Mom opens her mouth like she’s going to say something, but then the door slides open, and all is I see is Savannah.
She’s a mess, with raccoon smudges under her eyes and the same clothes she had on last night. Her face is red and puffy, and when I hold out my hand, fresh tears spill over onto her cheeks.
Mom stands up. “Could I speak with you outside for a moment, Dr. Henderson? There’s something I’d like to discuss.”
Doc nods. “Yes, that would be fine.”
Mom leans down and kisses me on the head. She squeezes Savannah’s arm as she passes, and they exchange the kind of look people give each other at funerals. Then she slips out of the room with the doctor and slides the door shut behind her.
I give Savannah’s hand a tug, and she climbs onto the bed. We sit shoulder to shoulder, Savannah’s knees tucked up to her chest and her head leaning on my arm. The only sounds in the room are the steady beeping of my heart monitor and Savannah’s soft sniffles.
I nudge her gently with my elbow. “There’s a tube in my dick,” I say, hoping a lame joke will ease the tension between us.
“Gross.” She doesn’t even look up.
“I think everything’s still intact. Wanna check?” I pretend I’m going to lift the sheet. Savannah swipes the back of her hand under her nose. “It’s not funny, Eli. I thought . . . I thought you were . . .”
“I know.” But I can’t stand to hear her say it. I shift my weight and gingerly reach my arm around Savannah’s shoulder. She burrows into my chest, startling when I gasp in pain.
“Easy,” I say, wincing as she gently wraps her arms around my waist and curls her knees up tighter. She looks so small like this. Fragile.
“Hey,” I say. “Hey.” With my finger, I tip her chin up so I can look into her eyes. “I’m okay, Savannah. I’m fine. I’m right here.”
She gives a little nod, but her arms grip my waist like I might disappear. She turns her face away from me, hiding it against my chest. “I’ve never been so scared in my whole life.”
“Me neither,” I whisper, even though I mean it different. It’s the doctor and the questions and the ‘what next’ that scares me now. I rake my fingers through Savannah’s hair and down her back. Kiss the top of her head.
“I’m sorry about your mom, by the way.” Her words are muffled against my hospital gown, but I hear them perfectly.
My spine goes rigid. “What about my mom?”
Savannah sits up, shoves her hair out of her eyes. “I knew you wouldn’t want me to call her, but . . .”
“You called her?” The words come out sharper than I mean for them to. But still . . .
Savannah’s eyes narrow. The calm in her voice is a tightrope walker, wobbling above inevitable disaster. “Your heart stopped, Eli. You were dying.”
A distant part of my brain tells me that Savannah’s right, that she had no other choice, and that I would’ve done the same thing if she’d been the one who needed help. But another part, a louder part, says Savannah betrayed me.
I drop my arm from her shoulder, shrinking back into my pillows. “I’m not dead now.” Now I’m stuck in a hospital room with a doctor asking me tricky questions, like how often I use, in front of my mom.
Savannah’s face flashes fire, and she shoves away from me, scooting her body down the bed so she can look me in the face. “Everybody else ran from the cops, but I went looking for you. I found you in your car. Your eyes were rolled back in your head, and you were foaming at the mouth and . . .” She pauses, sucking in air like she’s drowning. “You’d locked the door, Eli.”
I don’t want to listen to this. I don’t want to know what happened. “Shut up, Savannah.”
She shakes her head fiercely, pounding her open palm against the thin hospital mattress. Words spill out like white water over a broken dam. “The cops had to break the glass. And when they pulled you out of the car, you weren’t breathing.”
“I said, SHUT UP!”
“They did CPR, and they put you on a stretcher, and they took you away in an ambulance. So, yeah. I called your mom.”
There’s no air in the room. The space between Savannah and me is too wide, and I want to cross it, but I can’t. I wrap my arms around my head, covering my face, and wish the whole world would disappear.
Savannah’s voice finds me in my cave of skin and bones. “You need help, Eli. I care about you, but . . .”
Her voice wavers, and I know what’s about to happen. I can already hear the words she’s about to say. I lower my arms. “Are you breaking up with me?”
“I just . . . I don’t know what to do.”
The door opens, and Mom sticks her head into the room. Her eyes move from me to Savannah, reading the tension between us. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but . . .”
“No, it’s okay.” Savannah stands up, sweeps her hands across her cheeks, and straightens her clothes. “I’m actually super tired. I’d like to go home now.”
“Of course you would.” Mom steps into the room. Her arms are full of pamphlets and paperwork, and she drops it all on the counter and reaches for her jacket where it’s slung over a chair. “I’ll drive you.”
“No, it’s okay,” Savannah says. “My dad’s here.”
My head shoots off the pillow, and pain stabs me in the chest. I flop back down. “Your dad?”
Savannah sighs. “Call me when you get home, okay?” The door closes behind her.
I cover my face with my hands.
The chair beside me creaks as Mom drops into it. “Can I do anything?”
“I want to go home, Mom.”
“I know you do, honey.” She hesitates, reaching over the metal bar of the bed to squeeze my forearm. Her thumb strokes my skin in time with the practiced words she forces out. “But I’m not sure that’s the best idea right now.”
I freeze.
Mom walks over to the counter and scoops up the pile of pamphlets. “I want you to take a look at these.” She fans out the pamphlets across my legs like cards in a magic trick.
My mind goes numb as I scan the pamphlet covers. They look like college brochures, with pictures of smiling kids walking across manicured lawns and artful shots of stone buildings meant to showcase the architecture. Like anybody would pick a college because of the architecture.
Mom waves one of the brochures. “Dr. Henderson recommended this one,” she says. “It’s up in the mountains, a couple hours from here. I spoke to the social worker about it. She says she’ll make the call for us, see if they have a bed.”
I take the brochure. The cover boasts a view of a lake with fog-covered mountains in the background. LakeShore Recovery Center. Inside the brochure’s glossy pages, there are pictures of smiling teenagers seated in a semi-circle, all eyes on an overly expressive adult in the center. There’s a shot of the dining hall, but it’s the picture of the bedroom that surprises me, shoots a bolt of nausea through my gut. Because this is a place people go to stay.
“Rehab?” I say the word because Mom can’t. “Really?”
She avoids my eyes, shuffling through the brochures like she’s putting her cards back in the box.
“Those places are for people with drug problems, Mom. I don’t have a problem. I told you, this was the first time . . .”
Mom shoots me a sideways look. She knows I’m lying.
I hold up my hands to show her she’s got me. “Okay, so maybe it’s been a couple of times. But I don’t have a problem. I can stop whenever I want.”
Mom’s eyes soften. “I know you think that, sweetie, but . . .”
I cut her off. “I know I can. Just give me a chance, Mom. Please.”
Mom sighs and runs her hand down her face. “Steven spoke to the officer who pulled you from the car . . .”
My pulse throbs in my throat. I know what the cops would’ve found in my car. The plastic baggie, one lonely capsule inside.
“He’s made a few calls.”
> Knowing Steven, the chief of police is his golfing buddy, and he’s made some deal that looks like it’s about doing what’s best for me, but is actually about keeping his own reputation clean and shiny. A girlfriend from the poor side of town? That he can fix with a two-carat wedding ring and a walk-in closet the size of most living rooms. But a stepson who’s a junkie? Now that just won’t do.
“So if I go to rehab, the drug charges go away?”
“The officer agreed to sit on the case to give you a chance to get better. Do you have any idea how lucky you are? Your dad . . .”
“He’s not my dad!” I glare at her, my voice cracking like some pimply junior high punk. “And I don’t care what kind of deal he’s made. I don’t need Steven, and I sure as hell don’t need rehab!”
Mom slumps in her chair, shoves her hands through her knotted hair until the skin on her forehead stretches, and her eyes seem to bulge in the strange half-light of the room. “I mean lucky to be alive,” she says, her voice strained, a rubber band about to snap. “I knew you were drinking, suspected there was pot, too. I mean, it’s normal for teenagers to smoke once in a while. Christ, even I did! But fuck, Eli! Heroin? Do you have any idea what could’ve happened?”
I stare hard at the pocked gray ceiling tiles, sterile and colorless, like the rest of the hospital. I know what could’ve happened. But real life is hard enough without worrying about what-ifs.
Mom slides her hands down her face; her fingers wipe the sides of her mouth. “It’s just 28 days.”
I cough out a bitter laugh. “28 days? That’s a whole month of my life, Mom, and I don’t even have a choice.”
“You’re eighteen, Eli. I can’t make you go. But after the last time . . .”
Her voice trails off, but I know what she was going to say. The morning after Winter Formal, woken by the call from Savannah’s dad, Mom was waiting in the kitchen when I showed up, reeking of smoke and sweat, Savannah’s dried puke on my shoe. Mom’s yelling woke up Steven, who made me drink a pot of black coffee and said the next time, I might as well not come home at all.
I roll to my side, turning my back on Mom. “Steven finally found a way to get rid of me, huh? The three of you can finally be the perfect little family he’s always wanted.”
“We’re not a family without you, Eli.” Mom’s gentle voice reaches over my shoulder, tugs at me like a hand on my chin, but I don’t turn around.
Mom stands up, leaving the pamphlets in a stack on the bed. “I’m going to go home, get dressed, and pack a few of your things. I’ll be back in a couple of hours.”
She waits a minute for my response, and when it doesn’t come, she bends down and kisses the top of my head. “I love you, Eli,” she says.
I hear the door close behind her, and I squeeze my eyes tight, until stars form behind my lids, and the tears stop stinging.
After
Three days, eight cups of JELL-O, and countless hours of daytime TV later, Mom and I step through the sliding glass doors of the hospital and out into the parking lot. It’s raining; the weather’s a perfect fucking cliché. Nobody steps out of the hospital into a beautiful summery day—not when they’re going to rehab. When you’re on your way to rehab, the sky is angry, and the clouds close in on you. There’s no sun for miles.
Steven’s Lexus is waiting by the curb; thin rivers streak the SUV’s wide windows.
I ease myself down onto the backseat, the leather as smooth and creamy as one of Savannah’s vanilla lattes. Steven’s hair is wet from the shower; the inside of the car smells like coffee and dial soap. Benny’s sitting in his booster, barefoot, a Blue’s Clues coloring book across his lap.
“You brought Benny?”
Mom buckles her seatbelt and adjusts the shoulder strap. “He’s missed you,” she says, shooting me a pointed look. “And it’ll be a while before he sees you again.” She reaches for her coffee, turning her attention to Steven. “You know where you’re going?”
I lean back against the seat and shut my eyes, but I can feel Benny staring at me. I crack one lid. “What?”
“You don’t look sick.” He eyes me suspiciously.
“I’m not sick. Who told you I was sick?”
Benny squirts blue razzleberry hand sanitizer into his palm and rubs furiously. “Miss Tyler is taking us to the aquarium tomorrow.”
Miss Tyler, Benny’s kindergarten teacher, has managed to instill a fear of germs in Benny that borders on obsessive compulsive. Last winter, Benny’s hands were raw from over-washing. I’m just waiting for the day that Benny starts wrapping his school supplies in aluminum foil.
“You can’t go if you’re sick,” Benny says. “Miss Tyler says no germs on the bus.”
“I’m not sick, Ben. Mom, you told him I was sick?”
Mom’s arguing with Steven about the best way to get to the turnpike from the hospital parking lot, but she pauses long enough to give me an apologetic look. “We weren’t exactly sure what to tell him.”
Benny touches my face with small hands still glistening with sanitizer.
I swat him away. “What are you doing?”
“Checking for fever. Miss Tyler always checks for fever.”
“I told you, I’m not sick!”
Mom sighs. She tucks her seatbelt behind her and twists around to face us. “Ben, your brother’s not sick like you’re thinking of. He’s just not feeling like himself.”
That’s the understatement of the century.
“He’s going to take a little break from school until he feels better again.”
Benny’s eyes narrow. “Like Disney?” he asks, referencing the trip my family took spring break of my junior year. The little nerd-bomber was so upset that preschool would be closed for a week that his teacher gave him a special notebook, so he could tell his class all about his trip when he got back.
“It’s more like summer camp,” Mom tells him. “They have a lake and all kinds of fun group activities.”
Benny’s eyes get bright with excitement. He spent a week at day camp last summer and loved it almost as much as Disney World.
“Oh, yea,” I say, my voice dripping with sarcasm. “Exactly like summer camp.”
Steven’s dark eyes meet mine in the rearview. “I know it doesn’t feel like it now, but you’re making the right choice, son.”
“You know I don’t have a choice.” My words are fists, and I’m aiming for soft tissue. “And I am not your son.”
Steven’s face tightens, but he swallows his words like bitters in his whiskey sour. His fingers drum the steering wheel, tapping out all the things he’d say if Benny wasn’t here.
Mom reaches a hand across the center console and massages the back of Steven’s neck. As if he’s the one who needs her.
“When will you be back?” Benny asks me.
My throat suddenly feels tight, and my eyes sting. I’m grateful when Mom offers her phone to Benny.
“Here, Ben,” she says. “Why don’t you watch some Blue’s Clues, okay?”
He takes it eagerly, and I prop my packed duffel against the foggy window, carefully positioning it under my neck like a pillow.
“I packed your green hoodie,” Mom says. “The one with the fleece lining. That’s your favorite, right? And your slippers. I did all the laundry, so I probably packed more than you’ll need.”
I nod absently, wishing for my phone and headphones so that I could disappear into a world of sound. Although the worst of my withdrawal symptoms are over, my stomach still churns around my hospital breakfast, and my whole chest aches. Doc said that’s from the chest compressions, that I was lucky the paramedic didn’t crack a rib. People have thrown that word around a lot over the past three days. But I don’t feel lucky. I feel like my life is falling apart.
“They provide all your meals and snacks,” Mom continues, her fingers toying the lip of her Starbucks cup. “I’ll put money on your account, so you can get candy or soda or whatever.”
I close my eyes and push Mom’s voice to the background, like the steady whirring of a white noise machine. And I go to the secret place inside me that’s for Emergencies Only, the place where there’s so much nothingness that anything is possible.
It’s the place where I keep my dad.
“Eli. Eli, wake up, honey. We’re here.” Mom’s voice nudges me out of the dream. It’s the same dream I always have. The one with the park and the swings.
I wake up reluctantly, even though I know how the dream ends.
My duffel bag is damp where I’ve been drooling in my sleep; my head is pounding.
I sit up, squinting out the window at the building ahead. Blue clapboard siding surrounds white window frames and doors. White curtains billow in a few open windows. The entrance is made entirely of glass, marked by two white pillars, and crowned with a large sign. The words LakeShore Recovery Center hover over a watery horizon, punctuated by a couple of painted pine trees.
Benny’s snoring, his chin on his chest, a crayon loose in one hand. Blue, his favorite. I lift his head back against his car seat. He breathes easier for about half a second until his head flops down again.
Steven swerves into the lot. He parks, but leaves the car running. “I guess I’ll wait here?” He tips his head toward the back seat, where Benny’s already sawing lumber again.
Mom hesitates. Her hand flutters at her neck, frazzled. “Are you sure? It might be a while.”
“We’ll be fine.” Steven tells her. His voice is soothing, and he offers a reassuring smile. “If he wakes up, we’ll go for a walk or something.”
Mom nods. She checks the visor mirror, absently fluffing her hair and swiping her thumb over the tired lines beneath her eyes. “Okay,” she says, slapping the visor closed and collecting her purse. “You ready, Eli?”
Not in the least.
Mom climbs out of the car, closing the door behind her, and the sound nudges Benny from his nap.
“You going to Disney camp now?” he murmurs groggily.
“Yeah, Ben,” I tell him. “Go back to sleep, okay?”
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