“Fuck addiction,” I say again, louder this time. My voice echoes in the empty gym.
“FUCK ADDICTION!” My words graffiti the cement walls.
I’m sitting on the old brown couch in Richard Fisher’s office, picking at the worn patch of denim over my knee.
Richard Fisher is reading my purple notebook, the list he’d asked me to write about the challenges waiting for me at home. Every few minutes, he comments on something he’s read, but I’m barely listening. All I’m thinking about is Libby, and whether or not I’m going to tell Richard Fisher the truth.
“It seems like going back to school is your biggest concern,” Richard Fisher says.
I nod weakly—sure, it’s my biggest concern, second to getting kicked out of LakeShore. With only four days left, I finally want to make the most of it. And I’m pretty sure sneaking into detox would be the final nail in my coffin. But I want to know what’s going to happen to Libby. I want Richard Fisher to tell me she’s going to be okay.
“There are options, you know?” he continues. “You only have a trimester left. We could talk to your mom. There are cyber-schools . . .”
I glance at the clock, the second hand that’s maybe frozen because I swear to God it hasn’t moved since I got here.
Richard Fisher clears his throat. “Something bothering you, Eli?”
I meet his gaze, and it’s so open, so familiar, that I decide to tell him the truth. Sort of.
“Libby’s back.”
Richard Fisher sinks back in his creaking swivel chair. “You’ve heard.”
I nod.
Richard takes a deep breath. His face gets all serious, like he’s about to talk me down from a ledge. And rightfully so. It’s a ledge I’ve been on a few times since I came to LakeShore. Wanting to give up. Wanting to go home. But not this time. This time is different.
“Eli . . .” Richard begins.
“Relax,” I tell him. “I just want to know what’s going to happen to her.”
Richard Fisher taps his pen against my open notebook. “She’s going to finish detox, and then she’ll rejoin the program.”
“And then what?”
Richard raises his eyebrows.
“You know what I mean,” I say, fighting the rising urgency in my voice. “How are you going to keep her safe? How are you going to keep her from going back home? Don’t you have some sort of long-term program or something? What are you going to do?”
Richard Fisher lets out a heavy exhale. “You know I can’t discuss that with you, Eli.”
“But I need to know!” I slap the coffee table, and the sound echoes in the tiny office, surprising us both.
I take a deep breath. “I care about her, Richard. I’ve changed since I got here, you know? I know Libby and I aren’t . . . Look, I get it, okay? But I can’t handle not knowing what’s going to happen to her. I have to know she’s going to be okay.”
Richard Fisher gives me a small, sad smile. “One of the hardest parts of getting sober, Eli, is finding out that life isn’t perfect. There are no guarantees. And for the first time in your life, you’re going to have to deal with that kind of uncertainty without using drugs as a crutch.”
I sink back into the lumpy cushions, thinking of the pills in Chase’s car. The What-If’s buzz through my brain like hungry mosquitoes, and I know exactly how Mo felt that night before he left. What if I can’t stay clean? What if all the self-control in the world isn’t enough? What’s going to keep me from coming right back here? Anxiety shoots through me, and my palms grow slick with sweat. “What if I can’t?” I ask. “What if I’m not strong enough?”
“None of us are strong enough on our own,” Richard Fisher says. “That’s what Step Two is all about.”
I stare down at my empty hands. “I don’t believe in that stuff.”
Richard Fisher leans forward, his eyes glinting behind his glasses. “Sometimes you have to fake it until you make it. Act yourself into a new way of thinking. You’re not the same kid you were before. You have the tools to stay clean. Whether you use them or not is entirely up to you. But you and I aren’t done, you know? We still have to finalize your aftercare program, which is going to involve lots of NA meetings and outpatient counseling. We have a long way to go, kid, but if you’re willing to do the work, you’ll find that there’s another way to live. Eventually, it won’t matter how crazy or unfair life is—you can be peaceful inside anyway.”
I consider his words. That kind of peace feels a long way off.
“When you say lots of meetings, how many are we talking, exactly?”
Richard Fisher rolls his eyes.
“Seriously, give me a ballpark figure.”
Richard throws his pen at me. “Get outta town.” He points down at my purple notebook. “Are we going to talk about this entry, or not?”
I glance up at the clock again—there’s ten minutes left to my session. And I don’t want to waste any of them. “Yeah,” I say. “Tell me more about cyber-school.”
Day 24
Red’s saved me a seat at group. He’s got a cup of coffee on the floor by his feet, and a couple of cheese Danishes in his hands. “Want one?” he offers.
My stomach growls, even though I just ate breakfast, and I take it gratefully. “Thanks,” I say, scattering crumbs.
The other guys settle into their seats, and Howard starts the session.
“Because several of you will be leaving in the next few days,” Howard begins, “I thought it would be valuable to spend this session talking about some of the concerns you might have about going home.”
Red elbows me in the ribs. “Lucky I’m not one of you,” he whispers. “I’m in for another thirty days.”
I lick the remnants of cheese filling from my thumb. “The insurance thing got worked out?” Lisa’s mom had been working on getting Red an extension for a while, and Red, not at all ready to go back home, had been anxiously waiting for this news.
“Yep. I’m approved for the extended program, and then probably sober living or a half-way house or something.”
“Nice.”
All around the circle, people offer to share. One by one, fears are named in the safety of this space we’ve all come to trust.
“Falling back into old habits.”
“The stress of going back to school.”
“Having to find new friends.”
My own fears echo those of the group, and I find myself nodding in agreement, in understanding. When Howard asks the group how they plan on coping with these challenges, I raise my hand.
“Eli,” Howard says. “Do you have something you want to share?”
“I, uh, I go home in four days. And I’m not sure I’m ready.”
Howard nods encouragingly.
“It’s like there’s this big hole inside me, and nothing fills it. I know that’s why I used, because I was trying to fill that hole. But now that I’m not using, the hole feels bigger. It feels more empty.”
My throat constricts; I force myself to keep talking, even though my words tremble. “You guys all believe in something, but I don’t have that. What’s going to keep me from falling back in?”
An image of Libby flashes through my mind—alone in her bathroom, a razor pressed against her wrist. Certain there was no other way.
I drop my head into my hands; words pour through my fingers like water. “I want to get better. But I can’t do it on my own. I need help, okay? I need help.”
Howard’s voice tugs me out of hiding. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned over the past ten years, Eli, it’s that when you ask for help, it always comes.”
I press my palms against my eyes and wipe the telltale wetness onto my jeans. “It just feels so fucking hard.”
Howard nods. “I know it does. But you’re not alone, Eli. Look around this circle, look at the people in your corner. Individually, we are all vulnerable to the pull of our addictions. But as a group, we
are greater. You don’t have to do this alone, Eli. The strength and spirit of this group will be with you every step of the way.”
I dare to peer around the circle, to meet the gazes of the guys in my group. Some of them haggard, some of them broken. All of them with scars like mine.
A heavy hand drops on my shoulder, and I turn to meet Red’s eyes. In them I see the night Will left. Red in my room, both of us weak, both of us hungry for what Will had. But together we were more. Together we made it through.
“Thanks,” I whisper.
Red grins at me. “What are friends for?”
I sit cross-legged on the floor in front of my higher power canvas and page lazily through my pile of magazines. The art teacher had them ready for me when I got to class, along with a pair of scissors and a bottle of glue. “Collage is a wonderfully intuitive art form,” she’d said, handing over the stack of supplies. “Sometimes you don’t even know what you’re looking for until you find it.”
I sip coffee from my lukewarm cup and eye my canvas skeptically. The picture of the kayaker stares back at me. It’s hung there in isolation for the last week. The impossibility of the kayaker’s task first drew me to the image—the cliff of sheer rock rising up right in front of him. But it’s the water that I notice now, the crystal-clear expanse surrounding the kayaker, holding him up.
I remember something I learned forever ago in Earth Science. Water erodes rock. That mountain face might look impassable, but there are cracks in its seemingly solid surface—narrow spaces where water can get in. Water is powerful. With enough time, water can take down a mountain.
I turn back to the magazine in my lap and examine the pages with sharpened focus. The guys in group talk about their higher powers like they’re always available—as handy and accessible as a pack of Kleenex or a tube of ChapStick, right there in your pocket whenever you need them. Not me. I don’t believe in some ethereal superpower that can swoop in and rescue me when I’m in trouble. But I believe in my friends. I believe in Red, in the unimaginable courage he has to face down his demons even as he grieves the death of his girlfriend. I believe in Libby, in the quiet strength she finds in her paintings and in her journal, despite her fucked-up family. And I believe in Mo, in falling down and getting back up, over and over again.
I take apart the magazine with frenzied scissors. Within the blaring headlines, I find the words I need. I cut letters from lies, piecing new words together. Page after page, I fill with jagged cracks, until the words spill out like light into darkness, pathways through the mountain.
STRENGTH
COURAGE
HOPE
FORGIVENESS
With dots of glue and fragments of tape, I tell the kayaker the real story. There are cracks in the mountain, I tell him. There are places where you can get through. You may not see them yet. You may not see them for a while.
I fill the sky with words that guide his way like stars.
The lobby’s empty after dinner, the Front Desk Fascist gone for the day. I lean over the desk and scoot the phone closer. I lift the receiver, my fingers hovering over the keypad.
You were right.
I need help.
I’m sorry.
Words are insufficient. There’s nothing I can say to take back what I’ve done to my mom, nothing I can say that will change our family’s story. The past is already written. My dad died an addict. I’m an addict, too. Nothing I can say will make any of that better.
In the back of my mind, I hear Richard Fisher’s voice from so many weeks ago. “That’s why we start at the beginning, kid.”
And so I do.
I start from where I am.
My fingers crisscross the keypad, dialing the number I know by heart.
“Eli?” she says, before I can say anything at all. “Eli, is that you?”
“Hi, Mom,” I say. And then: “Yeah. It’s good to hear your voice, too.”
Day 27
It’s my second-to-last morning at LakeShore. Red and I sit in companionable silence over strong coffee and waffles soaked with syrup. We both know I’m leaving tomorrow. We both know Red isn’t. What we don’t know, what neither of us is saying, is how we’ll make it on our own.
Red’s the first to break the silence. “It’s going to be real boring playing Ping-Pong by myself.”
I snort. “At least you’ll finally hit a winning streak. Too bad Will’s not here to bet on you.”
“Yeah.” Red gives a small smile. “Too bad.”
“He’ll be back,” I say. “Eventually, he’ll find his way.”
“I hope so.” Red pushes a piece of waffle around his plate, soaking up the syrup. “Have you thought about what you’re going to say tomorrow?”
My own bite of waffle is suddenly plaster in my throat. I wash it down with coffee that scalds my esophagus and grimace at Red. “No idea.”
Red chuckles. “Winging it, huh? That’s brave. If I tried that, I’d just stand there sweating my ass off until somebody put me out of my misery.”
“It’s not that,” I tell him. “I want to plan it ahead of time, but I don’t know what to say. I feel like I’m supposed to tell some big story about how I’ve changed, you know? How I’m better. But what if I’m not?”
Red raises his brow, his loaded fork suspended just short of his mouth. “You don’t think you’re different?”
The last few days play on random shuffle through my mind, pausing on yesterday. My mom came up—Richard Fisher’s idea. It was awkward at first, the space between Mom and I throbbing with the pain of past hurts. But we’d talked, and not just ‘good game’ or ‘please pass the salt,’ but really talked for probably the first time since before my dad died.
“Things will be different,” she’d promised. “You can ask me anything—no secrets, no lies, okay?”
“Different, yes,” I say to Red. “But I know I’m not ‘cured,’ if that’s what you mean. I still have a long way to go.”
Red smiles; he points his fork at me before popping the bite of waffle into his mouth. “Then maybe you say that.”
I nod, considering. Red’s voice pulls me from my thoughts. “Is that Libby?”
I swing around, following Red’s fixed gaze to the far end of the room. And there she is.
I’m on my feet before Red can say anything else. I weave my way through the dining hall as Libby fills a Styrofoam cup with hot water and selects a piece of fruit from the overflowing bowl. She’s turning to leave when I approach.
“Libby?”
Her hair’s been washed; it hangs soft around her shoulders. Her blue eyes are the placid sea on a clear day. Her lips stretch into a small smile that fills me with relief. “Eli.”
I move to hug her, but her hands are full. We share an awkward embrace that jostles Libby’s tea. Flustered, I grab a handful of napkins and blot the spill from the floor. When I look back at Libby, her smile is strained.
“I should get going,” she says. She nods at the orange in her hand. “I just came for some sustenance. You know . . . other than broth.”
I force an uncomfortable laugh. “You’re feeling better then?” The question is meant to tug at her; I’m not ready for her to leave.
Libby shrugs, pain palpable in her eyes. “Better’s a relative word.”
“What happens next?”
Libby casts a look around the room, as though searching for an escape. My questions weave a net around her, drawing her in. Remember that night? I want to say. Remember the crash?
Realization dawns, weighty and sharp. Not everybody gets out. Not Will. Not my dad.
Not everybody’s ok.
“They’re moving me,” Libby says, and even though I’m leaving, too, her words sever me.
“Where?”
“Not sure yet.” Libby’s lips curl into a sneer. “Turns out LakeShore can’t handle my kind of crazy.”
Her words are meant to sting, but I reach out to her anyw
ay. Libby, the girl with sharp edges—edges that protect something small and soft and beautiful.
My hand brushes her upper arm, but she shifts her weight, shrugging me off. “What about you?” She rubs her nose with the back of her hand. “You’re leaving soon, aren’t you?”
“Tomorrow,” I tell her, almost guiltily.
“Good for you,” Libby says, her voice slightly shrill. “I’m happy for you. I am.”
“I’m giving my final testimony tomorrow night. You should come,” I offer weakly.
Libby gives me an uncertain smile. “Sure. Maybe.” She turns, waves awkwardly with the orange in her hand. “I’ll see you around, Eli.”
It’s like when Mo left. Libby’s dandelion seed kiss, her face streaked with tears. I’ll see you around.
Is this really how it ends? After everything we’ve been through? After crawling together from the wreckage of our pasts, we’re just going to shake hands and walk away?
Everything inside me wants to go after her, wants to keep talking, prolong the inevitable. But while Libby’s scars are deep and fresh, mine are finally starting to fade.
I watch her back until she’s gone, and then I make my way to the table where Red waits.
Concern flashes across his freckled face. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” I tell him, though the words sting, bittersweet. Because all at once, I know they’re true.
I’m okay.
I’m going to be okay.
I pick up my tray. “I’ll see you later, bro. I’m going to go work on my speech.”
Day 28
The rec room is full tonight. Howard mans the podium, opening group with a few readings and a brief summary of his own story. But tonight, instead of zoning out or counting down the minutes until I can play Ping-Pong, I’m anxious, my stomach in knots. Because tonight I’m the main attraction.
I’m boxed into my front row seat, Richard Fisher and Mom like bookends, Steven next to Mom. I twist around, taking in the crowd. I spot Red a few rows back. He gives me a thumbs-up, mouths Don’t Choke, and I flip him off as subtly as possible. I scan the room behind him, disappointment like iron weights on my shoulders. Libby’s not here.
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