You'd Be Home Now (35)

“The only thing I’ve ever been good at is letting people down, Emmy. My whole life, I just wanted to feel better. Forget about what a loser I was. And then I found a way to do that.”

He lifts his head and jams the key in the ignition. “And to tell you the truth, if we hadn’t been in that car accident, if Candy hadn’t died, I’d be trying to feel better right this fucking minute. You don’t know what it’s like to feel like you never fit.”

“But I do, Joey, I do.”

He shakes his head and wipes his eyes.

“Not like me, Emmy. Not like me.”

    He starts the car, turns on the radio, loud, and peels out of the parking lot.



* * *



—

At home, we do our homework while eating bowls of lukewarm spaghetti. My mom gave us dinner, scrolled her way through Joey’s phone to check his texts and searches, and then went upstairs to her room.

Joey works slowly on math, moving his lips. He writes something down, erases it, checks his calculator, redoes it. Over and over. But he doesn’t give up. He doesn’t ask for my help. Last year, I did just enough for him to get Cs, to maintain, so no one would notice.

I look down at my own homework, check the assignment on the student portal, read about ancient skulls found in Africa, human migration. People have always moved, to find better places, better ways to live. Searching for something. Safety. Food. Love. Survival. It’s amazing to think that part of a person could be found, millions of years later. A skull wedged in the crack of a cave. A bone found buried deep in the earth. And then we try to figure out how they got to just that one place. But in the end, that fragment of bone or skull can only tell us how they lived, but not if they were happy.

When I look up, Joey’s gone, his things cleared away. No evidence remains.





17


JOEY FOLDS AND REFOLDS the orange Hank’s Hoagies T-shirt in his lap. My mother is giving him the Look.

“You start next Saturday,” she says, sipping her tea. “Hank was quite nice. I ran into him in the mayor’s office. He was making a lunch delivery. Lovely man.”

“I just feel like it’s too soon,” Joey says hesitantly. “I mean, I just started back at school and I have outpatient and stuff.”

“Yeah, Mom, he’s only been back at school for two weeks. That’s…too much,” I say.

My mother swivels her head to me. “He signed a contract, Emory. He needs to focus. He doesn’t need free time.”

I drop my head back to the book in my lap. What did the Blue Spruce handbook say? It’s important for some patients in recovery to keep a tight schedule, to know where and when and what they will be doing. Others may need more breathing room and respite. Recovery is not one size fits all, but it is always one step at a time. The thing is, Joey just got back, and I’m not sure which of these he should do. Fill his days with school and then stuff white bread full of oily deli meats? Or stick to homework and free time, where he can think about getting healthy? It just seems like my mother is throwing all possible Joeys at him at once. It’s making even me anxious.

“I’m going to make sandwiches?” Joey says. A flurry of red is creeping up his neck. I feel sorry that he doesn’t have his long hair to cover it anymore.

    “Yes. And run the counter. All those things.” My mother waves her fingers. “It will give you a sense of pride. Everyone needs a first job. I worked in the library during college. I loved it.”

Joey’s jaw is clenched. I brace myself for his anger, for a fight, but then he just lets out a big sigh, so much air it ripples the leafy arugula on his plate.

“Okay,” he says finally.

Okayokayokayokayokay.

“Excellent,” my mother says, picking a radish from her plate and crunching it. “Emory can go with you sometimes, if you have to close, perhaps. She can study at a table. Hank was fine with that.”

I raise my eyes. “I don’t want to hang out at a hoagie shop.”

What I’m really thinking is, I need to be here, in case Gage texts. Because he’s my thing. He’s my own personal recovery from the hell of last year and this past summer.

My mother says, “You do need more study time, Emory. Your grades wobbled last year.”

“Well, what about Drama Club? I have to do that now. What if I have, like, a performance? And I know at some point we’ll have rehearsals and all that stuff.” My voice is getting testy, surprising even me.

My mom frowns. “We can cross that bridge when we come to it, Emory, but right now, this is the best solution. Don’t you want to help your brother?”

“Mom, she doesn’t have to—”

I think of the woman at the outpatient clinic. The nine times she said her daughter has tried to recover. I don’t want that to be Joey. I don’t. If I can just help him get to a good place, then maybe the Rules can relax a little, and I can ease out of hanging out at Hank’s Hoagies.

    “No,” I say. “Fine. It’s fine.”

Finefinefinefine. Joey and I are finefinefinefine and okayokayokayokay.



* * *



—

I hold Candy’s hand. It’s warm in mine. I want to tell her that her fingers are squeezing me too tightly, but I don’t. The music is so loud it’s hard to concentrate. My second beer didn’t taste as good as the first, but I finished it, anyway, and now I feel woozy. I wish I had it now, because my mouth is so dry. Joey hasn’t answered any of my texts. We go upstairs and look in the kitchen. We look in the pantry, in the backyard, we look in the bathroom, where we find Luther Leonard with two girls. Hey you Emmy baby, he says. The girls are drunk. Who’s your friend? Candy keeps her eyes down. No one at school likes Luther, except Joey. I tell Luther we need to go, we need to find Joey because I need the car keys, can he help us find Joey? Yeah, sure, whatever, he says, but he’s not gonna be able to drive you. He laughs. A long time ago Luther had a sweet laugh and liked to play Angry Birds but he’s not like that anymore. His laugh is thinner now, edgier, and he and Joey don’t play games anymore. They stay in the attic or lope out of the house with their hoods up, disappearing off the porch and into the night. We go down a long, dark hall, kids kiss each other against walls. A girl is throwing up. In a room at the end of the hall, a Lava Lamp drips drips drips and Joey is on the bed with a girl, lying down, eyes closed. Luther grabs his sneakered feet, shakes them, Joey’s eyes flutter open like bird’s wings. Leave me, he mumbles. Leave me. Luther says Nah man time to go angel let’s get up baby boy and for such a skinny kid he pulls Joey off the bed in one go, Joey falling against his shoulders. Keys brother I need the keys baby and Joey can’t get the keys out of his pocket his hand keeps missing so I let go of Candy and dig in and the keys are warm from his body heat and Luther hoists him against his shoulder and Candy grabs my hand again. We walk down the hall, Joey stumbling. He almost falls down the front steps and Luther says Where is the car and it’s over there, over there and Candy says I lost my phone and Luther says Get it later, girl. We have to dump Joey in the back and Luther laughs when he realizes the seat belt is broken. Joey mumbles Oh it’s like the ocean and I say Is he drunk and Luther says Oh honey just don’t worry and I ask Luther Are you drunk and he says Never touch the stuff, Em and I ask Luther Are you high and he says, No way babe I don’t touch the stuff anymore I’ve moved on to entrepreneurial interests and Candy says What? I say I had two beers and Luther says Not to worry, I’ll drive and he says, Buckle up, sis, to Candy and when he starts the car I can see her eyes in the rearview mirror Luther doesn’t put on his seat belt and Candy’s eyes are wide and she whispers I’m scared I’m scared don’t kill me