Beck leans into my ear. “He worked on it the whole way over here. Kid was beyond pumped to show you.”
This Walt-Mim-Beck mobile sandwich makes me wonder if there’s some kind of reverse Siamese twin operation. Or . . . triplets, as it were. “Walt, it’s an absolute masterpiece. I love it. Every twiggy inch.”
We’re forced to let go of each other, as simultaneous stair-climbing is basically impossible, not at all conducive to Siamese triplets.
“So,” says Beck. “Brother or sister?”
I don’t answer at first. I can’t. I’ve written the word, probably said it hundreds of times in other contexts. But never out loud, as it applied to me. I look Beck in the eye, and say it. “Sister.”
“Nice. They have a name picked out?”
“Isabel.”
Beck stops three steps short of the landing. I look back at him, and see something lighter than a shadow pass over his eyes. “What?”
“Nothing.”
“Uh-uh. Out with it, Van Buren.”
He takes one more step, pauses, runs his hand through his hair. “Last night, at the hotel—you may have mentioned her name.”
“What?” I look to Walt, as if he might offer some assistance. And by assistance, I mean resuscitation. CPR. The Heimlich. Those electric pads that literally shock your life back into its skin. Walt has his head buried in the Reds program. Probably not the best candidate for electric shock, come to think of it. “When?”
“During your . . . I don’t know what to call it . . . episode?”
Sometimes my brain hurts. Not a headache. A brainache. Chalk it up as just another in a long line of Mim’s medical mysteries, but right now, my brain hurts like hell. I take the last three steps, imagining my blackout and the host of private thoughts I might have announced: internal monologues, theories meant for no one but me, words that put the utterance of my unborn sister’s name to shame.
And then Beck’s hand is in mine, and my brainache subsides. (In place of the pain, curtains rise on a lavish Broadway song and dance, Rodgers and Hammerstein in their prime.)
At the top of the stairs, we are greeted by a rainbow-colored sign next to the entrance.
THIS IS YOUR NEW BEGINNING
PLEASE CHECK ALL NEGATIVITY AND SELF-DOUBT HERE, AS YOU WILL HAVE NO NEED FOR THEM INSIDE. FROM THIS POINT ON, YOU WILL LIVE YOUR LIFE.
“What a shame they didn’t remind me to breathe my air,” says Beck, opening the door with a half smile. But it’s not his signature half smile, all cute and coy. This one is different, lackluster. Supremely lacking in luster. “Mim,” he starts. And suddenly, my arms are around him, because I don’t want him to finish that sentence.
They aren’t coming inside, because this isn’t for them.
This is my wooden box.
It’s a deep, powerful hug, and Walt turns around, because even he understands there’s nothing romantic or funny about it. My mouth, just inches from Beck’s ear, whispers the familiar line on its own.
Beck kisses me on the cheek, and responds beautifully, simply, “Yes, Mim. You are.”
And I think of all the times I thought I wasn’t okay, and all the times maybe I could have been, if only I’d had a Beck Van Buren around to tell me otherwise.
He steps back now, throws an arm around Walt. “We’ll be starting a New Beginning when you get back. Right, Walt?”
“Hey, hey, I’m Walt.”
“Damn straight,” says Beck, winking at me.
An image: my two best friends with their arms around each other, so different and so alike, colorful and puzzling and alive, clicked into place like Walt’s cube. I tighten my backpack, wondering if I’ll ever again have friends like these.
“Damn straight.”
39
Sunrise Mountain
SUNRISE MOUNTAIN REHAB slaps me in the face with its unapologetic frontier motif. Standing between a butter churn and a rodeo saddle, I’m thinking it should apologize—to me, yes, but not exclusively. This place owes an apology to all those who have had the misfortune of setting foot inside its hellish doors.
On a throw rug a bald eagle soars atop snow-capped mountains; it is majestic, patriotic, and above all, obnoxious. Beyond the mountains, a purple sun sets on my electro-fuchsia shoes. A large bust of Daniel Boone stands tall in the corner, leading an army of oil paintings like a brigadier general: a wild lynx, an impossibly gorgeous horizon, a diagram of birds in their natural habitats—each painting in impeccable formation, awaits the trumpeting charge of their courageous General Boone (sic).
It is this: ridiculousness magnified.