ALL THE RAGE (writer: T.M. Frazier)(3)

Cody kind of had a point, but I didn’t bother to remind him that he was the only one besides my parents that I would have that reaction for. Out of all the people in the world, did caring about only three of them even count?

The week before, an older neighbor had fallen on his bike in front of our house. I watched in fascination from the living room window as he struggled with his obviously broken leg until a car came by and stopped to help.

It never even occurred to me to help. Not once.

It was that thought, the idea that I was broken, that sent the heat of rage soaring through my spine, and it was that anger that caused me to send the entire contents of my mom’s china cabinet crashing to the floor.

“You’ve got to remember that you’re different, not broken. We just gotta fix you up a bit. Make it so that others don’t see all the different inside you.” He winked at me, something he’s been doing a lot over the last few months. Whenever I tried to wink back, I just blinked a bunch of times and wound up looking like a genie ’cause I couldn’t close one eye at a time.

Cody walked over to the TV and started untangling two controllers for his gaming system. “It’s a start, though, right? We’re getting somewhere. You care about me, so what the doctor said isn’t true. I’d say that’s enough headway for today.”

“Sure is,” I agreed, sitting down Indian style on the floor in front of the couch.

“You can’t worry so much about what’s normal and what’s not,” Cody said. I wished it were that simple, but my parents were hell bent on fixing me. Some days I felt more like an experiment in a petri dish than their kid.

I knew I wasn’t normal without a single person having to tell me. My parents didn’t need to spend a single dollar for a professional to tell them something so obvious. “But my parents worry about me. That’s why they’ve taken me to every head shrinker from here to Georgia to try and figure me out.”

“But they’ve only taken you to them because of your anger thing, right?” Cody asked. “I mean the other stuff. The always worrying that you’re sick, the germ thing, the never sleeping, that’s not the thing that gets them calling the doctors, right? It’s just when you get really mad.” I nodded, knowing full well it was my rage and what I did when I had an “episode” that kept them up most nights.

Cody finished untangling the controllers and handed me one. He powered on the gaming console and the little TV sprang to life in bright, animated colors. “Then I think the answer is simple.”

“It is?” I asked. “What answer?”

Cody’s gaze was fixed firmly on the little green character on the screen, his tongue hanging out the side of his mouth while he concentrated. His elbows inches away from my face as he dramatically maneuvered his controller around in the air. “Uh huh. We just gotta teach you how to fake it.”

“Fake it?” I asked. “Fake what?”

“All of it. The emotion stuff. First, when you need to unleash the fury, when you feel like you’re choking in your own anger, we’ll figure out something for you to do to let it all out, but not around your parents. Whatever you do, just don’t let them see it. What they don’t know, won’t hurt them.”

That might work.

What Cody was suggesting sounded hard, but maybe it wasn’t completely impossible.

“Okay Doctor Delacroix, what about the other stuff?” I asked, interested to see what else he had in mind.

Cody’s character jumped up into the air and clutched his throat as he died. The game played a sad couple of notes as it sank to the bottom of the screen. My pink character came to life on screen, replacing his.

I didn’t feel much like playing anymore. I set my controller down on the floor and turned to face Cody who did the same. “The indifferent stuff.”

“You can fake that too,” Cody said, sounding a lot surer of himself than I was.

“How?” I asked.

“I’ll teach you,” Cody said, grabbing my hands in his. “When a dog dies in a movie, you are supposed to be sad so you make this face.” Cody frowned dramatically, which only made me giggle. “Or when the hero saves the princess at the end, you are supposed to be happy, so you make this face.” Cody smiled and batted his eyelashes like he was a princess being rescued.

“You’re being stupid,” I said, playfully punching him in the shoulder. The best medicine none of those doctors could ever prescribe was Cody.

“Yeah, I am,” he admitted. “But I’m being serious too. I’ll teach you how to fake it. We can do this.” His grip tightened around my wrists. My eyes snapped up to meet his. His smile straightened into a serious line. “We’ll keep a list of all the things that could help and we’ll cross them off if they don’t. We’ll carry it around always and every time you’re confused about something, all you have to do is read the list.” Cody really was serious. “We’ll do this together,” he promised. “Always.”

“Together,” I repeated, although with only a small fraction of his confidence.

“Good. I’m glad that’s settled.” Cody snatched up my controller and started clicking away on the buttons with his thumbs.

“But what about…?” I started to ask, the half question coming out as a whisper.