House Arrest (3 page)

WEEK 5

James frowned.
His little pig eyes narrowed.
Better, but not great
, he said.
Show more feelings
, he said.
Prove you're not a sociopath
, he said.
You prove
you're
not a sociopath
, I said,
slamming the journal shut
almost as hard as my heart slammed into my ribs.
YOU prove it.
You don't have to call me names, James.
Is making me feel worse part of your job?
Part of what they teach at
Probation Officer University?
I don't even know what sociopath means
but I know I'm not one.
I'm just a kid.
I'm just a kid.

There are all these words I say every day.
Words I never even thought about before.
Trach
is one.
You remember that one, right?
It rhymes with
brake
and
take
.
There is also
wedge
which can mean something you shove under a door
to keep it open,
but in this case means a thing that Levi hangs on,
actually hangs,
with his butt in a sling made of blue jean material,
a sling that has lots of superstrong Velcro.
He hangs on the
wedge
so his
trach
stays
unobstructed
.
That sentence is my world now.
Levi's world.
Mom's world.
It doesn't seem normal, but it is an everyday
sentence now.
So I guess that makes it normal?
Normal
is a word I never thought about before, either.
But now I think about it
a lot.

I haven't done my homework in so long
I can't even remember.
I know this journal is not for confessing
homework sins,
but there you have it.
Levi is too sick.
Even with his nurse, Marisol,
and even with Mom
there aren't enough hands.
Marisol has to go home at night.
And Mom has to work.
And my hands have to help.
Instead of doing fractions.
Some things are more important than fractions.

Hypothetically speaking,
what would happen if José does my math homework?
If I fail math will the judge get mad?
Could I go to juvie?
You know what should be on my math homework?
Q: What is 3 + 1?
A: The number of hours Timothy slept last night.

I met José when we were in second grade.
His family moved in three houses down.
José has four sisters.
They are all crazy.
I think he likes to come to my house because it's quiet.
Even with Levi's jackhammer suction machine
and breathing alarms,
and snot bullets,
my house is still quieter
than a house filled with four sisters.
Believe it.

You know,
the problem with babies is that you can't hate them.
You can try.
I tried.
But they have these fuzzy soft heads,
they have slurpy smiles.
Even when you stick out your tongue
or make a mean face
or give them a poke with your finger
they still have slurpy smiles.
It's really hard to hate a baby.
Even if you think about all the times before the baby
when your dad was at home and happy
and your mom never cried herself to sleep
at the kitchen table
even when you think about these times
you still can't hate a baby.
Stupid cute babies.
Complicating everything.

WEEK 6

Mrs. Bainbridge called that last part of the journal
a breakthrough.
I don't know about that.
Maybe she said that because I never talk in her office
so she was excited to see so many
feeling
words
all on one page.
I don't feel like I've broken through anything, though.
Really.
Maybe some things have broken through me?

The thing is,
and I don't know if I should say this,
but house arrest isn't
so
bad.
Pretty much,
I've been on “house arrest” since Levi came home.
That's not bad.
Just how it is.
It's not really safe to take him anywhere
because of how germs make him so sick so fast.
So, for months and months we stayed at home.
No movies. No football games. No restaurants.
Well, except sometimes
when Mom and Dad stayed with Levi
and I could go out with José
to the gross old mall
and we'd go to Game Space
so we could try out the new Halo
until the manager would yell at us
for being there too long and
getting pizza grease on the controllers.
Once we snuck into this movie
and that one actor said every swear
and José thought we were going to get in
so
much
trouble
Timothy
we
are
dead
if
we
get
caught.
But we didn't get caught.
It was so much fun.
You know what?
Now that I think about it?
House arrest stinks.
Like way more than I thought
before I started writing this.
Stupid journal.

Levi can't talk.
You know that already.
But it's not that he just lies around and doesn't
do anything;
he still cries and laughs.
You just can't hear it.
If you think about something that's so funny you
laugh and laugh
until you can't make a noise
and so you sort of suck in air and make a clacking noise
with your tongue
and a kind of wheeze with your breath,
that's what Levi sounds like when he laughs.
When he cries his face gets all screwed up in a knot,
big tears roll down his cheeks,
and wet bursts come from the tube in his neck.
He hisses, I guess, like a cartoon snake,
or a deflating balloon with lots of slobber in it.
He gets so mad and can't make a noise.
I want to make the noises for him
because it isn't fair, you know?
You should be able to scream
when you need to scream.

Mac and cheese for dinner
again
Peanut butter but no bread
again
powdered milk in stale cereal
again
going to sleep hungry
again

If Levi has to have a nurse all day, every day,
and all night, every night,
then why does he have Marisol only twice a week?
I am not a nurse.
Mom is not a nurse.
We do our best.
But we need sleep.
Mom needs to work.
I need better excuses not to do my homework,
like a real kid:
I was playing Xbox.
My dog ate it.
I forgot.
Not:
My brother has no nurse, again.
I like Marisol, though.
When she's here.
It's not her fault when she's not here.
There are other sick kids, too.
And not enough nurses.
But still.