Bear, Otter, & the Kid 03 - The Art of Breathing (37 page)

Not bad, huh? Yeah, try living with him continuously and see if it’s still amusing.

“You bet your ass you’re not going to California!” he finally explodes. “I’m not going to let you get raped by psycho cannibals!” Bingo. “And I swear to God, you better not think you’re ready for this jelly, because I will make sure your milkshake brings
no one to the yard
.”

Dammit. So close. Even I don’t know how he got to that one. I must be slipping with my Bearology. I used to have his neurosis down to the smallest detail. Which makes me very, very sad.

“We’re not going to get raped and murdered,” I say.

“And even if we did,” Corey says, “using the laws of averages and Horror Movie Trivia, at least one of us would need to survive so we could come back for the sequel.” He shakes his head sadly. “It probably won’t be me. I’m not white.”

“I would feel really sad if it was you,” I say, lying through my teeth.

“I somehow doubt that,” he replies, that smirk back on his face.

“No raping!” Bear shouts.

“They’re not going to get raped,” Otter says, trying to soothe Bear. “Tyson isn’t stupid enough to go into an abandoned meat-packing plant in the middle of nowhere.” Good to know he came to the same conclusion I did.

“Well,” I say, “I
probably
wouldn’t. But if it looks like it’s still in operation, all bets are off. Do you know how many of our animal friends are monstrously torn apart every—”

“Kid, you’re not helping your cause,” Creed says. “I’d shut your trap.”

He’s probably right. Bear looks like he’s ready to lock me up in my room, never to release me from my tower.

“I
am
twenty years old,” I remind them. “Legally, I can go wherever I choose.”

“Probably not the best argument,” Otter says, “however true. Especially since you’d be using our car.”

“I’ll just rent a car!”

“You’re not twenty-five,” Anna says.

“And you have, like, four dollars,” Corey reminds me.

“I am going to be trapped with all of you for the rest of my life,” I groan, and for some reason, this causes almost everyone to smile stupidly.

“We’ll go through Idaho,” Corey offers. “Then down through Nevada. Avoid the whole ‘cannibal Californian’ thing all together.”

“No,” Bear says quietly. “Stay out of Idaho.” He glances at me, and we both know why. That’s where
she
lives. Or at least, that’s where she was living the last time we heard from her. It’s not like there’s any chance I’ll accidentally run into her, but with all the things that have happened to our family, I wouldn’t dismiss it completely. We tend to get the brunt of the bullshit all at once. It’s kind of our thing.

“One of us could just go with them,” Creed says.

Who do these people think they are? “Now wait just a goddamn minute—” I start to say.

“That’s perfect!” Corey says, overriding me. “Dominic! Weren’t we just talking about how you have some time off coming to you?”

“You asked me that, yes,” Dom says slowly, and I can almost appreciate the diabolical trap Corey has intricately spread out all around us. I can do nothing as I watch him tighten the noose. “Randomly. Out of the blue.”

Corey claps his hands together. “Well, then,
Dominic
can go with us to Tucson! We’ll be gone, what… a week at the most? Two days there, three days to hang out in Tucson, and then two days back with just Dominic and Tyson. Alone. By themselves. Surely you could ask for the time off, couldn’t you, Dominic? And, Bear, wouldn’t that make you feel so much better about the trip knowing a rather large police officer was escorting our young, impressionable, and obviously easily murdered by psycho cannibals selves through the wilds of California?”

The more he speaks, the more his death at my hands becomes an inevitability. That asshole knows
exactly
what he’s doing. This whole thing should be over and done and never discussed again, and I would have gotten away with it, too, if it hadn’t been for that meddling homo.

And since the (loaded) question is directed toward me, naturally everyone turns to look at me. Otter looks worried. Judas (Creed) looks like he thinks this is the funniest thing to ever have happened anywhere and can barely contain himself. Anna is scolding JJ across the room with her eyes only (in that weird way that only parents can do) as JJ prepares to massacre a bunch of balloons with a fork. Bear looks between Dominic and me, a look of dawning comprehension falling over his face. His mouth tightens and his eyes narrow.

And yet, wonder of all wonders, he waits. He doesn’t speak. He doesn’t say what he thinks is best for me, and for once, I’m pissed that he’s
not
taking this decision away from me, that he’s making me act like the smart and mature and totally responsible twenty-year-old I am (or like to think I am, anyway). Just two seconds ago, I was mad that he was trying to make a decision for me and now I’m mad that he’s not. Jesus fucking Christ. I
have
to be bipolar. There’s no other explanation for it.

God. Being an adult sucks so much ass.

And Dominic, of course. Dominic, who stands there larger than anyone has any right to be, watching me with guarded eyes and a blank face, and I want to scream at him to just tell me what the fuck he wants, what the fuck he wants me to do. What he wants me to say. What’s that word Bear used to use? Projecting. Of course I’m projecting, because he doesn’t
want
anything from me, he doesn’t
need
me to do or say anything. His life and world was perfectly ordered until I came back.

And yet he waits and watches in that infuriating way.

In the space of the seconds that have passed, three responses have formed in my head, and it’s anybody’s guess which one will actually come out.

One:
Are you out of your fucking
mind
? Of
course
I don’t want you to come! I’m fighting a losing battle to get these ridiculous fantasies out of my head of your dick in my mouth, and you want to be plastered by my side for a
week
? How could you
possibly
think that’s a good idea. Don’t you know what you do to me? Don’t you know why I didn’t come back? You
broke
me, Dom. You
broke
me into a billion tiny little pieces, and somehow, I’ve put myself back together, only to have you here again. I love you. I don’t think I ever stopped. But I can’t have this because even though I’m back together in some shape and form, I still don’t know how to breathe.

Two:
Of
course
I want you to come. That way we can be by each other’s side as much as possible because I highly doubt once this summer’s over that I’ll ever come back here. I really think Seafare and I might be done. So let’s go do this one last thing before I figure out how to put my life back together and get myself back on track. One last thing so that I can look back years from now and not feel completely guilty about how I decided to run away yet again.

Three:
Sure, Dom! That’d be swell. We’ll have a blast! I really appreciate you taking the time out of what I’m sure is a busy schedule to come and babysit Corey and me. Maybe that’ll give us more time to reconnect and see what’s what. Maybe you can drive part of the way too? That’d be awesome.

Three choices. Three different reactions.

Which one do I pick?

Surprise! The fourth one.

“What about Ben?” I ask stupidly while
it
laughs hysterically inside my head, calling me an asshole.

“That’ll be his week with his mother,” Dominic says softly. “They’re taking him to Disneyland with a group of other autistic kids. Supposed to be a big to-do.”

“And you weren’t going to go?”

He shakes his head. His face is still blank, like any decision I make wouldn’t matter in the slightest to him.

You’re projecting
, it says, sounding amused.
Jesus, you’re supposed to be this fucking genius, and here you are, wondering yet again why a boy doesn’t like you like you like him. How positively
dismal
has your life become that this is what you are now? You’ve been to hell and back and
this
is what you’ve made of it?
This
is what you’re going to allow yourself to be?
Such promise
, they’ll say someday.
He had such promise and he let it all be squandered away.
I hope I’m still around to tell you I told you so when that happens.

I mimic Dominic as much as possible. I shrug. “Doesn’t matter to me one way or another. I don’t think we need a babysitter. But it would be all right to have company on the trip back home.” I think about each and every single word as it comes out of my mouth to make sure there could be no hidden meaning gleaned from any of them. I’m not being paranoid. Just careful. (And paranoid.)

He shrugs too. “That works.”

What is that supposed to mean, you son of a bitch?
I almost scream at him, but I stop myself even as I feel it start to well up in my throat.

Corey claps his hands together. “Wonderful!” he exclaims much too brightly. “Then it’s settled. Dominic will accompany us to Tucson, and we shall see what we see!”

Everyone starts talking at once.

T
HE
PARTY
is winding down and people are saying their good-byes. I’m in the backyard, and Jerry and Alice Thompson hug me tightly and tell me how happy they are I’m home again and that they’d better see me before I leave for Tucson. I smile at them as they leave me with a wave. Good people, them. The best.

I’m tired, though. Today has been weirdly draining. I’m not in a panic, not yet. I can still breathe, so at least there’s that. But I can’t help but feel the rug has been pulled out from under me, and I’ve somehow tumbled down a rabbit hole where I’m late, I’m late, and nothing makes sense because it’s all brightly colored and upside down.

If I could just find some control, everything would be okay. I know it would.

I slide off my sandals and curl my toes in the grass. It’s cool against my skin.

“Hey,” someone says from behind me.

“Hey, yourself,” I say back.

Bear stands next to me and brushes his arm against mine. I feel better now that it’s just the two of us. “You sure about this?”

“About what?”

“You know.”

Yeah. “Honestly?”

“Sure, Kid.”

“I want everything to go back the way it was.”

He laughs quietly. “It wasn’t always that great.”

I nudge his shoulder. “We had our moments, you and me.”

“We did, didn’t we?”

“Yeah, Papa Bear.”

“I’ll kill him, you know.”

This startles me. “What? Who?”

“Dominic.” Bear’s voice has gone hard.

“Bear—”

“If he hurts you,” Bear says, “I’ll kill him. I don’t care that he’s family. I don’t care that he’s one of us. You were mine first, and I swear on all that I have, if he does you wrong, it’ll be the last thing he does.”

I’m absurdly touched, even if his anger is misplaced. “Don’t think it’ll come to that,” I say roughly. “It’s not him, you know. It’s me.”

“There’s nothing wrong with you.”

I laugh. “That’s not even remotely true.”

He moves then to stand in front of me, facing each other and eye-to-eye. I don’t remember when that happened, the moment he didn’t have to look down anymore. It’s almost like looking into a mirror. It’s odd, really. But it’s home, too, so I don’t question it.

“It is,” he insists, his eyes flashing angrily. I don’t know who he’s pissed off at right now, me, Dom, himself, or this whole situation. “You are just the way you need to be. If anybody tries to tell you otherwise, I’ll knock them flat on their ass.”

“Sure, Bear,” I say, because I have no other words.

He nods and takes a step back. His eyes soften and a faraway look crosses his face. “I never thought we’d get to this point,” he says.

“What point?”

He shrugs. “Here. Now. You and me. You… you’ve grown up.”

“Everyone does, Bear,” I say lightly.

“I know. It’s just that….” He shakes his head. “I just thought there’d be more time. I thought I’d have longer.”

I roll my eyes. “We only have the rest of our lives. You can’t get rid of me that easily. I’m not leaving forever. It’s just a week.”

A small smile curves his lips. “Yeah?”

“We’re brothers, right?”

“Sure, Kid. Brothers.”

“And brothers stick together. No matter what.”

“No matter what.”

“So then you’ve got nothing to worry about.”

“I always worry.”

I laugh. “That’s because you’re you. That’s what you do. And there’s nothing wrong with you, either.”

“I wouldn’t go that far,” he says.

We’re quiet for a time. Just a thing brothers do, I guess. Finally, “Bear?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m doing the right thing. Right?”

“About?”

“Everything.”

He shrugs. “I think so. I hope so. We’ll find out, I guess. And even if it’s not, and even if it doesn’t go like we think it will, then you come back to me and I’ll put you back together and make sure all the little cracks hold together.”

I nod. “How do we think it’s going to go?”

“That’s the unknown, isn’t it? Life sucks like that sometimes.”

“I don’t know when you got so smart,” I tell him. Seriously. Remember Bear from back in the day? He’d never have been able to think like this.

He laughs. “Weird, right?”

“Way weird.” A pause. “I’ll be fine,” I say. “I think.”

“Of course you will.” He kicks off his shoes and lies down on the grass, staring up at the sky turning slow pink, rays of the sun streaked against the clouds.

I lie down beside him, shoulder to shoulder.

We watch the sky, Bear and me.

And I’m right where I need to be.

D
OM
’
S
THE
last to leave. Everyone else is upstairs settling in for the night. Well, at least Bear and Otter are. I’m sure Corey’s waiting for me to come up and shove a red-hot poker up his ass and wallow in his death cries. I shall have my revenge this night.