Chapter 10 #2
“It was like you thought. She took some pills, combined with too much alcohol. If you hadn’t found her when you did, it could have been very serious—but we pumped her stomach, and barring any complications, she can go home tomorrow.”
“Is she awake?” Anya asked.
“We were able to talk with her for a few minutes, but she’s asleep now. She seems lucid, and all brain function looks normal. You can go up and see her if you like.”
Anya was still holding Gabe’s hand. He was squeezing back now, and his whole body was rigid.
“Gabe?” she asked.
“Can we leave?” he said.
“Now?” Anya was confused. “Don’t you want to see your mom?”
“I want to go.” He turned to the doctor. “Can I go?”
“I…” The doctor looked to Anya for guidance, but Anya was baffled too. “Yes? If you want to get some sleep and come back in the morning, that’s fine.”
“Good.” Gabe dropped Anya’s hand. “Let’s go.”
He turned and stormed toward the exit. Anya quickly thanked the doctor and rushed after him.
“Gabe, wait, your legs are too long,” Anya huffed as she caught up to him. He was nearly at the ambulance bay.
“Where’s the car?” he asked tightly.
“That way.” She pointed to the right, toward the visitor lot. “Do you want me to take you home?”
“I’m not going back to that house,” he snapped—but then he sighed, and his shoulders drooped. “Sorry. I’m not— I’ll get my stuff out of the car, okay? And then I’ll get a cab to a hotel or something. I’ve already put you out enough.”
There was a twitch in his jaw. She couldn’t tell if he wanted to scream or break down crying. Maybe both.
“Do you want to just drive for a while?” she asked. “Maybe get some cigarettes? I could really use a cigarette right now.”
Gabe tilted his head slightly. “You’d defy the surgeon general?”
“Only in absolute emergencies.”
He exhaled. It was so good to see him relax, even a little.
“There’s a lookout spot in the hills, off Mulholland,” he said. “I don’t know the address. Is it okay if I just tell you where to go?”
Anya nodded. “Let’s do it.”
They picked up a pack of Parliament Lights and a couple of slushies from a nearby gas station, then Anya started driving.
It wasn’t long before they were back in the hills—on a wider road this time, for which Anya was thankful.
Still, the curves were sharp as they climbed in elevation, and Anya was tired enough that she drove very slowly.
Gabe was smoking a cigarette out the passenger window, and the lights of LA grew hazy and distant beneath them.
“Up here.” Gabe pointed to a turnoff ahead, and Anya pulled into it.
“Oh wow,” she breathed.
The view was dazzling—the entire city basin to the south, mountains climbing into fog and darkness to the east. Gabe got out of the car and walked toward a bench at the edge of the lookout, and Anya followed.
It was really cold up here, much colder than it had been down in the city.
She started shivering, which Gabe noticed right away.
“Shit, you’re in a dress. Should we stay in the car?”
“I’ll be fine,” she insisted.
“You’re so goddamn stubborn,” he sighed. For once, she liked how it sounded. “Can you pop the trunk?”
She did, and he went over to riffle through his weekend bag. A few seconds later, he shut the trunk and returned with a giant hoodie.
“Here.” He balled it up and tossed it to her. She was hit with a wave of how much like Gabe it smelled, whatever cologne he wore—something leathery and woodsy, like palo santo. She unfurled the hoodie and saw it bore a giant Dodgers logo.
“Dodgers?!” she faux-gasped. “Anathema!”
“Your body, your choice, Met fan,” he said dryly, and she let out a little grunt of displeasure as she pulled on the sweatshirt. It was huge and soft—it covered nearly her entire dress—and she immediately felt so much warmer. She settled onto the bench beside him.
“Better?” he asked.
She nodded. “What about you?” she said carefully. “Better? At all?”
He lit another cigarette, took a long inhale and let it out, the smoke dissipating into the twinkling lights of the city.
“My mom didn’t used to be like that,” he said, staring straight ahead.
“What was she like?”
“She was—” Gabe’s voice caught in his throat, and then he swallowed. He looked down, shoulders slumped, like he’d lost a battle. “I had a brother. He died.”
Anya froze, feeling the intensity of the moment, the enormity of it. She’d never seen Gabe look this vulnerable. She was terrified of saying something wrong.
“What was his name?” she asked.
“Danny.” Gabe took another drag, his breath uneven. “He was three years older than me.”
“Yeah?” Anya turned her body toward Gabe’s, and he looked up at the movement. There were tears in his eyes.
“Yeah.” Gabe nodded. “And he was like—he was the good one, you know?”
“What do you mean?” Anya felt tears pricking; she quickly blinked them back.
“He was the best.” Gabe smiled, but he looked incredibly sad.
“Valedictorian, captain of the soccer team—he was the guy everyone wanted to be, but he was so nice you couldn’t even be mad at him about it.
And I was just, kinda goofy, you know? I liked making people laugh.
My parents always wanted me to be more…But Danny never made me feel like that.
He thought my dumb little-kid pranks were so funny. ”
Anya tried to imagine Danny: this older, more serious version of Gabe. Darker hair, maybe. A sincere smile instead of Gabe’s impish one.
“What happened?” she asked.
“Car accident,” Gabe said numbly. “The night he graduated high school. Danny wasn’t driving, but the truck hit them on the passenger side.”
“Oh my god, Gabe.”
“And my parents…” Gabe shook his head. “I tried to be more like what they wanted. Studied harder, two sports. But my dad was never home anymore and my mom—well, you saw.”
“It seemed like maybe that had happened before,” Anya said tentatively, and Gabe nodded.
“It’s not usually that bad, but yeah. She gave up all her charity boards, stopped seeing her friends. She couldn’t sleep, so she started taking pills. She just…she couldn’t cope. And my dad didn’t help. I wanted to help, but I didn’t know how. So she kind of…floated away. I couldn’t stop it.”
“You were a teenager,” Anya stressed. “And you’d just lost your brother.”
“I guess,” Gabe said, but it was clear he didn’t believe her.
“What about you?” Anya asked. “How did you cope?”
“At first everyone pitied me. They were always looking at me like I must be so sad. And I was—like, I really was. But I hated when they looked at me like that. So I went back to being who I was before. Like it never happened. And I was busy, so that helped, all the studying and practices and every after-school club that would have me. I couldn’t be home. So I just…wasn’t.”
“And now you work campaigns.” Anya exhaled, understanding. “And never go home for Christmas.”
“I tried to go home, for a while,” Gabe said.
“But whenever I came home on college breaks, it felt like—I don’t know, like it made my mom sadder or something.
Like me being there reminded her that Danny wasn’t.
At some point it was like, who am I even doing this for?
I don’t want to be here, and nobody wants me here. ”
Anya thought back to the things Gabe had said to her in Ohio, in Vieques. How much he needed everyone to love him. She was so foolish not to understand that there might be some terrible reason why.
“But everybody wants you on their campaign,” Anya said softly.
“Campaigns are…” Gabe shrugged. “I’m good at them. And people need me. It makes me feel like…like even if my parents don’t want me, I still have a place to be.”
That was the second Anya burst into tears—humiliatingly noisy sobs—and Gabe turned to her in alarm.
“I’m so sorry!” she choked. “Oh god, this is so not about me, please ignore me, I’m so embarrassed.”
“Anya?” Gabe looked completely bewildered. “What’s happening?”
“Nothing! I’m being stupid. And feeling awful—about those things I said to you at Chandelier Bar, and oh my god, in Vieques?! But we don’t have to—”
“I said some shitty things to you at Chandelier Bar too,” he said, frowning. “And what are you saying about Vieques?”
“That stupid beach bar!” Anya wailed. She wiped her eyes on her sleeve—great, mascara all over Gabe’s sweatshirt.
“I was so humiliated you rejected me, and being furious with you felt like the only possible way I could handle it. You’re not a selfish asshole, and of course you want people to love you, it makes complete sense. I am so, so sorry.”
“Hold on.” Gabe shook his head in confusion. “You think I rejected you in Vieques?”
“I mean, yeah?” She and Gabe were both looking at each other in complete shock, like neither of them could believe they were having this conversation.
“How could you think that?” he asked.
“Is that a trick question?” Anya laughed; she felt insane. “I’m sorry, we were talking about something much more important. We really don’t have to talk about this.”
“No.” Gabe leaned toward her. “I think we really do.”
He looked right at her. Oh god, he wanted her to explain.
“I mean, I said I wanted to sleep with you, and you said no.” Anya fidgeted with the sweatshirt cuff, wishing it didn’t smell so much like him. “And then the woman you actually wanted to sleep with showed up, like, instantly, so. I’m not sure how much more rejected I could have been.”
“Anya.” Gabe sighed. “I had such a big crush on you. Like, an enormous crush on you.”
“What?” Anya gaped at him. That wasn’t possible. “Then why did you…”