A Broken Kind of Life (10 page)

The cemetery was silent, almost eerily so, considering it was a nice summer Saturday afternoon. The only sound to be heard was that of a mower in the distance. Grass seemed to stretch on for miles around him, but for all its airy solitude, the place made him feel claustrophobic—almost as if there should be a grave there for him, like his grave was calling for him. He should be buried there, right alongside Juliette under the granite eyes of God’s chosen messenger. Sometimes it felt like he
had
joined her, suffocating, trapped inside his own head.

Balling his hands into fists, he forced himself to take slow, measured steps toward the grave, his breaths coming in quick, sharp pants. Goddamn it, he couldn’t go to pieces. He wanted to do it, needed to do it, needed to see what he could get out of this physical reminder of his own fleeting mortality—maybe it would make him want to live again. Being careful not to step on the graves of other poor dead children, he followed the dates of death marked on the headstones, year by year, until he saw her name.

JULIETTE ANNE MARTIN

AUGUST 14, 1991—OCTOBER 9, 2008

BELOVED DAUGHTER

There were no bears or blocks or even angels, as he had seen on the other headstones while he had looked for hers. It was dark gray, marble, and very elegant. His legs buckled when he realized that his friend, his Juliette, lay dead at his feet, and he landed hard on the soft earth next to her. The forgotten flowers fell to the ground, and dry heaves racked his body. He wouldn’t cry; he knew that. He’d been unable to cry since that night. Just as he couldn’t stand to be touched, he was also not allowed the small measure of relief crying would have afforded him.

It took a long time for him to finally get himself together. Remembering the flowers, he moved them to the grass just below the marble marker he could no longer bring himself to look at. Aaron considered just standing up and going back to the car, having done what he came here to do unassisted. Glancing over his shoulder, Aaron noticed he couldn’t see his mother’s car from there, and he wondered if she was starting to worry.

“J-Juliette, it’s… it’s Aaron,” he whispered, feeling fairly stupid for addressing the flowers and a patch of freshly mown grass. Running his fingers gently along the prickly surface of the short green lawn, he felt a mild breeze pick up and caress his face. He wondered in that moment if maybe she could hear him but shook the thought off as a silly superstition. Nevertheless, he continued to whisper to his friend.

“It’s been so hard, Juliette. The way everyone treats me, like I’m a bomb just waiting to go off,” Aaron said, his voice trembling as he knelt on the cool, damp grass. “The memories, the flashbacks. I don’t know how much longer I can keep doing this. The doctors don’t help. The pills don’t help. As selfish as it sounds, I wish you were here, Juliette. God, I feel so alone, so scared all the time. I don’t know if you would have wanted to live, just like I don’t know if I do, but it would be so much easier to have someone that understood.” His chest ached as he continued to caress the grass with his outstretched hand, talking to the ghost of his lost friend. He had no idea if she could hear him, if anyone could hear him. Talking about it just made it all worse. The self-hatred he felt, the feelings he tried to keep contained, burned like acid on his tongue as he spoke about them.

Summoning all the strength he had left, he forced down the self-loathing and the thoughts of suicide, back into the place where he kept them locked away. Those were things he couldn’t let his mother see; she had so much else to worry about. So, after baring as much of his soul as he could stand to this empty patch of grass, he was finally ready to leave. Standing slowly, he brushed the grass off his knees, feeling suddenly guilty for the new stains it had left on his jeans. Aaron looked around slowly, noticing the sounds of the mower were now gone, and bent to straighten the flowers on Juliette’s grave.

“Happy birthday, Juliette,” he said quietly and then turned to go.

A
S
S
PENCER
flipped through the first few chapters of his new programming book, he sighed. He’d learned most of the stuff in high school and had figured the rest out on his own. More than anything, he needed a challenge, something to keep his mind off the other stuff going on in his life. While he was excited about starting college, his father’s drinking worried him. Dad was the only person in his life he could really count on. At eighteen, he couldn’t carry the weight of college and his father’s worsening alcoholism. It had gotten better for a while, until one of his Dad’s partners became involved in a lawsuit that wrecked their entire psychiatric practice. Rather than putting up a new shingle, he’d retired at forty-five to explore his other options. The only other option he’d found was in a bottle.

Spencer’s phone buzzed, so he pulled it out of his pocket. He didn’t have many friends, so more often than not the texts came from his father.

DAD:
I don’t feel like cooking tonight. You want pizza or Chinese?

Spencer had expected the text. His father hadn’t gotten out of bed until about two in the afternoon, and even then he looked like hell. He thought about offering to cook but didn’t feel much like it either. That kid at the college had scared the crap out of him. One minute, he was tapping the guy on the shoulder, the next he was watching in horror as the boy freaked out on the ground. Spencer hadn’t meant to scare him like that. He just wanted to find all his classes before Monday. Dealing with the interpreter the school forced on him was bad enough; he didn’t want to get lost and have to ask for directions.

SPENCER:
Chinese

DAD:
Orange chicken or fried rice?

Texting each other from the same house seemed ridiculous to Spencer, so he marked his page in the textbook, got up off the couch, and went in search of his father. The kitchen, spartan in its décor, was empty except for a lonely pitcher of ice tea Spencer had made earlier, which sat on the breakfast bar. The fifty-inch flat panel on the wall of the living room was dark, and the room appeared equally empty. It took him several minutes and a few more rooms, but finally he saw his father in his office. A quiet room lined with books, it was rich with dark wood and supple leather. His father sat on the leather couch that dominated the back wall. The desk, a perfectly crafted, walnut office desk with fancy bronze drawer handles and a black leather blotter, sat unused along the western wall. For all the effort his father put into managing his life the last few months, the desk could have had an inch of dust on it.

“Menu?” Spencer asked, and his father looked up from the book in his hands. He didn’t mind talking in front of his dad, because he’d been doing it all his life. His father, along with Aunt Nelle, had taught him to speak. It took forever, especially since neither of them had any experience dealing with deaf children. But somehow, between the three of them, they managed. That was years ago, however, while he still held his father’s complete focus. As he got older and became more self-sufficient, his father sank deeper into a depression that imploded with his forced retirement.

I think there is a menu on the desk,
his father signed after setting his book on the couch next to him. It showed just how far their relationship had deteriorated in the last few years that they were both sitting in the house reading, in different rooms, with absolutely no communication between them. He walked over to the desk and rummaged through the drawers until he found a file of menus. It reminded him of how organized his father used to be. From the top drawer, he pulled out a pad of paper and pen.

After scanning the menu, he wrote his order on the pad and handed it to his father. Just one more thing his father had to do for him. One day soon, restaurants would start taking advantage of online ordering, and he couldn’t wait. They already used online ordering for their groceries because neither of them wanted the bother of going to the grocery store. After a cursory look through the menu, his father picked up his cell phone from the couch arm and called in their order. While Spencer couldn’t hear what he said, he could read his father’s lips and discern the weary sound of his voice from the way his body sagged on the couch.

They said about twenty minutes,
he signed after tossing the phone back onto the couch. His father looked older than Spencer had ever seen him. Bags hung low beneath his eyes, which had once been bright and full of life. Growing up, his father had always been there for him, looking out for him, teaching him how to negotiate the hearing world, but lately, he watched as his greatest ally slipped farther and farther away.

Did you get everything you need for school? I saw the charge come through for the laptop.

His heart slowed just a bit with the concern in his father’s expression. Maybe he wasn’t as far away as Spencer had imagined.

Yes. I got my books yesterday. I even started reading them,
Spencer answered with a tentative smile. For the first time in his life, he felt unbalanced in their relationship. They’d always been a team before—just the two of them against the world, but all that had changed recently, and Spencer didn’t know how to get it back. His father picked up the discarded book and opened it back to his page.

Their distance weighed on him, heavy and awkward as he stood watching his father read.

“My. College. Career. Started. With. A. Bang. The. Other. Day,” he told his father in a desperate attempt to keep his attention. He’d wanted to talk to him about it when he got home, but his dad had been in no shape for a conversation. They hadn’t really talked in weeks, and Spencer missed their easy way with each other. His friends in high school had fought constantly with their parents, but he and his father rarely argued. Lately, his dad had been locked away in his office or his bedroom while the empties piled up in the garbage.

What do you mean?
His father’s signing was clipped and halfhearted, almost like he couldn’t stand another complication right then.

I tapped a boy on the shoulder to ask him for directions, and he freaked out.
Even just the memory of it bothered Spencer.

Freaked out how? He did not hurt you?
His father’s eyes took a quick inventory of Spencer, who smiled ruefully and dropped into the big leather office chair. Whenever he sat here, in his father’s chair, he felt like a little kid at the adult table.

No, he did not hurt me. He fell down with his hands over his head and begged me not to touch him. It scared me at first, but then I felt sad for him.
The boy’s scarred face haunted him. He couldn’t imagine what had happened to force such a reaction from a simple touch, but he knew what it was like to be afraid and in pain. He knew what it was to be alone.

Sounds like he had a flashback or a reaction to some kind of trauma. What happened to him?
His father sat up straighter on the couch, his interest obviously engaged. As a clinical psychologist, someone having an episode in the middle of the quad would be of interest.

A woman, I think it was his mom, came and helped him. I would not have left him alone. It was really awful. I had no idea what to do. Guess that is why I did not go into psychology,
Spencer reasoned with a shrug. His insides felt like ice as he thought about how scared the boy had looked.

Seeing someone in pain is not something you ever get used to. At least, I never did.

Spencer’s phone vibrated in his pocket. Looking away from his father, he checked the display and saw that someone had rung the doorbell. It didn’t seem like twenty minutes, but Spencer hadn’t checked the time when his father had called. He took the money his father held out and went downstairs to pay the delivery man.

They sat in silence at the dining room table and ate mediocre Chinese food, his father’s attention lost amid soy sauce and fortune cookies.

When he lay in bed later, he stared at the ceiling and tried to find sleep within its textured surface. His nerves were out of control. In high school, he had spent most of his time dodging bullies who loved to slam him into lockers, trip him in the cafeteria, or spit disgusting projectiles at him. His heart thudded in his chest as he wondered if college could be the same, or his career after college. Would he always have to fight so hard just to be like everyone else?

The kid’s face came unbidden once again to his mind, and sleep eluded him.

T
HE
sun hurt Spencer’s eyes when they opened through the crust that glued them closed, just a few hours after he’d finally fallen asleep. A dull pain in the base of his neck warned of an impending headache, and he rolled onto his side with a groan. Searching under his pillow for his phone, placed where the vibrations would eventually wake him, he hit the button to see the time. Monday, ten minutes before the alarm was set to go off. He tossed the phone onto the nightstand, rolled onto his stomach, and buried his face in the pillow. The stretch in his back and arms helped to relieve the tension mounting into a headache, but he knew he’d have to take something once he got out of bed.

His father would still be in bed when he left. It was his first day of college, and his father would miss it to nurse his hangover. The pain crept slowly toward his temples, threatening to block out the sun with its intensity. His stomach lurched with the pain, and he kicked back the blanket. The floor was cold under his feet as he moved quietly into the bathroom. The migraine meds sat in the medicine cabinet as they always did, but he resented having to take them right then. They made him feel slow and sluggish, not the best choice for his first day. Without them, however, the stabbing pain behind his eyes would only get worse.

His throat closed up around the pill even as the water from the tap washed it down. Shutting his eyes against the throbbing in his head, he wet a washrag and pressed the cool cloth to his forehead. The last thing he needed right then was to be incapacitated by a headache. Crawling back into bed, he decided to wait fifteen minutes, until the meds kicked in, before attempting to shower. Spencer reset his alarm and closed his eyes behind the cool press of fabric.
Please, just let it go away.