Girl Before a Mirror (21 page)

The power of a moment. To just allow it to happen. Experience it firsthand. I guess with all my theories on fishhooks and the wisdom of age, that one still eludes me.

I climb the three flights to Ferdie's walk-up and prepare my speech. I'm not going to butt in, but if we could I'd like to have a conversation about what he thinks he's doing with his life. He's thirty-one years old now. And then maybe we'll talk about some of this . . .

The landing in front of Ferdie's apartment is overrun with garbage and his door is open. My stomach drops. I race up the stairs and push open the door.

Tinfoil on the windows with an old bedsheet nailed up as “drapes” for good measure. Pizza boxes everywhere and just . . . darkness, trash, and hopelessness permeate the entire apartment. And there's Ferdie. He has a black eye and several other cuts from whatever barroom brawl landed him in jail however many nights ago. His knuckles are bloodied and I'm sure I don't want to see what the other guy looks like. Ferdie's sitting in that old leather club chair that used to be Dad's, surrounded by empty beer cans, beer bottles, fifths of scotch, bongs, and pipes, and on
the coffee table in front of him is what looks like the remnants of a line of cocaine.

I clap my hand over my mouth and finally see it.

Ferdie's not a loser. He's an addict.

He hasn't woken up. I walk closer to make sure he's alive. Check his pulse, realize quickly I don't know how to check pulses, and then just put my hand on his chest to see if he's breathing.

“What . . . what are you doing?” he slurs, bringing his head up.

“Checking to see if you're alive,” I say.

“And am I?”

“Just barely,” I say. He laughs a little, his head slamming back against the chair and he's out. “Ferdie?
Ferdie??
” Nothing. I check his breathing again. It's there, but . . . slow. I pull out my phone and dial Michael at work.

“Well, hello, stranger. How was Phoenix?” Michael says.

“It's Ferdie,” I say. I hear my voice. It's panicked. Not my own. I'm usually so calm in these situations, but this isn't just another day. Things have changed. I've changed.

“What's happened?” Michael asks, shifting gears instantaneously.

“I think . . . he needs help. I'm here at his apartment. He called from jail while I was in Phoenix and apparently he's been on quite the bender,” I say, taking in the mayhem around me.

“What can I do?” Michael asks, without hesitation.

“Didn't your nephew have to go to rehab a while back?”

“He got hooked on Oxy . . . or that was one of the things he got hooked on,” Michael says.

“I think I need to get Ferdie into rehab,” I say. Out loud.

“Okay,” Michael says.

“But it's not one of those country club places with the limos and all that, is it? Where it's just—”

“No, this place was good. It was in Virginia. This place—” I can tell Michael is sifting through papers, probably trying to find the name of the rehab. “Here it is. The Recovery House. Hilarious, that I couldn't remember that name. Okay . . . let me call and see if they have a bed. I kept in touch with the main guy over there. Let me call you back.”

“Okay.”

“Anna. He's going to be okay. Do you hear me?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. I'll call you right back.” Michael hangs up and I just stand there. Everything in me wants to clean up Ferdie's apartment before Michael gets here. Protect him. Protect us. I don't want anyone to see what . . . what's become of him. Do I want to hide the truth or the illusion? Which version of Ferdie . . . shit. I sit on the arm of the old leather chair and Ferdie absently rubs my back. And it's that simple thing that breaks me open. I cry quietly while my little brother's mitt of a hand tries to soothe me—even in his drugged-up haze.

What I wouldn't give for my walls now. What I wouldn't gi—oh no, of course. Of course. Now I see it. I was never the only Wyatt trying to distance myself from feeling things firsthand. I used ice, walls, and control. Ferdie used booze, drugs, and numbness.

I lost myself in becoming a winner just as sure as Ferdie lost himself in becoming a loser. Becoming these labels meant we didn't have to be us. Human. Vulnerable. The kind of kids parents don't love.

I wipe away my tears, set my purse on the filthy floor, and stand. Pace.

I find his backpack by the door, empty it of all the weirdo detritus he's always accumulated (what grown man needs a single rubber ball and two combs?), and pack what I think he'll need: T-shirts, boxers, jeans, and a sweatshirt. I walk into his bathroom, trying not to lose it as the filth and the . . . just the hopelessness of it all overtakes me. Did this apartment look like this the night of my birthday dinner? Sure it did. So, he came home to this? Why . . . why didn't he ask for help?

Because he's a Wyatt. It's not like I asked for help, either. Jesus. I pluck the toothbrush from the cup, grab some toothpaste, deodorant, and the glasses he never wears and tuck them into the outside pocket of his backpack. And why exactly am I making a mental note to get him a toiletry bag for Christmas? Because I can't stop being me on a dime, that's why. I walk back out into the main room and Ferdie is up doing another hit from a bong as big as my arm.

“When did you get here?” he asks, sitting back in the chair, the smoke coming out in little rings. Rings. Rings.

“A few minutes ago,” I say, putting his backpack over my shoulder.

“Oh,” he says, blinking back into beautiful oblivion. My conversation with Lincoln. Is it the drink, he asked? I so easily laid everything firmly on Ferdie. No, it's not the drink. It's
him
. I am always so quick to believe that it is us who are inherently flawed. My phone rings.

“Hello?”

“Okay. They've got a bed. Here's what we're going to do.
Ferdie's too big for just you, so I'm going to drive over there and we'll load him up together.”

“Thank you . . . Thank you so much,” I say.

“Don't worry about it. But here's the complicated part. It's not like Ferdie has medical insurance, and Recovery House costs a lot. Most of it up front. It's a six-month program.”

“Six months?”

“It's the least amount of time this particular place offers,” he says.

“Okay.”

“Can your parents chip in at all?” Michael asks.

“Probably not,” I say.

“I know. Look. I'll start over there; we'll get him loaded up while he's kind of out of it and then figure out the money stuff as we go. Okay?” Michael asks.

“Okay. Michael, did you—”

“I knew he smoked a lot of pot, but I don't know. It's Ferdie. He's always been kind of a goof.”

“I know.”

“He'll always be that little brat with the skateboard, you know?”

“I know.” I smile.

“Okay, I'm on my way. I'll tell Allison what's going on.” He gives me all the information for the Recovery House, the phone numbers, how to transfer the money . . . everything. We sign off. I whip Ferdie's backpack onto both shoulders and hold my phone until I'm positive it's going to break. I walk into the tiny galley kitchen—dishes, more pizza boxes, more empties, roaches skittering around the counter. I ball my hands up into fists, taking it
all in. How can he live like this? I turn around and face the refrigerator. One single picture hangs underneath a magnet for the local Chinese takeout place.

Ferdie and me.

I brush my fingers over the photo. I must have been about thirteen and he was no more than four or five. He's in those damn Underoos he never took off and that oversized pith helmet he got at the Natural History Museum. Dad bought him that dumb thing. The only thing he ever bought him and Ferdie just . . . he treasured it. I've got a pink shirt tucked into purple corduroys, an outfit pulled together with a rainbow belt and the whitest Keds any child ever had. It's a grainy photo, ripped at the corner. I pull it off the fridge and tuck it into the backpack. The pith helmet. I have to ask at least. I dial.

“Richard Wyatt.”

“Hi, Dad. It's Anna,” I say.

Silence.

“I signed a really big client today,” I say.

“Would I know it?”

“Lumineux Shower Gel,” I say, proudly.

“Never heard of it.”

“Yet!” I say jokingly.

“What?”

“You haven't heard of it, yet,” I say.

“Is this why you called?”

“Well…” My voice stutters.

“What?” I can feel my face flushing.

“Is this why you called, Anna? Honestly. To tell me about
some shower gel I've never heard of?” I swallow. Steady myself.

“No.”

“Well, what then? I have to get—”

“Dad, I need to ask a favor.”

Silence.

“Ferdie needs to go into rehab.”

“Oh, please.”

“Dad—”

“Ferdinand has been nothing but a disappointment to your mother and me.”

“There's a bed open at a rehab in Virginia. They'll take him tonight, but—”

“Ferdinand isn't a little boy anymore.”

“I know that. I know, Dad. He needs help.”

“What he needs is to take some responsibility for his life. Show some control. Know when to say when.”

“I think it's a little more complicated than that, Dad.”

I hear Dad heave a long, weary sigh into the phone. I can hear Mom in the background. She asks him who's on the phone. He says it's me. A long silence and then she launches into a list of errands she needs him to run and to get off the phone already. Stop wasting time, she tells him.

Stop wasting time.

“Dad, please,” I say. “He'll pay it back. Every penny. I'll make sure of it.”

Silence.

“Dad?”

“This is it, Anna. This is all I'm doing. And he has one year.”

“To get sober?”

“To pay back the money, Anna. Jesus.” I give him the information. All the numbers. All the amounts. He is quiet.

“Thank you,” I say.

He doesn't say good-bye. He doesn't say anything. I hang up my phone and just stand there. In the real world where my parents are who they are and there are no phantom limbs and no glimmers. That is my dad.

Michael arrives within the hour. I still have Ferdie's backpack on both shoulders.

“Jesus,” he says, walking into Ferdie's apartment. It takes everything I have to not apologize, start tidying up, and/or make excuses for Ferdie.

“I know,” I say, just letting it sit.

“Okay, the car is double-parked downstairs. Did you talk to your folks?” Michael asks, stepping over various empties and pizza boxes to where Ferdie is.

“Yeah, Dad said he would wire the money,” I say.

“Really?”

“It wasn't pretty,” I say.

“What you need, son, is to cut that hair o' yours!” Michael says in an exact Richard Wyatt impression. He stands straight up at attention. “I don't know how you two stood it.” Michael takes the bongs, the pipes, the pot, and the cocaine and bags them up. “Everything illegal we should get rid of just in case Ferdie doesn't come back here.” Always the lawyer.

“Where would he go?”

“If he's lucky he'll go to a sober living house after he spends six months at Recovery House,” Michael says.

“Hey, man. What are you doing here?” Ferdie asks, his head bobbing and his eyes blinking open.

“I got the car downstairs; you want to go for a drive?” Michael asks.

“He's not a dog, Mic—”

“Yeah, sure, man. Sounds like fun,” Ferdie says, getting up out of that stupid, old chair. He sways and after a few tries we're down the stairs and heading out of the city and into Virginia in rush-hour traffic.

Ferdie is in the backseat, his arm extended over Michael's baby seat. He finds a plastic bag of Goldfish crackers and starts eating those.

“I got the Lumineux campaign,” I say to Michael.

“You did?”

“Yeah. This morning,” I say.

“Oh, wow. That's so huge. Congratulations,” Michael says.

“What about the guy you met in Phoenix? The one who likes your Batman?” Ferdie asks, leaning forward through the two front seats like he used to do when Michael and I were teenagers.

“The one who likes your Batman?” Michael repeats.

“She attacked him in an elevator,” Ferdie says, digging his hand between the baby seat cushions for more crackers. He finds plenty and, of course, he eats them.

“Lincoln Mallory,” I say.

“That is not a real name,” Michael says.

“It is. And he's British,” I say. Ferdie's crunching fills the car.

“I know it's been a while for you, but making up an imaginary—” Michael says, laughing.

“No. He was real.” And I sigh.

“You just swooned.”

“I did not.”

“This is bad. You haven't swooned since . . . who was that boy? With the swoopy black hair—he swam, right? Oh, you loooooved him.”

“His name was Cam and he was my betrothed secret lover.”

“You never said one word to that boy.” Michael laughs.

“I know. Not one.”

“No, wait. You did actually,” Michael says.

“Don't. Don't say it,” I say.

“Shanks,” Michael says.

“It was half sure, half thanks.” My head falls into my hands. “Morrrrtified.”

“So, this Lincoln Mallory,” Michael urges.

“I invited him to my birthday dinner,” I say. Michael finally gets off the highway. I'm thankful that we've passed the time laughing and talking. I don't know how this is going to go once we get there.

“Like a year from now birthday dinner?” Ferdie asks.

“Yeah,” I say.

“I don't get it,” Michael says, making turns on one lush Virginian street after another.

“I'm not ready for . . . I have other things to clean up
before . . . you know,” I say, motioning back to Ferdie. Michael nods.