The last time my dad was home about a year and a half ago, my mom said the opposite. She told him he couldn’t stay anymore. “You need to go,” she said.
Ben and I had his railroad tracks set up in the living room. I was trying to distract him while our mom and dad fought by the front door. They were only hissing at each other at first. But then my mom’s voice got louder. Like she needed to be heard. It was early in the morning and my dad hadn’t come home the night before. He’d been arrested and sat in a cell all night to get sober. It wasn’t the first time. He didn’t call my mom to let her know. He left her at home to worry.
“No more,” my mom said that day.
My dad’s key was still in the lock. She wouldn’t let him inside the apartment. And after that day, he never came home again.
“Tell her what really happened,” my uncle Matt yells through the speaker now. “Tell her how he drank every last drop of alcohol in this house and started yelling and screaming. Tell them how I wanted to call the police, but you wouldn’t let me.”
“Stop!” my grandma cries. “Just, please, stop.”
But my uncle doesn’t stop. “We told him he could stay if he went to rehab. He didn’t like that ultimatum. He never does.” I can picture him pacing across the bright yellow linoleum floor of my grandma’s kitchen, running his hand through his thinning hair.
My grandma starts to cry.
Deep down inside, I’m sure she knew my dad would never agree to get help. But that didn’t stop her from hoping this time would be different.
“I tried to stay up all night,” she says. “But I got too tired. I fell asleep in front of the TV. He slipped out the front door. I woke up still holding the remote control.” Her voice cracks. “He’s gone.”
“And so is most of her jewelry, by the way!” my uncle yells in the background.
“It’s not your fault. He’s sick. You have to stop blaming yourself,” my mom says.
“Tell her, Carol! Tell her what a colossal waste of time this is.” My uncle is so loud that my mom has to switch the speaker off.
She balances the phone between her ear and her shoulder. She mumbles something, then stops to listen. She knots her hair on top of her head. She runs a blush brush along her cheekbones. She speaks calmly to my grandma. She sounds like Brenda. She tells her she did her best.
“I’ll call you tonight,” my mom finally says. “I need to take Ben to school. I have to go to work.”
My grandma must ask her something about me, because I hear my mom say, “She’s still at home.” She pauses to listen to whatever my grandma says back, but then my mom interrupts her. “We’re working on it,” she says. I can detect the clip in her voice. It’s right below the surface. It’s a tone full of frustration. I don’t know if it’s directed at my grandma or at me.
chapter twenty-three
I’m glad today is Tuesday. Brenda is coming. I haven’t talked to her since my emergency call a couple days ago. I wait for her halfway down the stairs outside the front door of my apartment. She stops and stands still at the edge of the pool.
“Well, hi,” she says. “Do you want to come over here?”
I shake my head no. She moves closer and asks if I want to go there. Still no. She moves closer again. It reminds me of when my mom and I would sit across from each other on the floor and reach our arms out to get Ben to walk back and forth between us. Only instead of gradually moving farther away, Brenda keeps closing the distance. Finally, she stands at the bottom of the stairs.
“How about here?”
I feel like this is her version of meeting in the middle. It’s not the edge of the pool. It’s not the center of the courtyard. It’s only a few more steps from where I already am. I stand up. I grip the railing. I put one foot in front of me, and then the other. I take six steps until I’m standing at the bottom of the stairs.
Brenda takes my hand. She squeezes it. One squeeze. A squeeze that means everything without saying it.
“Sit,” she says.
I do.
Brenda adjusts herself on the bottom step. She straightens her legs out in front of her, then crosses one purple-Chuck-Taylored foot over the other one. “Tell me about the rest of your weekend. How’s your dad?”
“Not good.”
“Mm-hm.”
She doesn’t seem surprised. And she shouldn’t be. It’s not like someone who gets hauled away on an involuntary psychiatric hold is expected to be in excellent condition after it happens. She asks me for more details, so I tell her what my grandma said.
“I see.” She scribbles a note down. Her forehead wrinkles. I bet she doesn’t want me to notice that. “I understand how that would be upsetting.”
“It’s just the same old thing. He only cares about himself.”
“Oh, Morgan. I’m so sorry. I know it can seem like he’s being selfish, but there’s more to it than that. Are you feeling frustrated?”
“I’m not frustrated. That’s not what’s wrong with me.”