Chapter 73
— Chapter 73 —
The night before Aubrey’s GED, Jam storms through the house after midnight to play a tarantella on the low keys of the piano.
I stumble into the sunroom, stubbing my toe on the door frame. “You can’t do this,” I whisper. “Aubrey has her test tomorrow.”
I’m steeling for a fight and expect him to argue, but he doesn’t. He takes his hands off the piano keys. Closes the lid carefully.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” His speech is slow, but his eye is twitching. I don’t know what this is. I thought he was drunk, but it’s something else. “I’m gonna go—I’ll go.”
“Why don’t you stay and sleep it off?” I say, even though I don’t want Aubrey to see him like this.
“No. I’m going.”
“I can drive you home.”
“I’m walking,” Jam says, lifting his arm in the air. “I’m out on a walk.”
“That’s stupid. Let me get my keys.”
“Freya!” There’s a sudden sharpness in his voice. “I’m on a walk.”
So, I let him leave. I’m not sure if that’s right or wrong.
After I close the door behind him, Aubrey appears at the top of the stairs.
“Is he okay?” she asks.
“I don’t know.”
“I don’t either,” she says.
When I finally fall asleep, my head gets stuck in a nightmare about Jam walking home, getting hit by a truck on Route 116. I run to him, screaming, breathless, and he’s fine, but as soon as I walk away, it happens all over again. My phone rings, and in my dream it’s the truck driver calling to tell me that I shouldn’t let my friend cross the street by himself.
But the ringing doesn’t stop, and it finally wakes me up.
“Freyyyyaaa,” Jam says, his voice a groan. “Come get me?”
“Where are you?” I ask.
“Under the elephant.”
It’s three AM and there’s nobody on the roads. I pull over in front of the statue of Old Bet. Just past the glow of her spotlights, Jam is lying in the frostbitten grass, so still I’m afraid he’s lost consciousness. A chilling emptiness creeps through me, as if my heart has decided it cannot stay for this. I want to run to him, and I also want to run away and stop time and keep believing that Jam exists. But I know if he is still in his body, he needs me, so I get out of the car.
His coat is open, splayed out behind him like wings. He doesn’t rouse as I get closer. I stand over him, breathless. Bet’s bright spotlight is shining in my face, and my eyes can’t adjust to the shadows. I shift out of the light, trying to build the courage to nudge him, panic clenching my chest. Then Jam opens his eyes and smiles.
“I tried to get her for you,” he says, strangely buoyant.
“Who?” My blood feels cold and chemical. None of this seems real.
He points up to Old Bet perched on her polished granite obelisk. The curled wrought iron base under her feet is at least two stories from the ground.
“I wanted us to give her a funeral. Like Lenny Juice.” His words are slow. He seems amused by every consonant, mouth curling at the edges.
“That’s really stupid, Jam,” I say as my fear fades to frustration. I’m annoyed to be in my pajamas in the middle of town in the middle of the night—angry he woke Aubrey, that he’s dragging his messes into our lives. I’m scared for him. And scared for me. I cannot unknow how it feels to think I’ve lost him. From this moment forward, I will always understand the cost of loving Jam on a visceral level. But more than anything, I’m relieved that he’s still here.
“I fucked up my ankle,” he says, but wiggles his leg to show me which one, and I don’t see any signs of pain.
“Why are you high?” I ask, sitting on the ground next to him, trying not to cry. The grass is wet and cold, soaking my flannel pants instantly. “I haven’t seen you this way in a while.”
Jam shakes his head like he’s disappointed with himself, or the universe, or both. “Just one of those days when it sucked too much to be me.”
I lie next to him and grab his hand, threading my fingers between his.
“That night that Eddie…” He holds his free hand in a fist, hits his thigh like a shot. “I choked at my recital. Walked off stage, got on the train and…” He stops talking for so long that I think he may have fallen asleep, but when I look over, there are tears streaming down his face, into his hair. “I couldn’t play on her piano either.”
The shadows sharpen the angles of his face and the hollows of his deep-set eyes. Sometimes, when I look at Jam, I picture Patty Olbrich fading into the depths of the icy reservoir, like a scene from a movie. And I want to save her. I always want to save her. So it’s not a leap to think Jam’s brain might get stuck in a loop of haunting imagination whenever something reminds him of his mom. I can’t blame him for reaching toward the promise of respite, even when it’s ephemeral and dangerous. I just wish there were a better answer.
“I loved making music in the basement on my dad’s old keyboard,” Jam says. “But then she tried to make piano everything, and I forgot how to love it. I did it—all the lessons and recitals, all of it—I did it to make her happy, like I could hold her together if I practiced hard enough. But she fucking killed herself.”
It’s the first time I’ve heard him refer to Patty’s death as anything other than an accident.
“I’m sorry, Jam,” I whisper. “I’m so sorry.”
He sobs, curling into my body, and I hold him tight. I feel like he’s letting part of himself go. Existing in denial of things you know to be true is like trying to live two lives with the capacity of one person. I know it’s naive to think this moment could change everything. I hope at least the truth isn’t worse than carrying the lie, that eventually the loss of dissonance might offer him some kind of peace.
“How does everyone else walk around like everything is fine? How does the world work for other people when it fucking breaks me over and over?” he says, his breath warm and damp on my neck.
I realize that I can’t think of a single person I know who hasn’t been broken somehow. There are people like Buck who exist in the break, and people like Hans who get broken and use it as a chance to start over. Bee isn’t walking around with open wounds, but she’s uncomfortable enough to frequently look for escape. I think every kind person I know holds some ability to acknowledge their broken parts, and the ones who have hurt me the most are the people who refuse to admit to their damage. My parents, my sister, Charlie, all sent their pain downstream as if it wasn’t theirs to hold, without caring who they poisoned.
“Maybe the world doesn’t work for most people,” I say. “Maybe you’re just more honest about it.”
“Or I’m too broken to hide it.”
“No shame in that. You didn’t break yourself.”
“I’m breaking myself now, though,” he says, groaning as he rolls onto his back.
I squeeze his hand and imagine the view of us from far above, splayed under the elephant in the wet grass like two paper dolls from a broken chain. “You’re still here,” I say, with all the hope in my heart. “You’ve got time.”
Jam points up to Bet. “I really thought I could climb up and get her.”
“Were you trying to shimmy up the pedestal? Or jump and grab the wrought iron part?”
“Both, I think?” Jam says, laughing. He seems to be coming back to himself. “I swear it was lower to the ground when I got here.”
“Idiot.”
“Hey, you don’t know if you’re Spider-Man until you try.”
“Trust me, Jam. You’re not Spider-Man.”
“You’re the only person I’ve ever trusted,” he says.
I want to say the same. I want to promise him so much more than I can. Instead, I say, “I love you,” because that will always be true.
It’s not easy to get Jam in the car. He’s exhausted. The pain has caught up with him. He can’t put weight on his ankle and it feels like he has jello for knees.
“Do you want to get sober?” I ask when I start up the car. If he doesn’t, trying to help him will only bring us busywork and broken hearts.
“This is better than it was,” Jam says. “At least sometimes I feel like I could save an elephant.”
I don’t know what would happen if I took him to the hospital. I think it’s hit or miss on whether he’d get arrested. So we park outside Shray’s house to wait for Dr. Singh to collect the morning paper from his driveway. Jam nods off, snoring, which I hope means the pain is not too bad.
Dr. Singh takes us in and makes us both drink tea. “It’s too cold out there. You should have rung the doorbell. I don’t care if you wake me up.”
He checks Jam’s ankle and looks in his eyes with a little flashlight. Takes his pulse and presses on his abdomen. Jam is sweaty and shivering.
“Not broken. Just sprained. Stop climbing elephants.” Dr. Singh wraps Jam’s ankle with a stretchy bandage and tells him to keep it elevated. But he follows me into the kitchen when I bring our empty teacups to the sink.
“Freya, that man is not healthy,” he says.
“I know.” I was going to wash the cups, but my hands feel numb and I’m afraid I’ll drop them.
“I have a friend who works at a methadone clinic,” Dr. Singh says, and the words are shocking to me. Which is stupid. I am used to the idea of Jam on drugs, and somehow the idea of Jam needing methadone to get off them is what shakes me.
“I don’t know if he wants to,” I say.
Dr. Singh pats my arm, gives me a look that makes me believe he understands the sadness I feel. “You tell him that he knows where I am if he wants to make changes. Or even if he doesn’t and needs my help.”
When we get Jam back in my car, Dr. Singh presses the palm of his hand to Jam’s cheek. Jam leans in ever so slightly when I would have expected him to pull away.
“You come back if you need me,” Dr. Singh says, slipping a piece of paper into the pocket of Jam’s shirt.
Dr. Singh looks at me and nods. I nod in return and then I back down the driveway and drive Jam to my house. My shift doesn’t start until four. So I can keep him safe until then at least.
“I guess I can’t go with you on your trip now,” Jam says, and I don’t know if he’s talking about his ankle or the drugs.
“Dr. Singh can get you into a methadone program.”
Jam’s eyelids are at half-mast. “That was ketamine.”
“Oh,” I say, as if I’m accepting his answer. Even though it may be true right now, I’m sure it isn’t every time.
“I love it so much,” Jam says, his voice dreamy. “But it’s so quick. It’s gone too soon.”