Teddy
JULY
Indie’s contact is open on my phone.
I’ve tried to call fifteen times now, each going right to voicemail. I thought maybe her phone was off, a hopeful delusion to soothe the fact that Indie blocked me.
The fallout of my choices is finally happening.
It’s like that movie Final Destination. Seeing what’s going to happen, desperately trying to warn people, and I was one of the idiots who didn’t listen to her.
But my mother scared me that night in June.
For weeks after, I saw violent images of my mother dead by her own hand, in a car accident, from sickness, or simply going to sleep and never waking up.
I don’t know why I didn’t tell Indie about it.
I knew she would know what to do. How to help. How to get her help. I know my mother isn’t well, but she refuses to even entertain the idea of grief counseling.
When I told her that Indie had some resources she could use, she shut that down hard. She says she doesn’t need help; she just needs time and family.
Since that night, I haven’t slept well. My stomach hurts so much I can barely eat. I couldn’t reconcile what I’d seen and began questioning my memory.
Did I actually see that?
When Indie would ask me what was wrong, I would tell her nothing. Always nothing. Because nothing technically was. Mom was back to normal at the following Sunday dinners, like that night never happened.
But my mind wouldn’t let me forget.
Then I started thinking more and more about Europe.
The distance and the time I’d spend away from home became overwhelming. I would stay up late while Indie slept next to me, or I would wake in the middle of the night from a nightmare, worrying that my Mom was dead.
Anytime I allowed myself to get excited about Europe, I felt like I was on the verge of a panic attack. What if I’m in Paris and something happens to my Mom? What if I’m enjoying the food in Italy, and she falls asleep and doesn’t wake up like Nana?
Will I be able to live with that?
And the guilt had been eating at me, because I was planning to leave her, to go and live my life. It turned me short, frustrated, irritated with anything and everything. I kept my distance from Indie as much as I could to not take it out on her.
And that backfired because it just built up in my chest until I exploded and said things I’ll regret until I’m dead and buried.
“You're around death every day, Indie. Why is this affecting you so much?”
“You fucking asshole,” I spit at myself.
Andrea’s death destroyed her because she cares, because empathy pulses through her veins. That’s why I fell for her—her fierce devotion, her unwillingness to do anything halfway. She throws herself headlong for her patients, her friends, and for me.
She offered me everything, and I shattered it with my vicious words.
My stomach clenches hard, and I wince, pressing my hand to it as it feels like acid burning through me.
I didn’t mean a single fucking word.
Maybe if I say that enough, it will take them back. Maybe it will reverse time so that I could punch myself for even thinking those words.
A memory surfaces, pulling me back to a phone call from three months ago.
“Indie’s having a rough week. She lost one of her patients—”
Mom cut me off, her voice gentle. “She’s around death every single day, you think she’d be used to it by now.”
Those words sank into my brain, lying dormant there and bursting to the surface at the worst moment.
I weaponized Indie’s trauma to hurt her because I was terrified and didn’t know what to do. And that’s not an excuse. There is no excuse.
I purposefully decimated Indie because she called me out on my bullshit and demanded better from me. And I grew up with a woman telling me I was already the best.
I fucked everything up.
I am a fuck-up.
“So, get up and fix it!” Nana’s voice snaps in my mind.
“Theodore!” Mom shrieks through the door, the handle twisting and the lock holding. “Open this door, right now! I’m going to count to ten—one… two… three—”
Car doors outside closing make me rush to the window, pathetic hope swelling and dying when I see that it’s my aunts, waving hello to Colleen and Lily.
My mom is counting outside the door like I’m fucking eight years old. My Dad is downstairs being useless on the couch.
I need to get out of here. I need to get back to the condo. I need to try to find Indie.
Slinging my bag over my shoulders, I grab my keys and yank the door open. Mom stumbles back, and I storm right by her, past Nana’s room, down the stairs.
Mom’s on my heels, yelling at me the entire way about being disrespectful to her on her birthday of all days.
Her voice and words grate on my nerves as I head toward the front door, just in time for my aunts, Colleen, and Lily to walk through.
My younger cousins burst in rushing to the living room. My uncles come after, ignoring their wives juggling groceries and decorations, and head straight to the living room anyway.
It’s all normal, and yet it all feels wrong.
“Theodore! Here, take this,” Aunt Robin sees me and shoves the cake box in my hands before I can even react.
It’s a large, elaborate sheet cake, pink and purple icing with Happy Birthday Dawn in elaborate script. Their voices climb higher and higher as they all speak over each other.
“June, did you grab the cups—”
“What? No, I thought you were supposed to—”
“Theodore, are you even listening to me?” Mom snaps from behind me.
“Oh, Dawn, you’re not wearing that, are you?”
“No, I need to change, but I need to get the chicken marinating—”
“Are you going to wear that lavender dress? Remember that one makes you look plump—”
“No, I was going to wear the mint green—”
“That one washes you out.”
“I told you to grab the cups—”
“And I was too busy grabbing the cake!”
“Dawn, grab me a beer!”
“Mom, bring me a bowl of chips!”
“Hurry up, the game is about to start!”
“That’s alright,” Lily grins, sidling up to me with a bright beaming smile. “I’m sure Teddy and I could run out to the store.”
Their shrill, meaningless chatter, the way they jab and slice at each other between the lines, twists my insides.
Then Lily touches my arm like she has the fucking right to.
Because I gave her the idea that she has the right to, by not setting firmer boundaries and by putting everyone in this room’s feelings above the one I should have protected from the start.
Because I went along, like a pathetic dog on a leash, with them to keep the peace.
“A friend to all is a friend to none, Teddy.”
Pop said that once. I never understood what it really meant until now. I told Indie, without words, that everyone else mattered first.
No wonder she ran—who would stay in this rotting circus?
I can’t help. I laugh at these clowns, putting on a show for each other. To impress each other. It’s all so fucking ridiculous.
The sound catches everyone’s attention, all eyes turning to me.
And under their heavy, judgmental gazes, I lose it.
I slam the cake down on the floor.
Hard.
The box explodes, the cake splatters, pink and purple frosting smearing across the expensive hardwood floor my Mom agonized over. Some of it even ended up on the walls, the cream carpet runner, and Lily’s legs, since she was in the splash zone.
All conversation abruptly stops.
Mom shrieks. “Theodore James—”
“Mom,” I cut her off, my voice loud and booming in this space. “For once—shut. The. Fuck. Up.”
Mom blinks, and her mouth snaps shut. My aunts, Lily, and Colleen gape at me.
My mind feels clear.
The weight that had been sitting on my chest feels almost lighter. The vise around my throat finally lets up. My shoulders drop, my back straightens, and I meet her eyes head-on.
“Haven’t you said enough?” I hiss through gritted teeth. “Haven’t you done enough?!”
Aunt Robin gasps, “Theod—”
“You can shut up too,” I snarl.
I meet every single person’s eyes in this room, these women who follow my mother’s lead.
“This family,” I sneer, shaking my head. “How could I not see it until now. All of you are so fucking pathetic.”
Not that I’m any better.
Not by a long shot.
But this is who I learned from, who I emulated and followed and barked for. Nana and Pop tried as best as they could, and I think there is some good in me from them, but all the rot comes from this house, these people.
My family.
My father appears in the doorway of the foyer, my uncles trailing behind him to see what’s going on. They look around at the pale women and the splattered cake on the floor.
I used to feel pride in my family.
When I was a little kid, my mother always told me I should feel proud that I came from a strong family unit. That my parents were still together, unlike some other people’s parents. That we had a nice home and nice things because we deserved them.
“The most empty and pathetic people on this entire planet—and I include myself in that because I learned from my family,” I scoff. Their shock seems to be wearing off and giving way to indignation. “Look at us—we’re a fucking joke.”
Mom’s eyes are practically bugging out of her head and she looks downright furious. None of the heartbreak, the grieving-daughter act she put on for me.
No, this is who she is.
Nana tried to warn me.
Indie tried to warn me.
And I refused to listen.
I refused to see.
Indie, I’m so fucking sorry, honey.
“Pretty words.”
Indie’s voice in my head hits me like a shot of adrenaline.
“Theodore—” Mom starts.
“Don’t cut me off!” I roar, and she jumps back, startled.
Dad doesn’t even say anything, doesn’t try to defend her. He just watches, shocked, with my uncles, my disrespectful little cousins, and my aunts, all gaping at me.
I sneer, “’Always put family first, Theo. Blood is thicker than water, Theo. Family is everything, Theo.’ Fuck this family! A bunch of image-obsessed clowns and useless men.”
That hits my Dad’s nerve, because he tries to shout, “That’s enough out of you, boy—”
“Oh, yeah? Now it’s enough, Dad?” I laugh, charging up to him. “Call me a sissy! Call me a faggot like you used to when I cried! Call me a little girl! Come on! Say it to my fucking face!”