Chapter 46 Miguel #2
“Now,” he says. “Different scenario. He texts you, ‘Volume is nine, I’m not safe,’ but he’s on campus, breathing, talking. Not actively harming himself, but at high risk. What are your options?”
“I drive to him,” I say.
“That’s one,” he nods. “What else?”
I think. “Call Dr. K,” I say. “Or the campus crisis line. Or tell him to go to the ER and meet him there.”
“Good,” he says. “Now, for your sake, we’re adding a rule. You must loop in at least one other person within fifteen minutes of learning he’s at an eight or above. Not later. Not ‘if it gets worse.’ Immediately.”
I make a face. “A snitch rule,” I mutter.
“Accountability rule,” he corrects. “Who’s on that list?”
I tick them off on my fingers. “Dr. K. Mom. Ashton, and you.”
“The campus crisis line,” he adds. “And, if available, any future psychiatrist or case manager. You are not allowed to be the sole holder of the information ‘Caleb is in danger’ anymore.”
My stomach twists. “They’re going to hate me,” I say. “For dragging them in every time his brain yells.”
“They’re adults who have already signed up for this,” Luis says. “If they feel overwhelmed, it’s their job to say so. Not yours to preemptively protect them by doing it alone.”
I stare at him. “You and Dr. K have been hanging out, huh?”
Luis smiles, small and sad. “We share brain cells sometimes,” he admits. “Now, what about you? When Caleb is high-volume but safe—say, a six or seven—but your own dial is at a nine from fear. How do you take care of your nervous system?”
“Is that allowed?” I ask, genuinely. “Taking care of me while he’s… like that?”
“It’s required,” he says firmly. “You are no good to him fried to a crisp. So when you notice your hands shaking, your thoughts racing, your anger spiking, what helps you come down a notch?”
I think of stupid things. The feel of my controller in my hands. The weight of my mom’s cat when I’m at her place. The smell of sawdust and copper when I’m wiring something and know what I’m doing.
“Showers,” I say slowly. “Hot. Music. Calling Benny and talking about anything else for ten minutes. Sitting on the floor with my back against the bed instead of hovering like a helicopter. Letting someone else sit with him while I go outside and breathe like a normal human.”
“Good,” he says, writing. “Those are regulation strategies. They go on your side of the crisis plan.”
I stare at the page. Two columns: Caleb and Miguel. Between them, arrows and names. It looks like a wiring diagram.
“I still feel like the line,” I admit.
“You are a line,” he says. “An important one. We’re just making sure you’re braided with others, so you’re not the only thing between him and the drop.”
I blow out a breath. “What if I can’t do it?
” I ask again. It feels like the real question.
“What if he tries again and I don’t find him in time?
Or he succeeds someday? What if all this just postpones the inevitable?
What if loving him means watching him slowly kill himself in front of me?
Over and over until one day he doesn’t miss? ”
The worst-case scenario I’ve been skirting around since the day I found him in that dorm.
Luis doesn’t look away. “If that’s where this goes,” he says quietly, “it will be devastating. For you. For his parents. For a lot of people. And it still won’t have been a mistake to love him.”
My throat burns. “Feels like I’d be signing up to get my heart ripped out on repeat.”
“You already signed up,” he says. “You’re here. You love him now. The question isn’t ‘should I love him if this might hurt.’ The question is, “How do I love him in a way that doesn’t erase me?”
I lean my head back, staring at the water stain in the corner of the ceiling. “And if I can’t do that?” I ask. “If I don’t know how to not erase myself?”
“Then we learn,” he says. “That’s why you’re here. That’s why we build you your own scaffolding. So when you are terrified, which you will be because that’s part of the job, you’re not alone.”
Silence stretches for a second. The ticking clock feels too loud.
“How do you do this?” I ask suddenly. “How do you sit in this chair all day listening to people describe the worst moments of their lives and not take it home like a backpack full of bricks?”
He smiles, small and tired. “Who says I don’t?” he says. “I just have my own net. Colleagues. My wife. Friends who aren’t therapists. Hobbies that have nothing to do with anyone’s trauma. A supervisor who reminds me I’m not God when I start acting like I am.”
“Feels like a theme,” I mutter.
“It is,” he says. “Miguel, if you try to be the only thing between Caleb and the void, you will eventually fall into it with him. That doesn’t help him, and it kills you. That’s the martyr route. We’re aiming for the partner route.”
“Partner route,” I repeat, rolling the words around like I’m checking the gauge on a wire. “What’s the difference, in plain terms?”
“Martyr Miguel says,” he holds up one hand, “‘If I don’t save him, no one will, so I must give everything until there’s nothing left.
’ Partner Miguel says,” he holds up the other, “‘I will show up, love him fiercely, and also respect my limits. When I reach those limits, I will ask for help instead of overriding them.’”
I snort. “Partner Miguel sounds like a guy who drinks water and uses sunscreen.”
“He does,” Luis says. “He also lives longer.”
I stare at the legal pad again. At the tiny map we’ve drawn together—lines and arrows and names.
“Okay,” I say finally. “So in a crisis, Miguel calls 911, loops in the net, and takes a goddamn shower. What about non-crisis Miguel? The one who has to go back to work and has to pay bills and pretend to care about breaker boxes while his boyfriend is on a psych unit?”
Luis nods. “Good question. What are you thinking for work?”
I hesitate. “I was… gonna ask my boss if I can cut my hours for a bit,” I admit. “Or switch to lighter jobs. Fewer roof crawls, more shop time. But I feel like an asshole. Like I’m asking for special treatment because my home life is a soap opera.”
“Or,” he says, “you’re a human having a crisis and you’re asking for accommodation so you don’t fry your nervous system and fall off a ladder.”
I give him a look. “You ever get tired of reframing?”
“Yes,” he says. “But I do it anyway. You need to talk to your boss. You also should talk to your mom and Caleb, when he’s clearer about what you can and can’t realistically do. Not promises you can’t keep, honest limits.”
I rub my palms over my jeans. “What if my limit isn’t big enough for what he needs?” I ask.
“Then the solution is not to stretch your limit until you snap,” he says. “It’s adding more people. More services. That’s what inpatient and IOP and crisis teams are for. Not replacing you, but joining you.”
I hate that that makes sense.
I also hate that it’s a relief.
“I feel like such a coward,” I say. “Wanting a break when he’s the one in the hospital bed.”
Luis shakes his head. “You called me from the ER and said, ‘I’d bleed for him.’ Do you remember what I told you?”
“Yeah,” I say bitterly. “You said, ‘You already are.’”
“And you are,” he says. “You did. You’ll keep bleeding metaphorically. But you do not have to slit your own wrists emotionally to match his. You’re allowed to bandage yours while the doctors bandage his.”
That hits me in a place I don’t have words for.
The session winds down with logistics—appointments, check-ins, and when he can coordinate with Dr. K.
When I leave, I’m not lighter, exactly. But the weight is…
distributed differently. Less like a single boulder, more like three smaller ones I can maybe rearrange instead of letting them roll over me.
That night, our parents’ house smells like home cooking and laundry detergent.
Mom’s in the kitchen, Tupperware army already in formation: arroz, beans, chicken, tortillas wrapped in a towel.
Hospital food is an insult, and from the looks of it, she’s declared war.
The TV is on low in the corner, some telenovela murmuring dramatic music at the walls.
I come in through the sliding door, drop my keys in the little bowl by instinct, and lean in the doorway. For a second, I just watch her. The way she moves—efficient, a little angry at the world, a little extra rough with the spoon as she stirs.
“Smells good,” I say.
She startles, then relaxes when she sees it’s me. “Mijo,” she says, hand on her chest. “No hagas eso. You’re going to give me a heart attack coming in like a ghost.”
I walk over and kiss her cheek. “Sorry,” I say. “Didn’t mean to go all stealth mode.”
My mother studies my face for signs of collapse. She’s subtle about it, but I know her tells, the flick of her eyes to my shoulders, the crease between her brows smoothing when she decides I’m not actively bleeding.
“You ate?” she asks.
“Yeah,” I lie automatically, then stop myself. “Actually, no. Coffee and a donut with a side of anxiety. I’ll make a plate in a sec.”
“Hm,” she says, unimpressed. “Sit. I’ll serve you.”
“Mamá—”
She gives me the look. The one that has shut me up since I was a mouthy third grader. “Siéntate, Miguel.”
I sit.
Putting a plate in front of me, she overloaded it in a way only Mexican moms can justify. Mountains of rice, beans, shredded chicken in salsa, and two tortillas on the side. My stomach growls even though I still feel like I swallowed a brick.
Leaning on the counter across from me, with her arms crossed, watching me take the first few bites.
Only then does she ask, “How’s Caleb?”
“Sleepy,” I say around a mouthful. “Pretty out of it when I checked in with him. But he’s… there. Talking some. Angry at himself. Scared. All the hits.”
Her eyes soften. “And you?”
I stare at my fork. “Also all the hits,” I say. “Luis and I did the ‘I’m not God’ tango again. We made a crisis plan 2.0. I didn’t throw the legal pad at him, so that’s progress.”
Her mouth twitches. “No lo puedo creer,” she murmurs. “You? Not dramatic?”