Trade Me

by Courtney Milan

  “Hey, asshole,” my dad snaps back. “This is a heart attack, not a fucking teachable moment.”

  “Technically,” Dr. Wong says, “I won’t know it’s a heart attack until I see an EKG. Until then, my official diagnosis is teachable moment.”

  “Shit,” Dad grumbles. “You’re fired.”

  Dr. Wong ignores this. “Once I get an EKG, it turns into a fucking teachable moment.”

  No wonder my dad likes this guy. I can hear the ambulance now, a dim wail in the distance.

  Dad grabs my wrist. “Hey.” His voice is getting softer. “About the narrative…”

  I look up. His bag of cocaine is still sitting on the counter. I want to tell him to fuck the narrative. But he’s clutching at my sleeve and he looks even more desperate now.

  I stand up and pick up the bag. “I’m throwing out all your stupid cocaine if I have to come through the house with a fucking dog, do you hear me?” Dad shuts his eyes in relief.

  “Live,” I say, “because when you get back from the hospital, I’m throwing your stupid ass in rehab.”

  The front windows fill with flashing red and blue lights. The ambulance is here. “Live.” I swipe my hand across the counter, gathering up the remains of the dust that sent him into this latest attack. I slide the plastic baggie into an oven mitt, obscuring it from prying eyes.

  “Love you too, asshole.” His voice is weak. “Check my bathroom cabinet. And the nightstand.”

  The EMTs are hustling through the front door, pushing a gurney before them. Dr. Wong meets them at the front and directs them as they strap my dad in. It doesn’t seem real. None of it seems real. Their boots crunch on glass. Dr. Wong hands me a card and tells me that my dad will be at the hospital, that I’m free to follow along.

  I walk beside them, bringing him to the ambulance.

  “Live, you stupid fucking bastard,” I tell him, again, leaning over the cot. “I love you.”

  “Love you, too.” His eyes are shut. But the EMT grabs his head and slips a breathing mask on, and that’s the end of the conversation. I tell myself that it can’t be that bad—that if he’s talking and cracking jokes, this can’t possibly be the end.

  I’m pretty sure I’m lying to myself. I wait in the cold night air until the EMTs slam the doors shut, until they strap themselves in their seats, until the lights seem to flare all the more brightly, and they let the sirens blare, briefly, warning the night that they’re starting off. And then they’re gone.

  20.

  BLAKE

  I’m standing in the driveway. The lights of the ambulance are receding; a moment later, they slip around a corner and are swallowed by the hill. My awareness of the circumstances seeps back in slowly. It’s almost like waking up from a nightmare: first, there’s a sharp, shock of consciousness, where physical reality sets in. My feet are bare. The concrete underfoot is wet and cold. I’m wearing nothing but a pair of jeans, and my skin is so cold that I’ve begun to shiver.

  Next, memory floods back. Except when you wake up from a bad dream, you have to remind yourself that everything is okay—that nobody has died, that there are no monsters.

  This is exactly the opposite.

  Dad is doing cocaine.

  No, scratch that.

  Dad has been doing cocaine. For years. My father has been killing himself. He’s been begging for my help, and I was too blind to understand how much he needed me.

  I’m the worst son ever. Somehow, the cold feels appropriate. It pinches my flesh, robs me of feeling. I could put on a parka and I would never feel warm again.

  Footsteps sound behind me. I turn around to see Tina holding a broom. Apparently, she’s cleaned up the glass. She’s watching me with dark, clear eyes.

  Twenty minutes ago, we were in bed, closer than close. Twenty minutes ago, I knew I couldn’t go on without her. I know that even more strongly now. I have never needed anyone like I need Tina now.

  “Come on, Blake,” she says, gesturing me in. Her voice is gentle. “You need to come in and get dressed. I’ll drive you to the hospital.”

  “I don’t even know where they’re taking him.”

  “You’re holding the card in your hand,” she points out. “Dr. Wong just gave it to you.”

  Shit. So he did. I’m not thinking very well right at the moment.

  She comes up and takes the card from me. “Here. He’s being taken to…the Reynolds Foundation Emergency Department? Huh. What a coincidence. For some weird reason, I’m going to guess that they’ll take good care of your dad there.”

  I look down. It’s drizzling, and I’m wet enough that my jeans are plastered to me. Have to hope that the EMTs didn’t have a camera. I can imagine what it would look like if these photos hit Twitter. For the first time, I can see how I must look: sparse and still too scrawny. The entire world just landed on my shoulders, and I’ve been dicking around.

  I take a deep breath. “All right,” I say. “But I have to get a few things ready.”

  I don’t just get dressed. I get a bag. I tell Tina that I’m putting a few things together for my dad. I am getting a handful of things, because he will go crazy if he doesn’t have at least a tablet if—no, when—he wakes up. But it’s not just that. I send her off to find a blanket—I tell her it’s for me, while I’m waiting for him to come to—but the truth is I don’t want her to see this.

  I ransack his room. I find a bag of white powder in the bathroom, another in his nightstand. I’m in a cold fury now—angry at him, furious with myself—as I toss it in a duffle alongside the stash from the kitchen. I gather up his personal items—computer, tablet, phone, headset, and, on second thought, a razor and a toothbrush—and throw those in a separate messenger bag.

  Tina meets me downstairs. She’s packed up my bag as well as her own. She throws these all in the car, and then slides into the driver’s seat.

  I can’t look at her yet. Instead, I pull out my phone, slip on a Bluetooth headset, and look out the window. The streetlights slide by between dark houses and dark trees. I glance at my phone, choose a number, and dial.

  The phone rings three times before a voice on the other line answers. “Blake?” The voice of Amy Ellis, our head of public relations, is blurred by sleep. But she doesn’t complain about the time. She knows that if I’m calling, it’s urgent. “What’s going on?”

  “We need a press release,” I tell her, “and we need it in five minutes, because chances are someone is going to squawk soon.” I don’t know how I manage to sound so calm.

  There’s a pause. “Your dad told me things were being rearranged a few hours ago.”

  “Fuck what my dad told you,” I say. “This is bigger than that.”

  She sighs. “You know I have to have your dad’s approval to release anything. But hit me with the damage.”

  “You’re not getting his sign-off on this.” I shut my eyes. “We need a press release saying that Adam Reynolds had a heart attack this morning.”

  It’s easier to say it that way. Adam Reynolds, not Dad. As if I can pretend he’s the distant owner of some distant company. As if I’m not bleeding inside.

  I hear her intake of breath. “Oh, God. Blake. Is he okay? Are you okay?”

  “He’s in stable condition,” I tell her, which I hope is true. “I’m on my way to the hospital where he’s being treated now.”

  “Which hospital?”

  “Don’t release that.” I shut my eyes. “Not that they won’t figure out anyway. Still. The most important thing is to get the message out, to get ahead of any of the aftershocks. I’ll have more details in an hour or so.”

  There’s a long pause. “What about the product launch today? This is short notice, and the press will kill me. But do we need to cancel?”

  I look down at the clock. It’s one in the morning, and yes, the product launch is this afternoon. I imagine my dad, larger than life, striding across the stage with a knowing smile. He had such a flair for these things. How the fuck am I supposed to ta
ke his place at the launch? It’s ridiculous, that’s what it is. It’s the most ridiculous thing in the world.

  And yet.

  I watch the streetlights slide by on an empty, deserted world.

  For the first time in a long time, I don’t feel like his shoes are too big to be filled by me. I don’t feel like he’s impossibly strong, unbowed by any problems. His weakness is equally my strength.

  One thing at a time. “I’m doing the launch,” I say.

  I hear Tina suck in air beside me.

  I should feel like I’m disappearing now, like my life doesn’t belong to me. But now, for the first time, this doesn’t feel like it’s taking me over.

  I still feel all my grief shut up inside me. But now it has a cause, an outlet. I know the name of the thing that killed Peter, and it wasn’t Cyclone and it wasn’t the job. It was not being able to walk away when it got to be too much.

  I can do this, because I am going to walk away. For the first time, this feels like a winnable battle.

  “It’s better if I run the launch,” I continue. “It’ll give the investors a sense of continuity. It’ll give the community a sense of belonging. And I’m the only one who can tell jokes about my dad.” I can already sense it. If I tell jokes, everyone will believe it’s not serious. And they have to think it’s not serious—the less serious it seems, the better things will go. I shut my eyes. “Speaking of which. Amy, I need someone out there to make up some jokes about my dad.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “Yeah.” I shut my eyes. “We need to minimize this as best as we can, and that means I need to tell jokes. I’m not really in the mood to make them up right now, though. So that’s on you.”

  “Is this serious?” Her voice is subdued.

  My father has been doing cocaine. He’s been doing it even after he watched it kill his best friend. If this isn’t serious, I don’t know what is.

  “I don’t know,” I lie. “I hope not.”

  Tina is pulling into the hospital parking lot.

  I shake my head. “I have to go. I’ll talk to you later.” I end the call.

  Tina finds a spot. But instead of grabbing our stuff and going, we sit there in the car. She’s parked right under an overhead light; it washes us with a pale, fluorescent light.

  There are a lot of things we need to say to each other.

  I put my hands on the dashboard. “I know we’re supposed to end this when I go back to Cyclone. But…don’t. Please.” I glance over at her. “Stay with me.”

  She shuts her eyes. Her fingers curl around the edge of the steering wheel and she bows her head. “Blake. This isn’t the time to have this conversation. Your life has just been turned around, you—”

  “It’s exactly the time,” I tell her. “This isn’t temporary, Tina. I care about you. I care about you a lot. And you know that.”

  Her voice breaks. “And I care about you. But—”

  “Don’t tell me that this can’t happen.” My heart is beating roughly. “Don’t tell me that this isn’t the time for you to break up with me. Don’t tell me that you don’t fit in my life. Whatever it is you’re thinking, don’t tell me that.”

  She raises her head and looks up at me, turning her face to mine.

  “All I’m saying is that this is not the time to work out those details. Your dad is sick. Let’s just…”

  “No,” I tell her. “If you’re going to come into that hospital with me, I don’t want it to be because you think I’m too fragile to handle the truth. This isn’t hard. If you walk in there with me, if you’re there for me through this, I don’t know how I can make myself let you go. If that’s not okay with you, walk away. I won’t even feel it if I lose you now. There’s too much else that hurts. Don’t wait until tomorrow or the day after. Do it now.”

  She doesn’t say anything. Her fingers clench around the wheel. She makes a little noise in her throat. I want to reach out and put my arms around her. I want everything to be okay.

  We don’t get everything we want.

  She looks at me in mute, pained agony. But she doesn’t reach out to me. She doesn’t say she’ll be there for me. And that means she won’t. One more ache in my heart—I can scarcely feel it.

  “That’s that, then.” I open the door.

  “Blake,” she says.

  “I know,” I tell her. “I know you care about me. We both have to keep ourselves safe. I know you. It’s okay. I’m going to be okay.”

  “Blake.”

  “Stay in my house as long as you want.” I cast her a glance. “I’m probably not going to be back any time soon.”

  “Blake…” The last iteration of my name. Her voice trails off. She looks over at me. There’s a hint of tears on her lashes.

  But she doesn’t say anything for a long time. She doesn’t lie. She doesn’t tell me she wants us to keep going.

  “Take care of yourself,” she finally says.

  “Yeah.” I hoist my overnight bag and look over at her. “Take care of yourself, too.”

  Then I’m pushing off.

  It’s better this way. My heart aches with an almost physical pain. I feel hollow and empty and bruised. But I would feel hollow and empty and bruised even if she were by my side. I’m half-unconscious as it is.

  I raise my chin and walk forward. The hospital doors slide open automatically as I approach, and I step inside.

  I don’t look back.

  TINA

  I don’t know how I manage to get on the freeway. My hands are shaking. My tears give haloes to the streetlights, turning them into avenging angels frowning at me over three lanes of asphalt.

  I drive. I can’t do anything else—just drive, drive, and even then, I still can’t push myself to go above forty, even on a deserted highway. When the freeway bends north, I get off. Not because I have somewhere else to be, but because if I continue on, I’ll end up back at Blake’s house in Berkeley and that will break me down.

  I don’t have any idea where I am, and I like it that way. I pass signs in Spanish advertising hair salons. There are residences with cinderblock walls and steel gates enclosing modest yards. I punch off the map displayed by the car. I want to lose myself.

  The road slips away behind me. My hands squeeze the steering wheel; I stare straight ahead over slick asphalt.

  It wasn’t supposed to end like this. I knew it would hurt. I knew I would miss him.

  It wasn’t supposed to feel like love.

  But it had tonight. It had.

  And I don’t know what to do with that.

  I’d seen the rest of the day in one long rush. I’d go into the hospital with him. In a few hours, his staff would converge on him, and I’d be there—holding his hand while they coached him through the altered launch, offering him the comfort he so badly needed. I’d be there when he was at his most vulnerable, his most hurting. I’d be there in the audience when everything was broadcasted to millions around the world, translated into seven simultaneous languages. I would be there, and when it was over—when press from the entire world converged on him to ask about the future of Cyclone, he’d make his way to me.

  It’s one thing for us to comfort one another in private, but in public, I’m the daughter of a Wal-Mart baker and a janitor. I don’t know how to be with him—him and his media training and his SEC regulations and his private jokes with his father, born from corporate sensitivity training.

  I don’t want to love Blake. Loving him will never be safe.

  The road I’m on narrows from two lanes to one. Sidewalks give way to rough gravel roadsides. I turn right just before the street peters out in a residential neighborhood nestled against foothills.

  After a few minutes of winding hither and thither, the new road I’m on begins to climb the hills in earnest, hairpinning up slopes that I can’t see in the darkness. My headlights illuminate only in flashes: a house, huge, hidden behind an ornate gate; the glimpse of orange rock where the road has been carved into a steep incli
ne. Eucalyptus branches stretch overhead as the road continues twisting up and up.

  It’s a road that finally matches my speed, a road where my thirty miles an hour seems safe. I keep going, glimpsing the scenery only long enough to leave it all behind: grassy banks covered with oak leaves shift into moss-covered fallen logs. A private gate comes up on the right and then disappears in dark fog.

  Eventually, the private homes I catch sight of turn into farmland. I glimpse a stile to the right, the arched sign of a ranch home on the left. The road takes on a meditative quality, something quiet and unending. It fits what I need right now.

  I can go slowly. I have to, here. One flubbed turn and I’d be careening off the hillside. This is my life: I have to play it safe.

  I have to play it safe.

  My eyes are stinging and for a moment, I have the strange impression that the windshield wipers aren’t working properly. But of course it isn’t the car. Blake would never own a vehicle that would dare malfunction. I’m the thing that has broken down, my vision blurring with tears that I refuse to acknowledge.

  I always play it safe. What choice have I had?

  That’s what dries my tears. Not words of wisdom or comfort, but a deep-seated anger.

  I always play it safe. I have to. I’ve chosen my future as if it were a blown-glass artifact, whorls and loops that needed to be packed away in tissue paper, put up high to keep it safe. I don’t go out. I don’t take risks. I never know when my parents will need an extra ten dollars. It’s an illusion that Blake and I could trade lives. Because he’s always known that he’ll get back to his—and I’ve always known I’ll fall back into mine.

  He’s always had someone to catch him. And me? Unless I’m careful, I can lose everything.

  The higher I go, the wilder the landscape becomes. I pass through a spooky forest. Wizened, wizard trees reach many-fingered branches to the sky. Moss drips from their branches like tattered scarves, and they look down on me like judgmental aunties.

  Look at that girl there. Can’t even drive a car safely, let alone manage her life.