when they first got married, their running joke was about forming their own Mathers family basketball team.

  Didn’t happen.

  Something went wrong after I was born and then my mom couldn’t carry a pregnancy to term. She lost five babies in seven years. Four sisters and a brother. After the first two didn’t take, my folks didn’t tell anyone until they were beyond positive the fetus was viable. After me and until my brother, Mom had never made it past the first trimester. By the end of my Mom’s eighth month, my parents finally exhaled, thought they’d reached the home stretch. They had a baby shower. They decorated a nursery in a jungle theme, with hand-drawn lions and elephants and giraffes dancing through an African veldt. They picked a name.

  Hayes.

  My brother was going to be called Hayes after my mom’s grandpa. I feel like Hayes would have been a cool kid, with our mom’s looks and smarts and our dad’s equanimity. (Sometimes I call him Father Dad, as he can sound more like a pastor than a consultant.)

  Or maybe Hayes would have been a mini-me. I was so excited to be an older brother, psyched to teach him how to play chess, how to use the Big Dipper to spot the North Star so he’d always be able to navigate and find his way home, so he’d never be lost. I planned to educate him on why Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five’s “The Message” is the greatest rap song of all time.

  I’d help shape him in any way he chose to be shaped.

  If Hayes had been my polar-opposite, that would’ve been awesome, too. Maybe he’d be tall and athletic, confident in every new situation. He’d be the leader and I’d be his follower. He could teach me.

  I’d have been happy however he’d turned out.

  After Hayes, the doctor said my mom had to stop, trying again was too dangerous. While my folks kept a lot of the specifics from me, especially the first few times, I was old enough to understand what it meant to lose Hayes. The doctor said his heart had forgotten to beat a couple of weeks before he was due.

  I was really sad back then, but I figured if I couldn’t have Hayes, then Stephen would be my brother. So he was.

  Now I’ve lost my brother all over again.

  Now I feel like my heart has forgotten to beat.

  Each m
iscarriage changed my mom. She used to be relaxed and even kind of funny. With every loss, she turned more serious, more regimented, more focused on me, to the point that my life became her singular obsession.

  That’s why I don’t fight her when her comingled love and concern pull me under like a riptide. I get why she smothers me. I deal with it. I try to tell her what she wants to hear because I know it’s been hard. She’s a great mom and I owe her that respect.

  But today, I just couldn’t.

  I’m kind of glad to be up here, simultaneously freezing and starving, because my physical aching gives me something to focus on other than my conscience. I want discomfort.

  “You won’t make sense of this right now, Kent,” my dad says. He grips my shoulders and looks me in the eye. “You want to, but it’s impossible. I know it’s your nature to reason things out—it’s mine, too. Sometimes you just can’t understand and you have to accept that.”

  I want to let my dad take over and make it all better, like he’s done countless times before. But that’s what a child does. Today I need to man the fuck up. I have to face this head on, accept responsibility for my part.

  I can’t push away my culpability.

  I tell him why I deserve to wear the thorny crown of guilt. “We discussed suicide in my psych class last year. We talked about the warning signs. I knew how to recognize them. But I didn’t see them and that’s my fault.”

  “No, Kent, this is not your fault. Do you hear me? You didn’t do this.”

  “Yes, I did. I was a shitty friend. I turned my back on him.”

  My dad is vehement. “No. That’s hindsight bias. You know the outcome now and you think that because you have this information, you could have changed the outcome. You couldn’t have. Doesn’t work that way.”

  “I needed to try harder.”

  “You did. I know that Stephen wasn’t always easy to be around, but you accepted that. You stuck by him when no one else did. You and him against the world. Even if you weren’t perfect, you were a friend to him, a good friend. The best friend. You are not responsible. Do you hear me? You are not responsible. You can’t control what happens in someone else’s mind. You’re not all-knowing and you’re not all-powerful and you have to forgive yourself.”