Turn Me Loose (Paradise, Idaho)

by Rosalind James

  And then there was the harder thing. When her parents showed up, and she had to explain it all to them. Her mother’s face strained and gray, her father’s set.

  “I’m sorry,” Rochelle said wretchedly when she’d finished the all-too-short account, everything she knew. “I should have told you. I didn’t want you to worry.”

  “Not sure what we could have done that you didn’t,” her dad said. “You made her get help, didn’t you? You took her home with you.”

  “I should have looked in her purse,” Rochelle said. “I checked the other places, but I didn’t check there. I should have . . .”

  “No,” her mother said. “This isn’t your fault. You can’t fix everything.”

  Rochelle felt her throat closing, and she couldn’t stop it. She didn’t cry, she thought wonderingly, even as she felt the hot tears spilling over. She never cried, because it didn’t help.

  She’d hadn’t even cried on the day of her brother’s funeral, because she’d been holding Stacy. She’d cried the day she’d known her marriage was over, and that was all. She’d cried because she’d failed. She’d never cried since, but she was crying now, because she’d failed again.

  “But I wanted to,” she said miserably. “Oh, Mom. I wanted to fix it so bad. I wanted to . . . to . . .”

  “Oh, baby,” her mother said, folding her into her arms, “I know. I know you wanted to. You did your best. All you can do is your best.”

  Stacy spent more than twelve hours in the hospital, as it turned out, and it was well after midnight by the time Rochelle’s parents put their youngest child into her dad’s pickup, tucked safely between them, and drove her home to Kernville with Rochelle and Travis following behind.

  “You don’t have to come,” Rochelle told Travis. She was dull with fatigue, everything seeming to take an extra second to register, her very words not forming quite fast enough on her tongue. “I can drive, if you take me home for my car.”

  “No, you can’t. And sure I do,” he said, as if there were no argument possible.

  “But you’re supposed to . . .” The white line in the highway was hypnotizing her, and she was staring at it, her vision starting to blur. “You’re supposed to leave tomorrow. Today. Whatever.”

  “Yeah, right. You remember that thing we said about love? What do you imagine it means?”

  “I don’t . . .” She couldn’t seem to finish a sentence.

  “Means I’m not going to San Francisco tomorrow. Today. Whatever. Means I’m staying here as long as you need me.”

  “Oh,” she said. “Well . . . thanks.” And then she leaned against his big body, closed her eyes, and might have fallen asleep. Just for a minute.

  She remembered climbing into the narrow twin bed in the tiny room she’d left so many years ago, and after that, it seemed like barely any time had passed before she was stirring, rolling over, and blinking in incomprehension at the white-painted ceiling. Slowly, the events of the day before came back to her, and she sat up and saw Stacy across from her, sitting up in bed, a cup of something in her hand.

  “Hi,” Rochelle said, still feeling fuzzy.

  Stacy looked down at her mug. “Hi. I can’t believe you’re here. I’m sorry.”

  Rochelle pushed herself farther up in bed and shoved the pillow behind her. “No. Don’t be sorry. Be glad that you finally did something desperate enough for us to notice, so we can help.”

  Stacy huffed out a laugh. “Yeah, right. Make an excuse for me.”

  “I’m not going to make an excuse.” Rochelle wasn’t sure what she’d thought she’d say to Stacy this morning, but it didn’t matter. Seemed she was saying this. “The hell with that. I’m going to hold your feet to the fire and make you take this on. You’ve been running away because you don’t think you can face it. But I know you can. You’ve done a whole lot of things, and you can do this. You’re going to have all the help there is. You’ve got this, and you’re going to do it.”

  “No,” Stacy said. “That’s you. I’m not you.”

  Just like that, Rochelle was done feeling guilty. Now, she was mad. A much more familiar sensation. “What, because it’s easy for me? Who ever said it was easy for anyone? I said you could do it. I didn’t say it’d be easy. Getting off those pills, all that stuff you’ve been taking, whatever you’ve been taking? It’s going to be hard. And you’re going to do it like you’ve done everything else. Like you went to college, and you stuck it out, even though you cried the first day, and probably a lot of days. And I know,” she continued when Stacy stared at her, “because I saw you. I knew when you’d been crying. And I admired you, because you stuck it out anyway. Just like you sucked it up in fifth grade when Marlene Thompson made fun of your clothes and your weight and your hair every single day. You didn’t quit then, and you’re not going to quit now.”

  “But you can do those things,” Rochelle could see the tears hovering at the edges of Stacy’s lids now, hear the wobble in her voice, and she hardened her heart against them. “You’re never scared. I’m so . . . I’m so scared, Ro. I was so scared, and it was the only thing that helped.”

  “What was?”

  “When I . . .” Stacy took a breath. “When I broke my ankle. I was so scared I’d flunk out. It hurt, and I missed school, and I . . .” Her chin trembled some more. “I wasn’t sure I could make it. And the pills made me feel better. They made it so I could do it.”

  “Did they make you smarter?” Rochelle asked. “I don’t think so. I bet they made you dumber. They just took the fear away, that was all. But the smarts, and the work? That was all you.”

  “But the fear,” Stacy tried to explain, sounding desperate. “It just . . . it smothered everything else. But if I took the pills, I could do it. Don’t you see?”

  “So you told the doctor that you needed more. You told him it still hurt.”

  Stacy looked away again. “Yeah,” she whispered.

  “But that couldn’t last forever. So what happened then?”

  Stacy was picking at the red yarn of the hand-tied quilt covering her bed. “You can get them,” she said reluctantly.

  “Uh-huh. Shane.”

  “It was harder, before. To buy them, I mean. I was so afraid I’d get caught, that you’d all find out, that Mom and Dad . . .” The hand tugging at the yarn was shaking now. “But he always had them, and he sold them to me, extra cheap, because he liked me. He said it was fine. That lots of people took them, and if you could feel bad or you could feel good, why wouldn’t you feel good? And that made sense, because I was so tired of it. I got so tired of feeling bad all the time. I just wanted to feel good.”

  “And he had more pills, too,” Rochelle said. “Whatever you were taking that first night, at that party.”

  “I hardly ever did that,” Desperate sincerity in Stacy’s voice, on her face. “It was just the Vicodin. Really, Ro. It wasn’t for . . . for partying. It was just to feel better. If I don’t take them . . . I feel so . . . bad. So scared. Because what about now? I’m way behind. I’ve got a lab due, and homework for Stats, and . . . and . . .” She was grabbing a fistful of quilt, squeezing it. “And he said . . . Shane said . . . I couldn’t get them from him anymore. That he didn’t want to . . .” Her shoulders were heaving. “See me,” she whispered. “Because I was too . . . he said I was . . .” She stopped, the tears dripping onto the quilt, and if Shane had been there, Rochelle wouldn’t have answered for her actions.

  “Stacy.” Rochelle had swung around and put her feet on the floor. She was in her underwear and a T-shirt, and the floor was chilly, so she pulled the quilt around herself. “You almost died the other night. You almost died. That matters so much more than Stats, or whatever horrible thing Shane said. It wasn’t true anyway. He’s a user, and he was saying what would hurt you most, because that’s what users do.”

  “No,” Stacy said miserably. “He doesn’t take them. He never does. He’s . . . he’s strong.”

  “No, he’s not.” Of that, Roch
elle was absolutely sure. “He’s weak. He’s the kind of person who feeds off other people’s weaknesses. He’s a vampire. That’s his addiction, and that’s not one bit strong. And he doesn’t matter anyway.” She still didn’t know how to do this, what was the right thing to say, but she was tired of waiting for Stacy to open up. She was going to go for it. “He’s all mixed up with the pills for you. That’s what I think. With you trying to be a different person. Which is stupid, because the person you are is fine. The person you are is great. So he said you were . . . what? Too needy. Too pushy. Too whatever it is, so you’d be on the defensive all the time, thinking it was you. It wasn’t you. It was him.” She started to say more, then stopped.

  “What?” Stacy said.

  There were times to project strength, and times to admit weakness. And right now, it was time for Rochelle to get over herself and tell Stacy how it worked down at the bottom of the hole. “That’s the way bad relationships go. It’s like boiling a frog.”

  “It’s like what?”

  At least Stacy wasn’t crying anymore. “If you drop a frog into hot water,” Rochelle explained, “he’ll hop right out again. You put him in cold water, though, then turn that stove on? He stays right there. The water starts warming up, and he starts getting cozy. You’ve changed his . . . his environment, and he feels like it’s normal. By the time he’s cooking? Too late then.”

  Stacy shook her head violently, and Rochelle said, “Not pretty, but that’s the truth. You take a little, then you take a little more, and before you know it, you’re taking way too much. I ought to know. I sat in that pot for years and got boiled. Just like Shane was doing to you.”

  “I thought Lake cheated on you,” Stacy said. “I thought that was it.”

  “That was just the last thing. Relationships don’t end over the last thing. It’s only the last thing because it’s the thing that happens right before you’ve had enough. My marriage ended, and that was the best thing that ever happened to me, and this is going to be the best thing that ever happened to you. You’re going to get over this, which has just about nothing to do with Shane, even though it feels like it. Trust me,” she said when Stacy shook her head again. “It’s going to be hard work, and at the end of it? You’re going to be stronger, and better, and you’re going to be out of that pot. And meanwhile, if you have to . . . whatever. Take a medical break from school? Get some incompletes? Go into your advisor’s office and explain, with a note from a doctor? A real doctor, who’s helping you get over this instead of just writing you a prescription for more and more of it? You face up to it, you explain, you start to deal. Things happen. Accommodations are possible. Didn’t you know?”

  “They . . . they are?” Stacy asked.

  Rochelle exhaled. “Of course they are. Things happen to people. Everybody knows that.”

  The force of it hit her, then. She could have smacked herself in the forehead. How hadn’t she seen it? “That’s why,” she said slowly. “You don’t know it. You think if you disappoint anybody, anybody at all . . . it’s the end of the world. That it’ll all come crashing down.”

  Stacy wasn’t just starting to cry now. She was crying, full out. “I can’t . . .” she managed to say. “I can’t stand to . . . Mom. Daddy. I’m so . . . I’m so . . . ashamed.” The word was a sob. “All this time. I’ve been so ashamed of what you’d all think if you knew. I just . . . I always screw up. I always screw up.”

  Rochelle was over on the other bed, gathering her sister into her arms. “No. No. You don’t. You don’t have to be perfect. Nobody’s expecting you to be perfect.”

  “What if I’m . . .” Stacy’s nose was streaming, and she wiped her hand under it like the little girl she’d been, and Rochelle’s heart turned over. “What if I’m not a doctor?” she whispered. “What if I can’t . . . I can’t get in?”

  “Then you go to plan B.” That one, Rochelle was sure of. “There’s always a plan B. Always. And if that doesn’t work? You go to plan C. You know how many plans I’m on? Working my way through the alphabet, that’s what. Life’s all about falling and getting up again. This is your low point. Time to get up again. Because how many people do everything right? Nobody, that’s who. Nobody. The only way you fail is if you give up. You’ve got people all around you who aren’t going to give up on you. We don’t care if you’re a doctor. We care about you. And we’re not going to let you give up on yourself, either. Because we love you.”

  “I don’t know why,” Stacy said in a small voice, sounding so broken. But she was fixable. Rochelle knew it. She was fixable. “I don’t see why.”

  “Oh, baby.” Rochelle hugged her, helpless with it. “Because we do. Because you’re ours. All of ours. Because you’re worth the effort. You’re worth our effort, and you’re worth yours.”

  She left Stacy after another few minutes. Left her wiping her eyes, but the tears this time were the healing kind, she hoped. The problem was out there now, at least, and out was better than in.

  She ducked into the bathroom, then went in search of clothes, ending up with a flannel shirt borrowed from her dad, thrown over yesterday’s jeans. And then she went into the kitchen to find her mom, who was cooking breakfast, and to fill her in.

  “Well,” Valerie said when Rochelle had finished, “I guess we do that, then. Find a doctor, and do what he says. At least we know what we’re dealing with now. There are plenty of families around here who’ve made it through this kind of trouble. If she wants to change, if she wants to get better—that’s the main thing.”

  “A doctor, or a therapist, or whatever—they might want to do some family counseling, I’ll bet,” Rochelle said. “I suspect there are some things Stacy’s going to have to hear a few times from you and Dad before they sink in.”

  “Whatever it takes,” her mother said. “I’ll go talk to her right now, and get her up, too. No problem ever got solved by lying in bed, fretting about it. Finish making breakfast, will you, sweetie?”

  With that, she handed Rochelle the spatula and left the kitchen, and Rochelle pulled the bacon out of the fridge, started laying strips of it on the heated griddle, and felt some of the weight leaving her shoulders at last.

  She hadn’t wanted to tell her parents about Stacy, and she’d been wrong, because they would deal. They’d already started. Travis had been right. She should have had more faith.

  Her early life might not have been so rich on the money side, she thought as the bacon began to curl and sizzle on the griddle, but if she’d absorbed half of her parents’ coping skills along the way, that wasn’t too bad an inheritance at all.

  What she’d told Stacy had been true. She’d been at the bottom of the pot, but her frog had hopped out anyway. She was never going in there again, and she was going to help tip Stacy’s pot right over.

  Shane be damned, she thought ferociously as she stabbed at the bacon and flipped it with too much force. Bad boyfriends be damned. Women were stronger than that.

  She got thrown out of her mad a minute later, when Travis came in the door from the mud room behind her dad, both of them shedding shoes and jackets along the way.

  “Oh,” she said blankly. “You’re here. I didn’t realize you’d stayed over.”

  “Aw, baby,” Travis said. “That could’ve come out better. I could leave if you want.”

  Just like that, her heart was lifting, and her day was turning around. Travis did that to her, it seemed. “What do you think, Dad?” she asked, turning her bacon again, but without quite so much violence. “Should I make him leave?”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” her father said. “He doesn’t seem too bad to me so far. Drove you home at two in the morning, got up early, went out with me to feed the stock. Even knew how to do it. Maybe you could give him breakfast first, anyway.”

  “Maybe so,” she said. “Besides, I need a ride home.”

  “How’s Stacy?” Travis asked, and she sobered.

  “Better.” She listened, heard her mom’s voice and Stacy�
��s quieter one. “Tell you later, all right?” She jerked her head toward the other side of the room. “Coffee cups to the left of the sink,” she told Travis, “and French toast and bacon coming up. We’ll see if we can keep it relatively drama-free this morning, how’s that? I keep testing him, Dad,” she explained. “One adventure after another. You haven’t seen the half of it.”

  “Didn’t I say,” Travis said, pulling down a mug and pouring from the simple countertop coffeemaker, “that I liked my life with a little adventure?”

  “You did,” she said, “but I’m not sure you were counting on this much of it.”

  “That’s the thing about adventures, though,” he said. “You don’t always get to choose them. We could try building ourselves some kind of stable platform to work from, maybe. What do you think?”

  “Funny,” she said, “I was just thinking something like that myself.”

  She smiled at him, and he smiled back, and her dad poured his own coffee and didn’t say anything. But he might have been smiling, too.

  CHOICES

  Travis drove Rochelle home, eventually, because that was what he could do, and he had to do something. He helped her pack up Stacy’s things, and drove her out to her parents’ again to deliver them. She told him he didn’t have to, of course, and he did it anyway. At least he could drive her. By then, it was lunchtime, and he took her out to the Breakfast Spot for a sandwich. And that was half their Sunday.

  “Wow,” she said when he pulled up outside her house, the fatigue evident in her voice. “One o’clock already. I had a lot of plans for this weekend.”

  “Me too. Guess that’s the way it goes.”

  “Sorry about that. Your trip and everything. Call me tomorrow, maybe?”

  That had sounded too far away, but they were both tired, and they both did have too much to do, so he left her and went home again. It felt a whole lot different walking into his cottage alone than it had walking out of it with Rochelle barely twenty-four hours earlier, though. Not as good, that was for sure.