This Is Where the World Ends(42)

“God,” I blubber into him. “God damn it all, Micah.”

He puts his chin on top of my chin. “What’s wrong?” he asks quietly. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

“No,” I sob. Because what’s the point?

And that’s the thing about Micah. He leaves it at that.





after


DECEMBER 15


Court-mandated alcohol therapy is not the worst sentence for underage drinking. As far as hearings go, mine is easy. They just send me back to Dr. Taser for a few more sessions.

Dr. Taser says that now that I have started to remember, I can start to heal too. This is bullshit, because this is not the first time I’ve pushed crap completely out of my mind.

“My father picked my first name for his father and my mom picked my middle name for her favorite month,” I told her last time I was here. “She died when I was three years old, and I don’t remember her at all. I should, but I don’t. You’re supposed to start remembering shit when you’re, what, two?”

“Language, Micah,” Dr. Taser said gently.

“Yeah, sorry. So my mom died in this car accident. There had been, like, an ice storm the day before or something, and she wanted to check on my grandparents, and she was going to spend the day there, right? And my dad was having this affair with some lady who lived in the neighborhood. She used to make us lemon bars. These, like, really fantastic lemon bars, right? So while my mom was dying, he was having sex with some lady down the street and I was with my babysitter, who also lived down the street. And when they called him from the hospital, he didn’t answer because his phone was downstairs and he was upstairs having sex—yeah, okay, you get it. So he finishes what I hope was damn good sex, it better have been f*cking worth it—”

“Micah—”

“—and hears that his wife is dead, and he never gets over it. He picks us up and moves us to Waldo. And he tells me all of this in, like, third grade. A confession or whatever, like that’ll fix his shit, and I just . . . I don’t know. The next day, I forgot about it. And he kept telling me and telling me and I kept forgetting. I don’t remember when I finally started remembering what really happened to him and Mom. I stopped talking to him when I did, though. It’s not like I had that much to say to him before, anyway. But f*ck, I know I should care, but I don’t. So, yeah, that’s me. Oh, and I feel fine now. This therapy is really helping.”

Today is the last time I have to be here. I have paid the money I owe the government for harming my body with more than fourteen drinks per week, I have gone to the therapy sessions, I have nodded and agreed to be responsible from now on. I go to Dr. Taser’s office, where she is already waiting with her iPad.

“Can I get you anything?” she asks me. “Water? Coffee?”

“The hell out of here,” I say, and smile as if I were joking. I’m unconvincing and she’s not convinced, but what the hell. We both keep smiling.

“Sorry,” I say. “Tons of strain.”

Dr. Taser nods sympathetically. “Do you feel more like talking about Janie today? Maybe we can try a happy memory again?”

I look up. Her eyes are dark, her head is cocked, her posture as welcoming as posture can be. I ask her, “You ever dissect a sheep heart?”

She looks startled, but I plow on. “I haven’t either. We were supposed to for Anatomy and Physiology, but—well. It doesn’t matter, I never wanted to. I took the class because Janie was taking it. Anyway, I did the dissection online today, and there was this picture of a human heart without fat or muscle in the introduction to the lab. It was just the veins.”

“And you wish Janie could have seen it?” asks Dr. Taser, typing away on her iPad.

“She already saw it,” I say, and both Dr. Taser and Janie frown at me. “She saw it in seventh grade at Lorraine Bay National Park.”

I told her about us, about that day. Ander Cameron’s mom had been our chaperone. She had been a decent person. She brought us cookies. Not sure what happened to Ander. Anyway, we collected rock samples and dirt samples and identified plants and shit, and then we had lunch on this big hill. Janie had Lunchables, the nacho kind that came with a candy bar for dessert. I remember because I was jealous. My dad packed me a hot ham sandwich that wasn’t supposed to be hot. Afterward, everyone started rolling down the hill. Dewey dragged me into it, but it actually really hurt—it wasn’t, like, some groomed country club hill. There were trees. There were branches sticking up and bugs under rotting leaves and poison ivy. So eventually Dewey ditched me, which he always seemed to do, and I sat at the top of the hill and looked up.

“What are you doing?”

I jumped when Janie plopped down next to me, and then I looked around. “No one’s paying attention,” Janie said by way of explanation. “They’re too busy rubbing themselves in poison ivy. I hope Robbie gets it on his dick.”

She and Robbie had just broken up. God, I just remember looking over at her, looking and wondering how she did it, how she was so damn comfortable. We’d just watched the sex video thing the week before, and Mr. Endero made us say penis three times without laughing to get into the room. I told Janie about it later, and she looked at me straight in the eye and said, “Penis. Penis. Penis. Grow up, Micah.”