Mom drops me off at home. “If I didn’t have a meeting, trust me, we’d be having a very long talk right now. Don’t think you’re off the hook. I’ll have to stay late to make up for leaving in the middle of the day, but we’re having a serious discussion when I get home.”
“Hitting a desk isn’t the end of the world,” I tell her.
“The important thing is that you hit, not what you hit. As soon as I get home, seriously. The minute I’m through the door.” And then she’s gone, and I’m alone in the house, and I start laughing. It comes from deep in my gut, welling up like a water spout in the middle of a turbulent ocean, and it takes a terrific effort of will to tamp it down, to turn it into guttural chuckles in lieu of full-blown guffaws.
I can’t believe I fell for it.
I can’t believe I fooled myself without even trying. That I tricked myself into thinking that I could be happy, that I could be normal, that I could ignore the voice and it would go away, dissipate like smoke in open air. That the voice had gone away, that it ever could go away.
And I realize the voice is screaming at me. No longer whispering. More than that, I realize it’s been screaming for a while now. I just wasn’t paying attention.
But now I am.
Now I am.
Is it time?
And the voice says, Yes. Now.
It makes perfect sense, suicide does. An end to pain, to misunderstanding. An end to my existence as a walking, talking, living, breathing reminder to my mother of what was taken from her.
Why has it taken me so long? Why have I let my pathetic excuse for a life drag on this long?
I know why. Deep down, I know. I wasn’t ready. Not before. Not like I am now. I’ve been preparing.
I haven’t been steeling myself for suicide. The suicide is actually the easy part. It’s the other thing.
The other thing. That’s what I’ve been preparing for.
And my phone rings.
The number is from Florida, according to caller ID. There’s only one person I know who lives in Florida, and I’m not sure I want to talk to him. I hold the phone in my hand and let it vibrate once, twice, three times. Before it shunts the call to voicemail, I thumb-swipe to answer.
And I pretend.
I’m so good at pretending.
After brief hellos, Dr. Kennedy says, “I’m going to be in town this weekend. Do you think you have time to let an old man buy you a Coke?”
This is what he always says when he’s coming to town. Dr. Kennedy was my therapist for most of my life—I literally cannot remember a time when I didn’t speak to him regularly. About a year ago, he retired and moved to Florida—“Because this is what old people do,” he said, somewhat gravely. By then, I was officially done with my therapy, but I still saw him once a month or so. “Just to keep up,” he would say.
He moved, but he still comes back to Brookdale two or three times a year, usually in the spring or summer, and each time, he calls me and offers to buy me a Coke. Each time, I tell myself I won’t go, that there’s no need to. And then that, okay, I’ll go, but I won’t talk about anything that matters. And each time, he manages to wrangle me into talking about important things, about things that matter, about things that are buried deep—like in a memory hole—and leaves me thinking it was somehow my idea.
He came to Brookdale over the summer, and I genuinely couldn’t meet him for that famed Coke; I was too busy with the YouTube channel, and that seems so ridiculous now.
A month ago. And now he’s back already.
“This is quite a coincidence,” I say casually.
“Not a coincidence at all. I spoke to some people at your school today.”
Dr. Kennedy is not a bullshitter or one to conceal. He’s bluntly honest, sort of the polar opposite of every psychiatrist on TV and in movies. Popular culture woefully underprepares us for actual therapy. He has never once asked me, “How does that make you feel?” or “What do you think that means?” He’s more likely to tell me what I feel or what something means.
“You don’t have to come up here because of that,” I tell him.
“At my age, there aren’t many things I do have to do. This is something I want to do.”
“Come on…”
“I didn’t get to see you last time I was in town. I keep up with very, very few of my former patients, Sebastian. Did you ever stop to think that I regretted missing you last time, and I’m happy for this opportunity?”
The truth is: No. No, I never stopped to think any of that. Dr. Kennedy has a way of saying something nice that makes me feel guilty, anyway.
“I want us to revisit the question of hypnotherapy.”
So. He’s definitely spoken to Ms. de la Rosa.
“We’ve been through it before, Dr. Kennedy.”
And we have. So many times. If you could remember, it might help you get past it.
And I countered: Isn’t it just as likely that not being able to remember is my way of getting past it?
That would be true. If. If you were truly past it. And I don’t believe you are.
“You’ve refused in the past for very good reasons,” he says, “reasons I understand and respect. But I’d like to discuss it again. Can you do me a favor and be prepared to talk about this again, with an open mind?”
And of course I can. Because for Dr. Kennedy I can and would do anything. I promise him to be prepared, to discuss the issue with an open mind, and I hang up and I know it doesn’t matter what I’ve promised because I will not live to have the conversation in the first place.
I’m so good at pretending.
I’m a liar.
I’ve lied to everyone.
To every person in my life, to everyone I know.
I’ve never told the truth. I’ve lied to them all.
To my mom. To Evan. To Dr. Kennedy. To Aneesa.
Everyone keeps saying that if I could remember, it would help. That’s what they’ve said all along.
And the thing is this: I remember doing it.
I remember every single bit of it.
History
I’m told it was a Tuesday. It was. This is true.
I’m told it was June and it was hot and there’d been no rain for weeks, no respite from the heat that pressed down on Brookdale. Sticky hot and oppressive. Unrelenting. Heat like a heavy breath in your face. Not a whisper of breeze.
(bored bored bored)
I’m told Mom was in the backyard, hanging laundry on the line, that my father was in the garage. Mommy says don’t go outside too hot but Mommy is outside not fair I want to be outside. He was cleaning the gun on the workbench just inside the door that led from the garage into the house. And the doorbell rang and he left the gun sitting out as he went to answer it.
(bored bored bored)
Daddy says go away I’m busy not for little boys adult stuff.
(bored bored bored)
Doorbell and I go see Daddy again but Daddy is not there but grown-up toy! Grown-up toy!
Grown-up toy! I have a grown-up toy!