“Yes,” he says.
I shake my head, thinking of how many times I’ve tried to get my sister to go to the cemetery or have a substantive conversation about our brother. Never to any avail. Resentment builds inside me—toward both my husband and my sister. “Well, thanks for the call. I need to go…intermission’s over,” I say, thinking of how he, annoyingly, always calls it halftime.
“No problem,” Nolan quickly says. “Enjoy the show.”
chapter twenty-five
JOSIE
For several days following my conversation with Nolan, I try to delude myself, a skill I’ve honed over the years. I keep telling myself that my actions were just one piece of a giant, tragic puzzle, and that a hundred little things had to happen for Daniel to die. A thousand. If you back up far enough, tens of thousands.
Take, for example, Scott Donahue, the driver of the Denali that hit Daniel. I have never laid eyes on the man, but somehow I know his part of the story. I know that on the night of the accident, he was headed to Walgreens to buy cough medicine for his three-year-old son. So right there alone, I can see that Mr. Donahue and his wife had to meet, marry, and conceive that particular child, who would then get sick that very week in December (perhaps picking up a virus at one of those bouncy venues that Meredith despises); that the Donahues had to be out of children’s cough medicine (maybe they both forgot to pick it up earlier that day); and that Mr. Donahue had to go out precisely when he did (perhaps he stalled a few minutes to watch news coverage of the shoe bomber, the big story that broke that day). And on and on and on.
Yet no matter how I slice it, or what other factors may have been at play on that fateful night (and in the weeks, months, and years leading up to it), the inescapable, bottom-line, stone-cold truth remains: Daniel would be alive today had I not gotten drunk—no, wasted—on the night of December 22, 2001.
Obviously, there is nothing I can do about the past except live with it, but my agonizing dilemma becomes what to do moving forward. Do I make a joint decision with Nolan to tell Meredith what really happened that night? Do I confess to Meredith on my own, regardless of what he decides? Do I tell my family the truth simply because they deserve to know every detail of Daniel’s final hours—or will telling them only burden them with more heartache? I think about the repercussions of a confession and worry that my father might blame himself for my excessive drinking. I can certainly see my mother feeling that way. I can also see her lamenting that she hadn’t been stricter during my teenaged years. Most of all, I know beyond a doubt that a confession will only further poison my relationship with Meredith, perhaps end it altogether, and that it might also be the death knell for her marriage. I know my sister, and I just can’t imagine her forgiving either one of us for keeping such an enormous secret.
After several torturous days and restless nights, I decide to talk to the one person I can always trust. So I knock on Gabe’s door late one evening, finally catching him alone, without Leslie.
“Yeah?” he calls out, sounding exhausted.
I open the door a crack and peer into his darkened room. “Sorry. Were you asleep?”
“Nah,” he says, rolling from his back onto his side to look at me. “I just got in bed….You okay?”
“Yeah…yeah….I just wanted to talk….”
“Well, come on in,” he says.
I hesitate one beat, then take a deep breath, climb onto his bed, and talk as quickly as I can, before I can change my mind, spilling my whole disjointed, raw confession.
“Well, you always thought this might be the case….” he says after I’m finished, his tone sympathetic yet matter-of-fact.
“Yeah,” I say, nodding as I hug my knees. “But I also always hoped I was wrong.”
“I know,” he murmurs.
“It sucks,” I say.
“Yeah…but aren’t you just a little relieved to know?” he asks. “Now you don’t have to wonder anymore?”
I nod, impressed with his usual insightfulness. “Yeah. I guess. Maybe a little…I probably should have talked to Nolan a long time ago.”
“He should have talked to you, too,” Gabe says, loyally shifting the blame. “And I really can’t believe he never told Meredith….Wow.”
“Well, I kept a secret from her, too.”
“Yeah, but you aren’t married to her.”
I nod.
“Besides,” Gabe continues. “Nolan knew the truth. You only suspected it….”
“I guess,” I say, having considered all of these angles as I searched for ways to absolve myself, or at least mitigate my culpability. “But we’re still both to blame for what happened.”
Gabe props himself up, cradling his head in his left hand. “Nobody is to blame, Josie. It’s not like someone was drunk driving here….It was an accident…an accident nobody could have foreseen.”
“Still,” I say.