The Mourning After (31 page)

“Chloe,” he calls out, “it’s time.”

His sister comes bouncing into the kitchen, the TiVo remote in one hand. Ordinary day.  Ordinary treatment.  Levon imagines the drink that Chloe grabs rather hastily will taste like crap, yet she never winces.  She finishes it and heads to the family room to zap the twin boys on the screen back to life.

The backpack beckons him again.  He sits at the glass table and rubs his temples. He hears the sharp voices coming from the TV.  The beating of his heart is pronounced as he fantasizes about destroying the letter.  Finally, he reaches down toward his black bag and finds his journal.  He writes:

I can’t do this anymore.

Then, he writes it again and again and again and again—pages of denial and forgiveness as he succumbs to defeat, begs for mercy.

The clock says four o’clock.  He has been sitting at the table, staring at the same sentence for almost an hour.  Homework.  He takes out his math assignment and the numbers jumble his brain, so he tosses the book aside and returns to the journal.

Miguel Lopez has a secret.
  (His characters are often Spanish because he feels in Miami his potential for commercial success improves with multicultural appeal.)
Miguel is in love. 
He crosses that out and begins again. 
Miguel Lopez is hiding the truth.

Miguel is an asshole.

The story needs some work.  He knows that.  Though words have always come easily to him, right now he is stuck.

Dr. Lerner told him the healing process would take time. She said that he might never get over losing his brother, only the good minutes would occur more frequently than the bad.  What was most important, she said, was that he was kind to himself, allowing himself to grieve.  He flips back the pages to when he last saw Dr. Lerner and reads over his entry.

It was about doctor-patient confidentiality.  She said he could tell her anything,
anything
(she repeated it twice), and his face reddened, knowing she was reading the pages inside of his thoughts.  It was implausible that she knew, though when a trained psychologist had her hypersensitive antenna fixed on him, he suspected she was like a mindreader.  He told her about the “panic attacks” thinking Lucy made up the diagnoses, but she was right.  Dr. Lerner had this checklist of symptoms, and Levon had every single one of them.  She said, “For some people, anxiety presents when our unconscious pushes through.  The repression of sad or angry feelings emerge and the anxiety symptoms, similar to the fight or flight response, protect you from those intense emotions.” Levon didn’t understand at first.  It was too clinical.  Then she explained it to him in terms that appealed to the psychologically-challenged: when true feelings that are too hard to cope with want to come out—ones that are deeply rooted in our unconscious—they often present in the form of anxiety.  Then she added, “Is there something you want to tell me?

Two hours pass before Levon looks up from his homework and hears his mother’s wail coming from the other room; she’s shrieking that he should call 911.  He is almost sure the backpack has exploded, and she is choking on its sharp, bitter pieces.

“Levon,” she screams again wildly.

Levon jumps from his seat at the table, grabs the cordless phone from off its cradle and dials the foreboding number.  He follows his mother’s cries to the frenzied spot on the dark, wooden floor where Chloe lays unconscious in the throes of a seizure.

“What happened?  Did you give her the feeding?” she asks.

Levon does not answer because he is frantically giving their address to the placid, yet commanding voice on the other end of the line.  Chloe’s body is violently shaking; a river of wet stains the front of her jeans.  Madeline turns her onto her side so she will not clamp down on her tongue.  She is leaning over Chloe, holding her head in place, while her daughter’s eyes fall back into her forehead.

Levon races into the kitchen and trips over the backpack, the source of his distraction.

The measuring cup he left on the marble countertop remains where he left it, along with the box of cornstarch.

He gave her the wrong amount. 

Acting on adrenaline and impulse, he finds Chloe’s nighttime feeding apparatus and fills it with glucose.  Levon is focused and in charge.  He knows exactly what to do with the concentrated sugar water that his parents have marked in a cabinet for emergencies.  The lack of cornstarch caused Chloe’s blood sugar to drop.  He knows he cannot give her more cornstarch because it would take too long to digest.  He has to get some glucose in her.  Fast.  The feeding tube is the only way.

With the life-saving device in his hand, Levon heads toward his baby sister and his panic-stricken mother.  She is patting Chloe on the head, kissing her, stroking her forehead.  Her hair is damp and clumped, matted to the sides of her freckled face. He waits for his mother to accuse and point fingers, but she does not.

The device connects to Chloe’s feeding tube, and within five minutes, Chloe stops flapping against the floor.  Her eyes become focused and clear.  The sirens are heard outside, and a moment later, EMT paramedics race through the door, Lucy by their side.

Chloe is awake, alert, and asking why everybody is staring at her.

The paramedics are brought up to speed on her condition, while they are poking and prodding her tiny body.  She has awoken from an extraordinary slumber and finds herself in the starring role of a medical drama.  Levon’s mother is quiet, still.

“How is she?” Madeline asks the blonde-haired young man working on her daughter.

“She’ll be fine.  You saved her life.”

The other paramedic, a man with a long, gray ponytail and a fair amount of facial hair adds, “Her vitals are good.  She’s stabilizing.”

Madeline looks at Levon.

He says, “That’s never happened before.  Never.”

She doesn’t yell.  Actually, she doesn’t even speak. 

The paramedics pack up their things and head for the door.  As they walk out, Craig Keller walks in.  He is shaky, but they assure him that everything is fine.  Chloe is resting comfortably on the couch.  She is thirsty.  Levon heads for the kitchen and a bottle of water.  He eyes the backpack and believes it is a curse.  When he returns, Chloe is already sound asleep.  His mother is on the phone consulting with Dr. Gerald.

They gather around the kitchen in silence. 

Lucy is dressed in her yoga outfit, white flowing pants with a matching white tank top.  Her hair is pulled back in a ponytail.  She is flushed from Mano’s supernatural hands, and the thought leaves Levon seething a little inside. 

Madeline cannot acknowledge to herself that her son has just saved her daughter’s life.  She is in a knot of confusion.

Craig Keller asks, “How did this happen?”

Levon is looking down at the floor and at the bag that contains one of the secrets that has him tangled up inside.  “I don’t know.  I used the measuring cup, the one that’s always on the shelf with the cornstarch. I didn’t notice it wasn’t the right one.”

His father speaks up, “It’s possible someone accidentally switched the cups.  Thank God you knew exactly what to do.”

Thoughts and words and compulsions are filling Levon’s head.  Lucy is there beside him.  The daggers in his mother’s eyes have returned.  He feels the heaviness in his chest, the air that is trying to escape.  He is leaving his body.  He is close to panic.  He tries to identify the source, the “repressed feelings that are fighting to get through,” but they are moving too quickly for him to decipher.

Lucy breaks the silence.  “It’s time, Levon,” she says, pressing her hand on his shoulder.

Levon listens to her words and considers the many interpretations of time.  Is it time for another panic attack?  Is it time for Chloe’s feeding?  Is it time to face the truth?

Levon cannot breathe.  He is gasping for air, convinced again that he is about to die even though Dr. Lerner reassured him that no one has ever died from a panic attack.  Lucy is the only one who notices the physical changes in him.

“Tell her, Levon,” she demands.

“Tell me what?”

“The truth.”

“Levon, what is she talking about?”

“Enough, Lucy.”  He is sure he is going to faint.  The paramedics are probably still near the neighborhood.  It won’t take them long to carry him out of the kitchen and into the safety of their ambulance.

“I love you, Levon; I can’t watch you do this anymore.”

Her eyes are glazed over with a compassion that halts the symptoms of panic. “You love me?” he asks.

“Oh geez,” she says, “don’t lose focus here.  Tell them the truth about that night.”

Madeline looks to her husband and asks, “What is she talking about?”

Lucy reaches into her bag and pulls out the stack of papers.

12:18 a.m.

“Levon,” David repeats, his words are faint, interspersed with gasps, “there’s something you need to know.” 

Levon turns toward his brother who is trying unsuccessfully to unfasten his seatbelt.  “I gotta get out of here.”

Levon says, “Don’t move.  We have to wait for someone to come.”

“I can’t,” he says, raising his voice in agitation.  “Listen, bro, I’m fucked.  If they find me here, I could go to jail.”

A sharp pain pierces Levon’s right side.  He hopes he is not about to die from internal bleeding.  “What do you mean?” he asks, each word searing his stomach.

“Oh man,” David, cries out.  This time his voice is riddled in panic, and Levon cannot tell if he is wincing because of pain or fear.

“I have drugs in me.  Jesus Christ, I snorted fucking coke with that bitch Shelly.”  Now he is crying.  “There’s been so much shit with Becks, and Shel said it would take the edge off.”  He is trembling.  His body is shaking wildly.  “Fuck, it made me feel like crap.  That’s why I needed you to come get me.  No one at the party wanted to leave, and Becks was pissed at me.  Bro, I’ve never taken a drug before.  Never.  And now they’re going to test my blood since I was driving.  I’m going to get busted by the cops.  Shit, what have I done?”

Levon listens as his brother’s sentences run into each other.  Fear is flooding out of his every pore.  When he saw David walking toward the car from the party, he had thought he looked like shit.  When he insisted on driving them home, David refused.  “You’ve already done enough tonight.  I’ll drive so you don’t get in any more trouble.” 

The pain in Levon’s side is mounting.  What feels like water dripping down the front of his face is something else.  He touches the liquid, and the red stains his fingertips.

Levon thinks of only one thing for them to do.

“Switch places with me.”

“What?”

“Switch places with me,” he says again with more insistence.  “I’ll take the rap.”

“Levon, no way,” he grunts.  “Mom’ll ground you for life.  You could go to jail.”

Levon is pulling himself up and out of the seat.  It is dark, and he cannot see what’s around him. He feels sharp metal, pieces of the cushion, the airbag thrusting into him, against his cheek. His entire body aches.  He is certain something inside of him is broken. 

The ground swallows him up as Levon realizes the car has been cut into two pieces.  He reaches for his brother and feels for him in the dark.  That is when he sees the blood.  It is everywhere. “David?”

No answer.

“David, we’re gonna take care of this.  I promise.”

A moan escapes David, a whisper. “No.”  The hysteria has been replaced with a quiet stillness.

Levon tugs at his brother and says, “Come on, help me move you to the other side.” For an instant, David pulls himself up and allows his brother to help him.  Together, they reposition the older boy to the passenger side.  David falls into the seat that has been carved out by his brother’s body and rests against the window.  For Levon, it is extremely difficult to fit behind the wheel and the airbag left by David’s narrow frame.  He throws himself into the seat; it is cramped and he can barely breathe.  He has been so caught up in his head that he hardly notices the music drifting from the radio.

“Listen to the music,” he tells his brother. “Help will be here soon.”

Levon’s breathing steadies.  He rests his head on the seat and closes his eyes.  He is going to be the hero.  He is going to save David.  Who would care if his future is compromised along the way?  It would be worth it to see the gratitude in his brother’s eyes.  David will be thanking him tomorrow.

As they switched places, it never occurred to either boy that David would die.

I’m not mad at Lucy for what she did. I gave her the pages from my journal so she would do exactly what she did, even though I didn’t realize it at the time. 

When she handed my mother what I wrote, I took the backpack with the letter from Brown, grabbed my wallet, and ran out the door.  It was freezing, and I didn’t have a jacket.  I ran up La Gorce for what felt like eighty frigid miles and when I hit Forty-First Street, I flagged down a cab.  A cab.  Sid and Lyd would say how Manhattan I’d become.  I knew exactly where I was headed.  I needed to see him.  I needed to talk with him.  The whole ride in the smelly cab I was thinking of him and whether he knew I’d ratted him out.  I thought when I got there I could explain what it’s been like for me, and he would understand.

The cemetery had changed since we were last there, or maybe it was me who changed.  It was getting dark, but I wasn’t afraid.  There was something peaceful about the trees and the flowers.  I found his plaque and rested my hand across his name.  I gave him the acceptance letter by placing it across the dates under his name.  It was so cold, though I hardly noticed.  He was close by, and I could feel him warming me up, not just on the outside, on the inside too.  That I wasn’t shivering when the cold wind whipped through my hair and ears was the sign I needed, the signal that he was okay with it all.

I didn’t hear the car or her footsteps.  She just seemed to appear there, kneeling beside me, my mom.  She was bundled in a bulky coat.  It was hard to find her face, though there was no mistaking her eyes.  They had been crying.  With her eyes wet, she was the beautiful, strong woman I once knew.  We didn’t talk much.  We didn’t have to.  We just sort of huddled close together and felt the fierce ache of missing David together.