CHAPTER 28
Yaz stopped walking three days ago. Joe didn’t have to convince Rosie of anything. She agreed. It’s time. Rosie already said her good-bye. She knows this is the right thing to do, but she can’t bear to see it happen. Joe thanks God she has baby Joseph to keep her distracted, or she’d be an inconsolable mess.
“Who’s driving?” asks Katie.
“You do it,” says Meghan. “I don’t wanna go. It’s too sad.”
“Gimme the keys,” says Patrick. “I’ll drive. You and Katie stay here. Me and Dad’ll do the dirty work.”
Katie hands the keys to Patrick, and Joe leads the way to the front door, trying to pretend this conversation about driving had nothing to do with him. But he knows he’s the reason for every word, and despite his feigned ignorance, he feels shamed and helpless.
Two weeks ago, Joe was asked to turn in his service-issued weapon. Three days later, upon recommendation of the department physician, Rick informed him that they had to notify the Registry of Motor Vehicles that Joe was no longer medically fit to be behind the wheel. Rick then elaborated. If Joe were ever to get into a car accident and hurt someone, a scenario the physician and Rick apparently deemed imminent and likely, and the injured party were to find out that Joe has Huntington’s and the Boston Police Department knew about his illness, they’d be liable. Allowing Joe to drive, even off duty, would be inviting tragedy, a huge lawsuit, and a media shit storm. So, Rick notified the RMV before notifying Joe, and the state revoked his license to drive.
With no service weapon and no driver’s license, Joe didn’t need an interpreter to read the writing on the wall. He officially and unceremoniously quit his job four days ago. And then, as if in an act of solidarity, Yaz quit walking. It’s been a fuckin’ awful week.
Joe still has a license to carry and legally owns his personal handgun. But he suspects that this license, too, will go. Somewhere, someone has already yelled out Timber! and the tree is on its way down.
So Patrick is driving, and Joe and Yaz are in the passenger seat. It’s a short distance to the vet’s office in Somerville, but they’re in traffic and facing at least a half dozen lights, plenty of time for Joe to have a conversation with his son. Joe notices Patrick’s knuckles resting atop the steering wheel, cut up and pink, like raw steak. The intention to speak is there, but Joe still sits in heavy silence, patting Yaz’s head. It often takes tremendous internal work for Joe to initiate talking, yet another act in the three-ring circus that is HD. He imagines pushing a granite boulder up Bunker Hill, a grueling, painstaking, sweaty task, and he can only squeeze the first syllable of what he wants to say out his mouth after he’s reached the peak and gravity takes over the job. The damn rock is finally rolling downhill.
“What’s goin’ on with you, Pat?”
“Nothin’.”
“What’s with all the fightin’?”
Patrick shrugs. “Bar’s been rowdy.”
“Don’t you guys have bouncers?”
“Yeah. They’ve been outnumbered. I’m just givin’ ’em a hand.”
“Is that all there is to it?”
“Yeah.”
“We haven’t seen you in the mornin’ in a while.”
Patrick looks straight ahead and doesn’t acknowledge that anything has been said. Katy Perry is singing “Roar” on Kiss 108. The windows are steaming up. Having Huntington’s burns a ton of calories, and in doing so emits a lot of heat. Joe now fogs up every car he rides in. Patrick flicks on the wipers and turns the defroster setting to HIGH. The sounds of rushing air and Katy Perry fill the car. Joe feels himself sinking back into the cozy bed of silence, the conversation fading to black. He has to resist and keep talking, or else he’ll find himself back at the bottom of the hill, tasked with yet another boulder.
“Where you been stayin’?” Joe asks, rephrasing in the form of a direct question.
“Here and there.”
“You got a girlfriend?”
“Not really.”
“Then where you been sleepin’?”
“Mostly at this girl’s place.”
“This girl’s not your girlfriend.”
Patrick shrugs. “Not really.”
Joe shakes his head. “You using?”
“What?”
“Are you takin’ drugs?”
“Jesus, Dad. No.”
“Don’t bullshit me, Pat.”
“I’m not. I’m just drinkin’ with friends after work. No big deal.”
“Stay away from that shit, Pat. I mean it.”
“I don’t need this lecture, Dad. I’m not doin’ drugs.”
“Your poor mother has enough to worry about.”
“Don’t worry about me. It’s all good.”
The wipers and defroster aren’t making enough of a difference. Patrick leans forward and wipes the windshield with his hand, creating a complex web of wet finger streaks on the glass amid the fog. Joe watches Patrick drive, trying to figure out whether he believes his son. He can’t get a bead on him. Even sitting right next to him, at arm’s distance, it feels as if Patrick is miles away. And still running.
Joe can’t really blame him. Patrick’s a young man with plenty to run from—the impossible truth of what’s going to happen to his father, his brother, and Meghan; the 50 percent chance that it could happen to him, Katie, and baby Joseph; feeling anything real with this girl he’s sleeping with; pulling her innocent life into this horrific nightmare; feeling anything real with anyone.
“There it is,” says Joe, pointing. “Right there.”
Patrick pulls into the parking lot and gets out. They’re here. Patrick is standing in front of the car, hands stuffed inside his coat pockets, appearing blurry through the watery, fogged windshield, waiting. Joe cradles Yaz in his arms and kisses his soft, matted head, wishing there were more to do before going through with this. Joe wraps a green fleece blanket neatly around Yaz’s frail body. He takes his index finger to the steamed passenger door window and writes.
Yaz was here.
Then he kisses Yaz again and opens the door.
BACK HOME, JOE is sitting in his living room chair, drinking his fifth Budweiser, strapping on a comfortable buzz. Yaz’s dog bed is empty but for the small discoloration where he used to sleep, and it’s surreal that he’s no longer here. Gone. Just like that. Joe presses his shirtsleeve against his eyes, mopping up his tears.
He’s watching the evening news. They’re in the middle of the sports, recounting the Bruins’ pitiful loss last night to the Canucks, when Stacey O’Hara cuts in with breaking news.
An unidentified white male walked into the lobby of Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital in Charlestown just after five o’clock, carrying a black backpack; it was seized and found to contain a fully loaded semiautomatic weapon. The unidentified male then shot off several rounds with another gun he had hidden in his coat, wounding one Boston police officer before being restrained and taken into custody. The gunman’s motives are unclear. The officer was taken to Massachusetts General Hospital. His condition is not yet known. We’ll bring you more details as this story unfolds.
An electric jolt shoots through Joe’s numb brain. He texts Tommy, then Donny. He stares at his phone, his heart pounding in his tight throat, waiting forever. He runs down the list of everyone else. Rosie and Colleen are upstairs with the baby. But what if Colleen dropped by work today for a visit with her coworkers to show off baby Joseph? He texts Colleen.
Where r u?
He texts Rosie.
Where r u?