Fadeaway

by E. B. Vickers

  Jake extends his hand one last time.

  I nod and hand him the stack.

  Our fingers do not touch.

  Then I walk away so he won’t see me cry—and so he can have a moment with the person who missed him most.

  While Kolt tries violence

  and Daphne tries diplomacy,

  all I can do is hide

  behind the car door

  like it’s a force field,

  keeping me from this shapeshifter.

  I mean, I know it’s Jake,

  but I want it to not be Jake

  because he is smaller, sunken,

  and this place is dim, dirty,

  and if this is Jake,

  then my hero

  left me,

  hurt me,

  made mistakes,

  and all of it was

  his choice.

  Jake looks at me.

  Tries again.

  “Happy birthday,” he says.

  “It isn’t,” I say, because

  I

  am

  angry.

  “Where have you been this whole time?”

  “Here.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I thought I did.”

  “I felt like you were frozen in carbonite.”

  “I felt like that too.”

  “You said it’s not my fault.”

  “I meant it.”

  I swallow my sob,

  step out from behind the door.

  I don’t know if I want to hug Jake

  or hurt him back.

  He steps toward me.

  I let him.

  “You said ‘when this is all over.’ ”

  “That was stupid.

  I didn’t think.

  I didn’t realize.”

  “What do I tell Mom?”

  “Tell her I’m okay.

  Or that I’m getting there.”

  He can’t look at me for the next part.

  “Tell her I’m sorry.”

  “What about me? Are you sorry to me?”

  My force field must be down because

  Jake pulls me in,

  holds me tight.

  I am surprised how much he feels

  like my big brother.

  “I’m sorry to you most of all,” he says.

  It takes a long time

  before either of us lets go.

  As Daphne and Luke say their goodbyes, I’m watching Jake and Kmart. Their steady movements, the way they stand their ground. Finally I believe it.

  “You’re clean,” I say, and it’s not a question. “Both of you.”

  Jake looks away, like he’s still so superstitious he thinks saying it out loud will make it all disappear.

  Kmart, on the other hand, looks me straight in the eye. After all these years, the anger inside me isn’t going to burn out anytime soon, but I’m not going to let it keep me from getting answers. “Is that why you came out here? Because it’s easier to stay clean outside of Ashland?”

  He half shrugs. “It’ll never be easy. But yeah.”

  “So now what?” I ask. “You drive away and never come back?” I try to keep my voice level. Try not to sound like I care.

  “Nah,” Kmart answers, sliding his hands into his pockets. “It’ll take two years for his dopamine receptors to start working naturally, but it’ll get better after that.”

  I can barely believe this is my brother. “Thanks, Professor.” It’s supposed to be a joke, but even I can hear the sharp edge on it.

  Good.

  Then I play the odds. “It’s been longer than two years for you, though, hasn’t it? You could come home. Mom and Dad would want that. We could, you know, be a family again. Don’t you think you owe them that?”

  Kmart kicks at the gravel. “I owe all of you a lot more than that. But I need to see this through for him,” he says. “Somebody did the same for me a while back.”

  “Who?” I ask. My brother is even more of a mystery than I thought.

  “That’s a story for another day,” Kmart says, fishing for his keys.

  Another day. He said it like this won’t be the last time we see each other. But I don’t want to care whether that happens, so I remind myself he came back for Jake, not for me. And he’s choosing Jake again right now.

  “Where will you go?” I ask.

  Kmart leans against the truck. “I’ll let you know when we know. It wasn’t supposed to happen like this. I mean, it was always going to be rough on Jake and me, but it wasn’t supposed to be so bad on your end. I didn’t know about the search until it was too late to smooth it over with the authorities, so we had to dig ourselves in deeper and wait it out.”

  I look to the house, which is pretty sketchy, even by my standards. “So you’ve been here the whole time? Running some kind of vigilante rehab?”

  Kmart laughs. “You could call it that, I guess. The only kind guys like me and Jake can afford.”

  “And you didn’t break the law?”

  Kmart hedges. “Well, I’m not sure the cops would see it that way. There were…struggles, let’s say. Times when Jake didn’t want to be here.”

  Jake shudders, and I can see it’s still raw. I try to come up with the perfect joke—something about the creepy setting and the horror-movie house—but nothing quite clicks. Then I realize I don’t want to make a joke right now, anyway.

  But he still owes me answers. I nod at the soda-can tab on his key chain. “You still collecting those?”

  “You remember that?” he asks. “It was just for fun at first. But now I keep one for every day I’ve been clean. Almost a thousand now.”

  “I found one on the sidewalk outside Jake’s house the day after he disappeared. I almost showed it to the police, but even I couldn’t believe it was anything but trash.”

  “Might have been,” Kmart says. “Or maybe I dropped it. Maybe they would have believed you, maybe they wouldn’t.”

  We stand there, probably both of us thinking about the millions of ways this might have gone down differently. And even if I’m still pissed, I can’t stop myself from picturing how much worse this could have turned out. I feel something building inside me, and then, dammit, I’m crying, even though everybody knows Wookiees don’t cry.

  “We gotta go,” I say, swiping at my eyes with the back of my arm.

  I’m halfway to the car when Kmart’s arms wrap around me from behind.

  “I’m sorry, Kolt.”

  His words are dulled against my shirt. His hold tightens, and panic sears inside me. In a flash, a thousand painful thoughts surface: Kmart picking me up from practice high, Kmart missing his own hearing, me holding Mom one night while she cried until Dad came home to take my place. Because of my brother, I had to grow up way too quickly. I’ve had the suspicions of every teacher in Ashland on me like a freaking magnet. I’ve felt police officers’ eyes following me all my life. And I didn’t deserve any of it.

  Maybe when you’ve been hurt like that for so long, you can’t forgive somebody in less time than it takes to play a basketball game. Even if they saved your best friend.

  “I know,” I say, turning and pulling back until he and I have our hands on each other’s shoulders.

  “I wish Jake could go back with you, for Luke’s sake,” he says. “A kid deserves to have a big brother he can believe in.”

  “Yeah,” I agree, but there’s not as much bitterness in it as before. “That makes a difference.”

  I look back at Jake one last time. Decide maybe he’s ready for a joke now.

  “I miss you, asshole,” I say.

  It’s only there for a second, but I catch a twitch of a smile at
the corner of his mouth. “Thanks,” he says.

  “You shouldn’t swear,” Luke says. He hands Kmart the envelope that led us here. “We brought your mail.”

  Then he hands a stack to Jake. Even from here, and even though I didn’t get nearly as many, I can tell they’re letters and mailers from colleges. “I made you a new highlight video with the state tournament on it. Arizona State is too focused on their big men, anyway. You might want to look at New Mexico State or Southern Utah. Let me know if you want me to look up stats on any of the others.”

  “Thanks,” Jake says, pulling Luke in for one more hug. “I will. I promise I will.”

  Then we tear ourselves away, divided between Daphne’s car and the junky old truck. It all feels wrong, but what can I do about it?

  Back in Daphne’s car, we follow the truck to the end of the long gravel drive, and then they turn right and we turn left. In the mirror, I watch the taillights of the truck—one steady, one flickering—until they disappear around a turn. When I look over, Luke is watching too. And he’s crying.

  The kid needs a big brother, or at least something like it. Maybe Mrs. Foster will let me take him to Best Burger, or to play catch. Or maybe we could even go out spotlighting—if he can stop talking about the stars long enough that the animals don’t all run away.

  “Hey,” I say, tossing him a bag of chips I find next to my seat. “If those two are going to take care of each other, you and me might as well do the same thing.”

  Luke turns the bag over in his hand and studies the nutrition information. “One hundred sixty milligrams of sodium.”

  I look at Daphne, but she just nods like I should know what to do about this. “Is that okay?” I ask him.

  Luke shrugs. “Could be worse. Did you know that there are significant amounts of sodium on Mars? And in the stars? But not in cars.”

  “Luke,” I say. “You’re a poet.”

  Luke crunches his chips. “Of course I am.”

  “The Rebel Alliance makes a pretty good team,” I say.

  Daphne laughs. Luke doesn’t.

  “Of course we do,” he says.

  I’m in my room, pretending to do homework, when a car turns down the gravel drive, lights flashing blue and red off its slick black body. I stare at my calculus book, knowing they’re here because of me, wondering whether I should run while I still have the chance. But it all piles on—the drugs, the lies, the perfect public persona—and I’m so sick of it all, so ready for it to be over, that deep down, I know I wouldn’t run, even if it weren’t too late.

  It’s my mom who answers the door. Her voice is faint, but only because I’m not man enough to actually go downstairs and face what I’ve done. Not because she has anything to be afraid of. Yet.

  “Come in, Matthew,” she says. Then her tone tightens. “Is this about Jake Foster?”

  “No, ma’am.” It’s Officer Vega—Matthew, I guess—sounding like he’s trying too hard to be tough and professional. “We’ve got a warrant to search the house,” he says.

  “I—I’m sorry?” she stammers.

  “Me too,” Officer Vega says. His boots beat a rhythm across the wood floor and up the stairs, purpose and direction in every step, his partner following close behind. I spin the state championship ring on my finger, watching to see if my doorknob will turn.

  But no, they pass by, headed down the hall to the little room over the garage where Coach keeps his tools and a small steel box I used to think he’d forgotten about.

  Speaking of Coach, I hear another set of footsteps coming up the stairs. Quicker. Catching up. Then his voice, almost cracking. “Now hang on a second. What did you say you’re looking for?”

  I open my door, just a sliver. Hear them looking around for something, know exactly what the something is.

  Then another thought hits me: it was probably Judge Sharp who signed the warrant. He probably knows they’re here right now and knows exactly what they’re looking for. Daphne’s dad has never liked me much. What will he think of me now?

  I hear the heavy thunk of the box as they pull it from its hiding place.

  “You can’t take that,” Coach protests.

  “I hope we won’t need to,” Officer Vega says, and he tells the combination to his partner. “Zero-nine-one-nine.”

  Nine nineteen: 9/19. My parents’ wedding anniversary. It took me only three tries to guess it. The box was sleek and silver with a dusting of white across the bottom—the perfect place to hide something small and valuable.

  “Now hang on,” Coach says again, his voice rising. “My family doesn’t deserve this. We’re good people. We’ve given a lot to this town. You know that as well as anybody. Didn’t I take a chance on your boy playing JV this year?”

  Through the crack in the door, I see him step forward, like he’s ready to yank the box right out of their hands. For all his faults, he’d do anything to protect me. Her. Us.

  “You’re going to need to back off,” Officer Vega says.

  “Not until you tell me what it is you’re looking for.”

  It’s time to face what I’ve done. I push the door open, sick and scared, and they all turn toward me.

  “Drugs, Dad.” I hope they can’t hear the panic in my voice as I walk toward them. “They’re looking for drugs. Painkillers. The ones that were stolen from the pharmacy.”

  Coach is so stunned that he forgets to fight as the other officer raises the lid. Even from the hallway, I can see the stash and hear the sharp intake of breath of everyone in the room.

  Then my mom looks at me and Coach with so much pain in her face that I know she’s put it all together.

  But Coach. Dad. Whoever he is, I’m pierced by the hate in his eyes.

  “How could you?” he asks. “How could you do this to me? To us?”

  I don’t answer. I can’t. I have no words for this.

  Officer Vega takes the cuffs from his belt. “Seth Cooper, you are under arrest,” he begins, and there’s a part of me that’s floating above the whole scene, surprised that it really is the same words you hear on TV. “You have the right to remain silent….”

  What would have happened if I’d remained silent? I wonder, that same floating feeling taking over. How long could I have kept this secret?

  But it’s too late now. The cuffs click into place, and no one speaks as Officer Vega follows us down the stairs.

  We stop for a moment by the door. “Seth,” my mom whispers, and I think she’s speaking to my dad. The man I’m named after. The man I’ve spent my whole life trying to live up to.

  But no. She’s looking at me.

  “It will be okay,” she says. There are tears in her eyes, but she won’t let them fall. She will be stronger than any of us. Always is.

  Officer Vega agrees. His face softens for a moment, and I remember that he and my dad played ball together, that they won a championship of their own for Coach B. “This isn’t the end,” he says to my dad. “Just the part where we turn it around.”

  Then he takes Coach by the shoulder and walks him out to the waiting squad car.

  I sink to the steps as they drive away. My shoulders shake; I can’t breathe.

  My mom pulls me against her shoulder, and I hate myself for letting her, because it’s all wrong. She should hate me right now. Or at the very least, I should be holding her, comforting her. I’m the one who found his stash, who made this happen. Our family has been splintered and broken for a long time, but I’m the one who tossed a match on top of it all when I called the cops from the sketchy pay phone down by the gas station, because I was too afraid to use my own phone or my own name.

  “I’m sorry,” I tell her between gasps. “I’m the one who called the cops. I’m so sorry.”

  “This is not your fault,” she tells me again and again as her tears fall like rain on my
hair, my neck. “I should have seen it. He struggled off and on for years, but he told me it was okay.” She smooths my hair, and I feel her strength as she hugs me close. “You did the right thing, Seth. And it will be okay.”

  I shift on the cold concrete steps, and my mom rests her head against my shoulder. We stay there like that, not saying a word, until headlights cut through the night and Daphne’s car pulls up. I should have known telling her not to come over would make her do exactly that.

  “You should tell her,” Mom says, standing up and waving Daphne over. “She’ll find out soon whether you tell her or not, and it’s better if she hears it from you. I’ve got a couple of phone calls I need to make anyway.”

  Then Mom goes inside, and it’s just the two of us out here.

  “Hey,” I say to Daphne. “I’m still not feeling so good.”

  But when she steps into the porch light, her eyes are red. “Me neither,” she says. “I think we need to talk.”

  Not tonight, I beg. I can’t lose you tonight too.

  But then she rises up on her toes and pulls me down with one hand behind my neck and she kisses me. “Can we go out back?” she asks.

  So I get the same quilts and we go out to the clearing and we look at the stars, surrounded by a dark halo of trees. Then we lie on our backs and, after a false start or two, we tell each other everything. Jake, my dad, Kmart and Kolt. All that’s happened between us, including what I witnessed in the training room—what it meant, and what it didn’t mean. Maybe it takes an hour, or maybe four, but finally there’s something like peace in the clearing.

  “I never lied,” I say. “I really thought it was Kolt in the truck. Does this mean I have to apologize to him?”

  “Yup,” Daphne says. “Even though I think he’s forgiven you already.” She pulls the blanket closer; I feel the heat of her side against mine under the stars.

  “Sodium,” she says with a little laugh. “After all that, somehow my mind goes back to potato chips and Luke and sodium and space.” She props herself on her elbow and looks right into my eyes. “Everything is going to be okay,” she says.