by H. J. Lawson
“Don’t sit up. You might have a concussion,” Nurse Helen says as she pushes open the curtain around me, bringing with her a welcome sweet smell of perfume.
She always has a welcoming smile when I see her. Here it comes. The edges of her lipstick-coated lips move into a car-stopping smile.
All the boys at school have a crush on her. There’s something about the way she smells that used to fill my nights with pretty interesting fantasies. That was, of course, before I first saw Clara. But I don’t like Nurse Helen to see me when the teachers send me down to her, because she always knows it’s because I’m getting bullied, and that I’m pathetic.
“You were hit pretty hard,” she says, the sympathy in her tone as clear as her blue eyes. “I don’t understand why they make you boys play these scrimmages. I’ve gone to the principal about it a dozen times, but he doesn’t see the harm, he says. Well, I can show him the harm, I say. It’s just…”
I zone out a little, trying to remember how I got here. Nurse Helen continues talking in a fast flurry of words, her voice going up when she’s annoyed about something.
And then it comes back—football, Travis… enough said.
“I should get back to class,” I say, interrupting whatever Nurse Helen was saying.
“No. I think you should go to the doctor, get checked out just to make sure it isn’t serious.”
“I’m fine.”
I sit up, moving sideways to avoid her hands. I reach up to brush hair out of my face and realize that I still don’t have my glasses.
“Can I go change?” My gym clothes feel crusty from lying on them.
“Your clothes are here. Your friend Douglas brought them.”
Good ole Douglas.
“Did he stay long?”
Helen smiles. “He used his charm on me, so I let him stay a little longer than I was meant to.”
“Douglas used his charm, and I was still unconscious,” I laugh.
“He’s going to be very popular when he grows older.”
“Douglas, popular?” I never thought I would hear those two words together.
“You both will be, if you get through high school alive. You really need to stand up to those kids,” she says. With a teasing look on her face, she adds, “You had another visitor.”
“Who else came?”
“Kimi.” Nurse Helen smiles, then adds, “Are you taking her to the school dance?”
I snort. Jesus, Parker, what will she think of you? “We’re just friends. Think we are skipping it.” There is no thinking about it; we’re playing Xbox at Kimi’s house that night. Better to be there than laughed at for Douglas’s dancing. He really wants to go. He doesn’t seem to see or care when people laugh at him.
Nurse Helen smiles. “She was really worried about you. Asking all types of medical questions. She’s quite smart, you know.
“Mr. Conrad came to check on you as well,” she adds. I frown. Was he here to see me, or Nurse Helen? Bet they are secretly dating.
“Why did he come here?”
“Something about what happened in class today, and he… felt guilty,” she says, as if she’s not meant to tell me.
I could blame him, but it's not going to make things, or me, any better. “It was just a stupid game.” I shrug it off like it was nothing. Then I start to climb off the bed, but I’m lightheaded and wobble a little.
Nurse Helen grabs my puny upper arm and helps me back onto the bed.
Wasn’t it humiliating enough to be knocked out on the football field? Did I really need to be reminded that I am so weak, that now I literally can’t stand on my own two feet?
I don’t know how this day can get any worse.
Yes, it can.
“What’s going on? Why is my boy not in class?”
Mom.
“Mrs. Jenkins.” There’s an edge to Nurse Helen’s voice when she says my mom’s name. I completely understand. My mom can be a little difficult to take, especially when she is tired, which is always. She acts annoyed at everything.
“I had to leave work to come down here because someone said that Parker was injured. But he looks just fine to me.”
“I am fine,” I say. “I was just going back to class.”
“No,” Nurse Helen says. “He needs to go to a doctor. He passed out and was unconscious for more than ten minutes. That suggests he might have a concussion.”
My mom looks at me for a long second then shakes her head. “He’s tough,” she says. “He’s been hit on the head before and survived. He’ll survive this.”
But Nurse Beth isn’t about to be defied. She crosses her arms over her chest and stares my mom down.
“I will not sign off on allowing him to return to class. You don’t have to take him to the doctor, but you have to take him home.”
My mom mutters something under her breath that I am pretty sure is something less than friendly. But then she gestures at me.
“Get your stuff. You have two minutes.”
Nurse Helen hands me my clothes and gestures to the small bathroom tucked into the back corner of the room.
I dress quickly, relieved to have my glasses back, until I step out of the bathroom and see the dark, sunken look on my mom’s face. She worked the late shift last night, and then the afternoon shifts. Going home early might be fun for some kids, but for me it’s a nightmare.
The lecture begins before we even leave the building.
“Do you realize I had to leave work to come pick you up? Do you know how much money we’re losing right now? How am I supposed to pay the bills if I have to keep cutting work to come get you? My manager told me this is the last time, Parker. Do you know what that means? Do you know what’ll happen if I lose my job?”
“Mom, people are looking,” I say as nosey eyes burn into my body like the scalding sun.
“I don’t care.” She just carries on complaining at me, as if the whole school wasn’t around her with front-row seats to my private life at home—the life which I usually pretend isn’t real, and now everyone can see it.
“Mom, it wasn’t my fault.”
“Parker, you always say that, but really you are old enough to stand up for yourself.”
“Why can’t you be on my side for once? Dad would have been!”
“I am, and dad’s not here. I’m doing the best that I can.”
We both pause for a second. Mom never used to be like this. We were once very happy, when she was everything a mom was supposed to be, but the day my Dad was killed, that part of her was taken also.
As if mom can’t handle the silence, she carries on the way she has since my father died, worrying and complaining. “The electricity bill is due tomorrow. The phone bill the day after that. Do you really want to go without your cell phone? Do you really want the electricity turned off so you can’t play your video games anymore? You do realize those games aren’t free, right?”
“Yes.”
I pay for most of my games from money I earn from selling cheats online. But she doesn’t need to know that.
“This is getting ridiculous. This is the third time I’ve had to come pick you up, and school’s only been in session for six weeks. Six weeks, Parker!”
“I know.” I’ve still got the faded yellow bruises to prove it.
“This has got to stop. You have to stop putting yourself in these positions.”
Like this was my choice. Like any of this was my choice. Does she think I stepped into Travis’s way on purpose? That I went looking for trouble? Does she think I want to end up in the nurse’s office twice a week?
I climb into the car and slam the door, even though I know I'm going to hear about that, too.
The school bell rings and a bunch of kids come pouring out of the school. I spot Clara walking with a couple of her friends. I let my eyes roll over her, taking inventory of all the things that make her unique. The way her skirt fits on her hips, the way her blouse clings to her waist, the way she carries her backpack over one shou
lder, the way she tosses her hair. I have it all memorized.
“You need to be a little more respectful, young man,” my mom announces as she climbs into the car. Young man? I love how adults can one day leave you to be the adult and the next day insult you with “young man.” “Cars aren’t cheap. You can’t just slam the doors like that,” mom adds. I know how much cars cost; I spent hours trying to find us one. I know more about this car than she does.
I just keep my eyes on Clara, with my cheek pressed against the car window.
“Maybe if I can get back to work by two my manager will let me finish my shift. We really need this money. I can’t believe you had to choose today of all days to do this.”
“You know,” I say without thinking about it, “if Neil worked, you wouldn’t have to worry about the bills as much.”
I can feel my mother’s eyes burning through the back of my skull.
“You know why Neil can’t work. It’s not his fault he hurt his back. If only you had helped him when we were moving, he would be able to work.”
“It was his job to move our belongings, not mine.” Mom met Neil when the bank took our house away from us, a year after Dad died.
Mom had been a wreck, and Neil had swooped in and rescued her.
That’s what she said at the beginning; then once he moved into our new crappy home, he quickly showed who he really was.
“Parker, I taught you to be better mannered than that. You help when people ask.”
The drive home is mostly silent except for the few moments Mom curses at other drivers.
“What are you doing home so early?” Neil asks. I’m surprised he’s even noticed we have entered the room. His eyes are glued to the television, as usual. “Shut the door, you’re letting the cold in,” he adds. If he were wearing more clothes, instead of the off-white wife beater and combat shorts, he wouldn’t have to worry about the room temperature. The only combat his shorts have seen is the struggle to cover his bloated body. From inside the house comes the smell of the frying oil he uses every time he cooks. The smell is disgusting; it sticks to the walls like it does to the crusty, old frying pan.
I hold onto the door handle for a few moments, letting the stench waft out, until mom taps me on top of my hand and pulls it closed.
I watch Neil wipe sweat that’s rolling down his bald head. He’s not cold, he’s having meat sweats. There is a plate on the worn leather seat next to him, with a half-eaten burger. By the ketchup track marks running down his overgrown stomach, I guess that’s not his first burger.
They are his burgers. Mom and I are starving most of the time, but Neil always gets double servings, normally most of mom’s food. She always says she’s not hungry, but the gray shadows on her face don’t lie. She’s fading away; what’s left is a shadow of her old self. A mom I can barely remember. Some days she looks like the cancer has come back, and she’s accepted her fate with open arms.
My head starts pounding. I wonder if Nurse Beth is right, that I have a concussion or something.
Stars dance in front of my eyes, and I feel a heaviness weighing down on me. I slump down into the chair.
“Answer me,” Neil demands.
“What? What was the question?”
Neil leans toward me, the sickly smell of burger wafting off him. “You on drugs, kid?” he asks, squeezing my cheeks in as he brings my head closer to his.
I squirm out of his grip, which has left a greasy trail on my face. “No, just got a headache,” I say, wiping the grease away.
“A sore head! You do realize that your mother was at work, right?” he continues. “We have bills due and your mother can’t afford to miss any more work.”
“Then why didn’t you come pick me up?” I ask before thinking. Luckily it’s early in the afternoon, and the two beer bottles on the floor next to him mean he’s just begun drinking.
“I can’t drive, because of the bad back you gave me,” he says, rubbing his back. Jesus, that was years ago, and he still blames me. It's all frigging rubbish anyway. There is nothing wrong with his back, it’s just a tool of guilt that he uses against my mom.
“You drove to the store just fine the other day.”
“I needed my prescriptions. That’s different,” he says with a scowl. “So, what really happened? Why did you come home?”
I don’t want to tell him and hear the mocking from him, not now.
Mom speaks before I do. “He had a half day. It’s my fault. I forgot all about it.”
Neil stares at my mom and then his eyes drop to mine. He knows she’s lying. I can see it in his eyes.
Neil reaches out for my mom’s hand and squeezes her fingertips lightly. “Well, maybe the store will let you finish out your shift if you head back over there.”
I can’t believe what I’m hearing. Is he honestly sending my mom back to work? If he’d get off his lazy ass and look for a job, maybe we wouldn’t have to live like this. Maybe my mom would actually be a mom instead of working twelve hours a day, seven days a week at the local grocery store. Maybe she could be here, see what happens in this house when she’s not around.
But none of that is ever going to happen.
“Where are you going?” Neil calls as I head up the stairs.
“Leave him,” mom says softly.
“Your kid really is a miracle kid… it's a miracle he’s still alive,” Neil says, laughing, loud enough for me to hear him upstairs.
All I can do is slam my door in response.
Chapter 7
Mom and dad called me a miracle baby. Neil has no right referring to me as that.
When I was born, I never cried for my first breath. The doctors tried everything, but it never worked. They declared I was a stillborn—born still, dead.
My parents loved to tell me the story of that day. I was placed into my mom’s arms after the doctors had cleaned me up. They thought they were holding a dead baby, but then I took my first breath, in her arms.
Everyone in the room was completely surprised with my outburst of screams, which were followed by my mom’s cries that I was alive.
News quickly spread in the town of my being a miracle baby. I even had my photo taken for the local paper. That was the peak of my life. They say everyone has their fifteen minutes of fame. Mine were the first few minutes of my life, but it quickly went downhill after that.
I look at the family picture on top of my dresser. That was my old family. Mom is smiling up at dad, dad is smiling down at me—we’re the perfect family. The photo was taken during the last family vacation in our holiday home in Texas, where Dad was from. He loved taking me out there and teaching me to shoot. I was a pretty good shot.
We did have a good few years, and that’s one of the hardest things to get over. I can still remember what a normal family is like. It's like being given a taste of chocolate, only to be told you will never taste it again. My life is bittersweet.
A loud thundering sound rolls into my brain from the oncoming train, on time as always, every hour on the hour. The house shakes as the train flies past. One day the house is going to crumble and crash down to the ground.
This house is rotten. In the winter the walls are damp to the touch, and there are stains of black mold in the corners of the ceiling that have started to creep down the walls. As if the mold is trying to cover the walls with its creepy darkness, surrounding me in its damp poison.
In the winter the darkness enters my lungs, choking me from the inside, which results in my spending most of winter sick in my bed as the darkness swallows me.
This house is making me sick, but there is nothing we can do. I long to be back in my old house. I never felt winter in that house; the temperature was always perfect. Dad loved natural fires as well, so we used to have an open fire in the living room. The flames would roar as we placed our hands in front of them, warming them after playing out in the snow. Now we just have one main room, which Neil has claimed for his own. There is no family room anymore, just as there i
s no family.
I reach for my computer game next to the family photo. Time to get lost in another world, a world where the real Parker doesn’t exist.
“Take that!” I yell at the screen as I fire a barrage of bullets, and the figure of my foe drops to the ground, along with mine.
My heavy eyes look at the screen. The sunlight has stopped seeping through the blinds and is replaced with stars. My head throbs from this afternoon’s knockout.
I wish that it were Neil’s body laid dead on the TV screen. No, wait, I wish he were the one lying outside the store, in the rain, with blood draining from his body, and not my dad’s.
Why do Neil and Travis get to live while my dad is left in a cemetery?
Great, bet I will have more frigging nightmares replaying the night my dad was murdered. I think of Clara; memories of her are the only things that stop my nightmares.
I drop the controller to the ground and click off the TV, leaving a tiny blue glow from the TV monitor and a red glow from my alarm clock, which sits on the nightstand by my bed. The glowing number 12:56:01 reflects off the edge of the orange bottle with my sleeping pills. I’ve been on them for years, since I was a child. I had a habit of sleepwalking. Dad once found me in the neighbor’s house when I was a little kid.
I hate the way they make me feel in the morning. It's like I’m in a thick fog that allows nothing to seep into my brain, which makes school a nightmare, even more than normal.
Not tonight, I tell myself, as I do most nights. Tonight is the seventh night in a row I’ve gone without the sleeping pills.
I throw the blanket over my head and bury myself in the heat it provides, hoping it will knock me out, but all it does is steam my glasses up.
It really would be easier to sleep if this bed wasn’t so uncomfortable. I flip around trying to find that sweet spot, but can’t.
12:59:01. If it gets to 01:00:00 I’m taking the sleeping tablets. Parker, don’t do it! You’re just starting to feel normal, as if the years of medications are finally leaving your body. No doubt I’ll fail tomorrow's math test, from the lack of sleep. But I would rather fail one test if it means I get out of this permanent zombie state.