The Believing Game (24 page)

I put my fork down. “You can't follow someone into the hospital. There are laws against that.” The old me would be rolling her eyes at this new me, worried about inconsequential things like getting arrested.

“Those laws probably don't apply to patients faking terminal illness.”

“Sophie, I've done this before. I walk Joshua to the hospital. He's not kidding.” She just smirked. “No, really. He might be lying about this operation. I get that. But he goes to the hospital.”

“For his treatments?” Sophie still sounded dubious. “You walk him in and stand there while they hook him up to honest-to-God medical machinery?”

“Well, no. But I walk him to the outpatient clinic.” She made a face. “What? You think he just sits there?”

“Maybe they have good magazines.”

“That's nuts. Who does that?”

Sophie shrugged. She downed a glass of orange juice. “I'm just saying. An opportunity has presented itself. There's no logical reason why we wouldn't take advantage of it.”

There was a reason flitting around my mind. I wasn't sure that I wanted to know for sure that Joshua was lying. Sophie sat across from me, though, daring me to move forward.

 

When Addison and I headed down the hill after dinner, I kept having to stop myself from turning around to check for Sophie following us.
Concentrate on him,
I told myself. That never used to be so difficult.

At the pizza place, Joshua stood up to greet us and I hugged him longer than usual. Then I slid into the booth, so I sat closest to the window and could watch for Sophie outside. We settled in and then Addison left to place our order at the counter. As soon as he was out of earshot, Joshua turned to me and said, “I need the truth.”

My heart lurched and lunged. But Joshua only asked, “How is he?” He nodded toward the counter at Addison's hunched back. “Is this too much for him?”

“Addison's just fine. We're all surrounding him, supporting him.” And then because Joshua looked so lost and lonely,
I made myself pat his hand. “And you too. Of course. In the same way, we're all here for you.”

He waved my hand aside. “I don't expect you to understand this truth, but my sickness is actually Addison's trial. I am just a vessel — a body where this battle is happening. He had just reached a place of such peace and joy. You took him to that place, Elizabeth. And he'd built up his own strength so that he would not falter. So the universe had to test him through me.”

“He's going to be back any minute.” I tried to keep my voice light. “You know this kind of talk would upset him.”

Joshua nodded. “How are you handling your truth?” I wished it were acceptable to ask which truth. Instead I nodded solemnly and waited for Joshua to follow up his cryptic question with another cryptic question. “Do you still feel closed in that room?”

“Some days.” I didn't know for sure if he meant for me to say yes or no.

“You must keep fighting.”

Addison slid into the booth across from us. “Fighting? Who does she need to fight? I'll kill 'em.” He turned to Joshua. “I ordered you a salad. Get some healthy greens in that belly.”

Joshua grimaced. “Brother, I don't know how many meals I've got left and you want me to waste one on a salad?”

“I ordered pizza too. Thin crust.”

“I like the Sicilian.”

“Try this kind.”

Joshua rolled his eyes. “Greer, do I look fat?”

Addison shook his head. “It's not about fat, Joshua. Let's make some healthy choices.”

“Greer will tell me if I need to eat salads. Right, sister? What have you done to this boy that he's talking about healthy choices? I want my meatballs, dammit.”

“Give me one minute.” Addison grinned. “I'll be right back with a big plate of leafy greens.” Joshua and I sat there at the table, waiting. He drummed his fingers on the table.

“Maybe it's better to eat a light meal? Before treatment?”

“Are you my doctor? Did someone add an
MD
after your name?” Joshua spit out his words in sharp bursts.

“No, I just thought —”

“Well, don't think that hard.” Addison walked up with a giant spinach salad on one plate just as I reeled from Joshua's venom. With a flourish, he deposited the plate in front of Joshua and headed back to the counter. It might have been funny, except Joshua looked ready to toss me through the plate-glass window.

I calculated the chances of vaulting over the table, past Joshua, and out the door. Slim to none. And then, slinking around the corner of the deli across the street, she appeared. Sophie leaned in the doorway like some kind of film-noir detective. She even wore a man's hat, with its brim tipped over her face. I almost laughed out loud, but Joshua was still glaring at me over a plate of spinach.

“Awwwww. You didn't think I was serious, did you? Slide the salad over to Greer Rabbit over there.” Addison set down two plates of spaghetti and meatballs. Joshua's face brightened, but he didn't look sheepish or embarrassed. He glanced at me like he was checking to see if I planned to speak up. “Did somebody get a little cranky?”

I stared at Addison and he gazed back at me lovingly. He didn't seem to understand my telepathic message of
This man
scares me, please find a way to accept that he doesn't channel the voice of God so that we can maybe leave him at the pizza place.
So I gave up and instead tried to concentrate on the salad I didn't feel like eating, just so that I'd keep my eyes from the window. That way, neither of them would turn to see Sophie framed there.

“Greer's going to walk you to the hospital — I have my men's health class.” Joshua looked up, a strand of pasta hanging from the corner of his mouth. I kept still, waiting for Joshua to mention that I didn't have the necessary degree for that kind of responsibility.

“You getting an A in man class?” Joshua liked to bust the guys about that McCracken Hill tradition in particular.

“I don't know. Ask Greer.”

“Shut up, meatball.” I thought of Sophie waiting outside and hoped she wasn't crazy enough to think that just her little hat would hide her. I tried to broker peace. “Joshua, I'm happy to accompany you tonight, so that Addison can relearn how to act like a gentleman.”

“That sounds lovely.” I couldn't detect a trace of anger in Joshua's voice. By the time we rose to leave, I'd almost convinced myself that I had imagined it. “Brother, thank you for sharing these times with me.” He stretched out his arms to Addison. “You don't need a class to learn to be a man.”

“I know, but it's better to show up so they see that.”

“That's my boy — learning to bide his time, playing by their rules.”

Addison leaned in to give my cheek a quick peck. “All good?”

“We're good.” He held on to my arm a bit longer than he needed to and then gave us a little salute. When Addison
turned his back to walk back toward McCracken Hill, I tracked his progress for a second or two.

“I wonder if anyone has ever watched me the way you watch him.” Joshua's voice broke in. “You don't even know how you drink him in — that would embarrass you.”

I made myself smile. “We should get going, right? Your appointment is for eight thirty?”

“They can't start without me.” But Joshua started shuffling along. He took my hand in his and held up our fingers intertwined. “You examine everyone closely, though, Elizabeth. That used to make me nervous. I felt that you were searching for flaws. But now I think distrust is just your way.”

“It's isn't, though.”

“Don't argue just to argue. Search your heart. What are your intentions when you direct your gaze? You look out at the world and scrutinize every word and gesture. I feel your eyes on me.” Joshua gripped my hand so hard that the bones ached.

“No. It's just that you have us all so worried,” I told him.

It sounded lame. We walked a few more steps before he spoke again. “It's funny to me.” Joshua drifted into silence, and at first, I thought he forgot his own fragment of wisdom. But eventually, as we closed in on the brick high-rise ahead of us, Joshua pointed out, “When you feel threatened, you use the plural. You say
we
or
us
, like you're gathering the troops behind you. I'm glad they make you feel safe. But they are, in fact, my troops. Do you understand that?”

I understood that Joshua had buried a warning beneath that surface and that I wouldn't even have to dig too deep to uncover it. But I also knew something that Joshua did not —
Sophie lurked behind me and she was certainly not fighting on his side. Really, the only person he had left was Addison.

So I said, “Of course,” and let him think what he wanted. “Are they painful — your treatments?”

Joshua sighed. “Nothing I can't handle. I think of you all and that helps me endure.” He looked up to the building. “The worst part is the temptation — they could give me drugs. To take the edge off a little. But I burned that bridge a while back.”

“I could sit with you.”

“And hold my hand?” Joshua raised up our clasped hands.

“Yeah. Sure. Or just sit there so you're not alone.” I made sure to underline my voice with an air of rebelliousness. “I don't even care if I get in trouble for missing sign-in time.”

“Well, you should. That's the drug you're working to give up — trouble.” Joshua nodded. “But I thank you, Elizabeth. You are my angel, you know. It's enough that you deliver me.” He stopped at the hospital entrance. The sliding glass doors slid open behind him. “Thank you.”

“I'll come up.” My heart picked up its pace. Before, I'd walked Joshua into the lobby, to the reception desk. That's what Sophie and I had planned on.

“That will tempt me to ask you to stay.” Joshua leaned down and kissed my cheek. He murmured, “Examine your intentions.”

My heart skipped into a full sprint then. “What do you mean?” I looked Joshua in the eye, but he just raised his hand up and stepped backward through the doors. I stood there, waiting for him to turn and walk into the heart of the hospital.

“Follow him,” Sophie hissed from behind the thick hedge along the circular drive. She scared me so much, I almost yelped out loud.

“Are you crazy? He knows you're here.” I turned to see one of her sneakered feet step out of the greenery. “No way. Get back.”

“Where is he?”

“I can't see him. He walked past the front desk. Sophie, I really think he saw you.” I scanned the lobby with a look of concern pasted on my face, as if I just wanted to make sure he arrived safely. Just in case he'd turned back. But he hadn't. He'd vanished. I couldn't even tell which direction he'd gone.

“Go inside and ask at the front desk. Say your uncle forgot to tell you what time to pick him up.”

“No way. What if he just stopped at the bathroom or something?”

“God. You're impossible. This whole thing is pointless if we don't track him.” Sophie emerged from the bushes and grabbed my arm. “C'mon. Quick — let's go.” She dragged me and we ran toward the back of the building. It was farther than it looked — the length of the playing field at my old school. Once we turned the corner, though, she blocked me with her arm. “Stop, stop, stop.” Sophie leaned down with her hands on her knees, wheezing. We hung back in the shadows cast by the building.

“Dude, you're nuts. And I think he saw us —”

Sophie thwacked her arm across my chest. “Shut up. Look. At. The. Taxi. Stand.”

In the middle of the lot stood a little booth and a line of cabs snaked behind it. On a folding chair next to the booth, a man sat reading a newspaper.

Joshua was leaning against the first cab, with his arms folded, as if annoyed to wait. Another man jogged out of the booth. He called out to Joshua and Joshua nodded. They both smiled at each other and laughed. Joshua made a motion like he was tapping his finger against an invisible wristwatch. As the man approached, Joshua slid over, opened the door, and climbed into the cab's backseat. The driver scrambled into the seat ahead of him. At the top of the cab, the
IN SERVICE
light flipped on, and Sophie and I pressed ourselves as close as possible to the building. I felt bricks digging in my back.

I remember thinking,
Wow. That treatment doesn't take long at all.
Stupidly. Before all the pieces settled in place and I understood that Joshua had taken just enough time to walk through the first floor of the hospital, past the lobby and the clinic, and out the back door to the taxi stand. That the cab driver greeted him out of familiarity, because every night that Addison or I walked him here, thinking we were delivering him to some excruciating cure, he walked straight through the hospital and into the back parking lot to catch a cab home.

“Holy crap.” Sophie's voice sounded like thin metal bending toward me — tinny and hollow. “So that's Joshua's treatment. I knew it, but I didn't know it. You know, I had a hunch and so I figured we should check back here but I still didn't expect …” Sophie kept babbling and I half-listened. I couldn't look away from the red glow of the cab's taillights. I stood there next to Sophie. Silent, shivering, hypnotized by Joshua driving away.

The crappy part of knowing about Joshua's hospital hoax was knowing Addison would never believe me. “We should have taken pics,” Sophie had said while we trudged home.

At that point, I couldn't even get words out. I just nodded and grunted and tried to fight down the panic rising in my chest. “I just don't get the point, you know?” Sophie waited for me to grunt back. “He has nothing better to do than to fake terminal illness?”

I got the point. The minute we saw Addison the next morning, he asked how Joshua seemed the night before. “Do you think he's getting any stronger?” Addison cracked his knuckles. “I don't see a difference, really. But his appetite's back. That's something.” Sophie glanced at me.

“Maybe we could schedule a meeting?” I suggested. “With Joshua's doctors?” Addison's face clouded. “It would help us support his recovery more if we had a clearer picture of what he needed.” Sophie nodded vigorously beside me.

“He's not going to go for that,” Addison said. “Joshua doesn't want to worry us.” I tried to steady my eyes from rolling.

“Yeah, but look how worn out you are,” Sophie told Addison, so I didn't have to.

“It's nothing.” Addison shook off her sympathy. “Think of what Joshua's going through.”

I needed to keep reminding myself:
Addison thinks Joshua saved him.
Whatever lies followed, that was the one indisputable truth. And it made everything else harder.

Joshua had taken to walking with a cane. He kept a little pill case with colored caplets distributed in each tiny plastic compartment. He trotted that out when we circled up after the boys' Tuesday night NA meeting. I leaned in closer, expecting them to be Tic Tacs. But they were actual pills. I thought maybe we'd get lucky and he'd overdose on aspirin. “Elizabeth, could you rub my throat for me, please?” he asked me when he caught me watching him swallow the little row of pills.

“I'm sorry — what's that?” I thought I misheard him but he craned his neck back, baring the dark arc of his throat.

“Just massage there, right by my Adam's apple.” He pointed to the spot. I reached out and placed my palm carefully against his throat. It crossed my mind then —
I could tighten my grip and strangle him.
Instead I felt him swallow. “I take so many of these. Not so easy to get down.” When Joshua spoke, his skin hummed lightly.

“What are they?” I tried to sound casual.

“Just something the specialist prescribed for nausea.” When I stopped rubbing, Joshua grabbed my hand. “You have healing powers. Do you believe that about yourself?” I shrugged. He said, “Better than anything pharmaceutical.” I felt my eyes darting around, avoiding contact with his gaze. He held up my hand to examine it. “I feel fortunate. What other patient has access to an angel?”

My ears went hot with embarrassment. Joshua looked past me to the others in the room — Addison, Sophie, Jared, and Hannah. “I need to make a request to stretch my fortune. Do you understand what I'm asking for? Sophia?”

Sophie's voice sounded sour. “A return to the wilderness.” I tried to coax her with my eyes.
Sweeten it up, Soph.
But Joshua noticed.

“Why does that inspire anger in you, Sophia?” My belly knotted up, sure she would spill everything. Jared even stepped forward, as if he too thought Hurricane Sophie was ready to blow. But she caught herself and even mustered up the strength to tell him, “I just fret about you a little bit.” Somewhere, Sophie had sprouted a little twang. “Your immune system must be so darn compromised.”

“And if anything should happen up there,” I tried to help, “who would we call for help?”

Joshua pouted. He called out to Addison, “Brother, I have been envisioning a ceremony. Now, I don't know if it will be a farewell ceremony, but I'd like the chance to gather us under the big sky one last time.” Joshua glared up at the light fixtures as if they hid surveillance cameras. “Away from prying eyes.”

“We can find our own place here.” I kept my voice firm and held Addison's eyes. “No one wants Joshua to put himself in harm's way for our sake.”

Hannah stepped forward and ducked under Joshua's arms. “But we appreciate the spirit of your sacrifice.” He crumpled a little, then slumped in his seat. Hannah had begun to speak his language.

Joshua shook his head sadly. “I don't know who gave you all permission to have such little faith. You all are stingy with your beliefs.”

“We worry. We love you and so we worry.” When Addison said that, it seemed to calm him.

“Let me just make a humble request that you all share your strength with me. I will keep fighting, if you surround
me with your resilience. Our world might have tried to discard us, but we will return in triumph.” I watched Addison's head bob up and down. Hannah wiped tears from her eyes. Sophie sat in stony silence. She met my eyes and then mustered a vigorous nod.

Later, in her room when it was just the two of us, Sophie tried to explain. “I just can't,” she told me. “Sitting there and listening to him spew all his bullshit about sacrifice and suffering — doesn't that infuriate you? How can you let him get away with it?”

“We're not letting him get away with it. That's the whole point, right?”

“Yeah, sure. We'll track the cracktard's movements, get telescopic lens photos that spell out his total sham of a terminal illness, and then what? We confront him and then look at that — we'll be discarded like Wes. Or maybe Addison won't be subtle about it this time. He'll just physically hurt us.”

“Shut up. You're talking about Addison.”

“I'm talking about a guy who's admitted to violently assaulting someone. You don't think that confession was designed to intimidate us? I, for one, intend to protect myself from here on in.”

“Stop it. It's Addison. If anything, he meant us to understand that he'd protect us. He's on our side.”

“As long as we're on Joshua's. I don't mean to insult your blow-job skills, but you might be overestimating them a little bit, lady.”

“Awesome. Really. There's actually a little more between me and Addison. He'll believe us because he trusts us. At the same time, we're toppling his idol, you know? So we need hard evidence. And maybe more time to gather it. We can't
do that with a target on our back. Joshua needs to believe we're complacent.”

“He doesn't. You heard him today.”

“Because you keep challenging him. All you need to do is sit there and look sad. Furrow your brow. Throw a little concern his way.”

“Greer, I'm telling you I can't lie like you.”

An accusation sat there between us, although Sophie pretended otherwise. “So that's my superpower? Lying? Or is it tied between lies and blow jobs?”

“Okay, I didn't say that. But it seems like you're able to compartmentalize. You sit there with Joshua and play the part of the ardent believer.” She looked away from me then. “It just freaks me out to see how good you are at it.”

Really, it isn't much different from stealing,
I wanted to tell her. You just act as if you should own whatever it is you're walking out with and then you do. Or how, afterward, my family all managed to sit steadily at the same dining room table where my cousin held us at gunpoint — you passed along the dish of mashed potatoes like nothing happened, until it felt as if it didn't. In the back of my mind, I knew Joshua had just wandered into our lives through the back door of a Narcotics Anonymous meeting. If he hadn't met Addison at a desperate moment, he would have just been another old creep who tried to strike up a conversation at the coffee shop.

But that's not how it happened. So in the front of my mind, I kept Joshua perched on a throne and made sure to frequently genuflect. I saw all of us as if we'd been positioned on a stage. Yeah, I played the part.

“I don't believe in church either,” I tried to explain. “Those are rituals too. My parents believe in them so I went
through the motions. Right? Why wouldn't I do the same thing for Addison? He's done more for me than —”

“I know. Joshua's gone off the rails, though,” Sophie reminded me. I just nodded. We hadn't been debating that. “He's a really sick man. Really, he scares the hell out of me.”

We just sat there in silence then, leaning against the flimsy bed. And then almost dove underneath it when Sophie's door swung open. “What the hell?” Sophie yelled, probably expecting an invasion from Jenn Sharpe, blogger to the scars.

“It's okay, it's okay,” Addison whispered as quickly as he slipped through the door. “Shhh — you don't want to make too much noise.” Sophie's eyes widened more and I could tell she did want to make a whole lot of noise. Even I felt like I'd been kicked in the chest or something. How long had he been standing outside that door?

“Shh — please?” Addison pleaded with Sophie and looked to me for help. “I just need Greer. I need to talk to Greer.” He didn't look right. His face was strained and his eyes kept darting around the room. He raised a hand to rub them and I noticed blood on his knuckles. I stood up and Sophie grabbed my ankle.

“What's going on, Addison?” I tried to keep my voice light and calm.

“Can we go outside?”

“No!” Sophie pretty much screamed it, and Addison and I both turned to shush her.

“It's almost lights-out, buddy. Right? It's pretty dicey that you're even in the dorm. Ms. Crane will lose her shit.” I stepped forward and felt Sophie's grip tighten. I looked down just for a second, to shake her off, to say
stop
. Or
don't worry
. But right then Addison grabbed my arm and tugged me toward the door. I stood there, caught between them.

“I just need to talk to you. Five minutes.” Addison's voice choked, like he was trying not to cry. I reached out for his hand, glanced down at Sophie, and nodded. He said, “I couldn't find you.” And then Addison seemed to remember Sophie. “Sorry. I couldn't find Greer.”

He held up his hand and examined the palm.

“Other side,” she barked.

“Oh. I …” He closed his eyes, hung his head down. Sophie stared meaningfully at me. Addison's shoulders heaved. “I'm ashamed.” For a second, I flashed back to Addison up at the Delias' cabin, how his voice shook as he spoke about kicking that kid in the face. “I got so angry, just fed up about how unfair the whole thing is. I punched the wall.” He looked up at me. “A granite wall. Like some cliché. I'm such an idiot.”

“No,” I said, even as Sophie muttered, “Yeah.” She added, “You're both idiots, and you're going to get caught shacking up in my room.”

“Five minutes?” he asked again. “I'll go out first. Wait a minute or two and follow close behind. Try to keep me in sight.” He glanced at Sophie and seemed to realize how little she trusted him. “Thanks, Soph. Sorry to bother you.” But Addison didn't sound sorry. He opened the door just a sliver before darting out into the hall.

“Greer,” Sophie warned. But he was already halfway to the stairwell, confident that I'd trail behind him. So I rushed to catch up.

I know plenty about the decisive glide of the up-to-no-good. How you sacrifice the slightest bit of speed for a lot of silence. You stare at some fixed point straight ahead, as if you could stop to explain yourself, but that might distract you from your focused purpose. Addison was a ninja, though. He
pretty much floated through the female dorm right before lights-out, while most girls were trekking to and from the showers with their dopey plastic buckets of face soap and toothpaste. Just following in his wake, I felt unseen.

From the top of the steps, I saw him kneel down and whip out a roll of electrical tape from his pocket. Addison looked once each way while he tore off a piece and taped over the lock to the building's entrance. By the time I reached him, he stood up. He reached behind me to make sure the door shut softly behind us.

“You sure it will hold?” I asked, imagining what would happen if we got locked out of our dorms overnight.

“Positive,” Addison said.

“Where are we going?” But he didn't answer. We kept up the brisk pace until we found the little bridge by the dining hall. Addison jumped down; pebbles scattered where he landed. He reached up and helped me hop down too.

“It's okay, here?” But Addison just sat down in the spot closest to the building's wall. The cement footbridge cast a shadow topped with the dark bars of the wrought-iron railing. He took my hand and guided me to sit beside him.

“It's fine, but stay as close to the wall as possible.” He pulled out his cell phone and cupped his hand around the lit screen.

“How often do you do this?” But Addison just stared at me.

“It's happening tonight.”

“What is?” At first, I thought he meant his release from McCracken Hill. Because that's what I was most afraid of.

“The surgery. The beeper went off at Sal's when I was getting him food.”

“Did you hear it go off?”

But Addison hurtled right past that question. “We left right then and I walked him to the hospital.”

“They didn't send an ambulance to pick him up?”

“Joshua wanted to spend the time together. But then he wouldn't let me stay.”

“Listen — if we explained to the dean — someone would probably even wait with you if you didn't want to be alone at the hospital. I could go —” I moved to my knees, to stand, but Addison dragged me back.

“Get down.” He huddled beside me. He leaned his face against mine and I felt tears. “Joshua doesn't want me there.”

It was crucial to press ever so gently. “Really? Maybe he just didn't want to ask? Did you speak to his doctor?”

“No. He didn't even let me walk him into admissions. We went to the chapel and said a prayer there. Then he walked me back to the lobby.” Addison covered his eyes with one hand, gripped his cell with the other. “I walked back myself. You know — the whole time thinking,
they're prepping him now, they're wheeling him around into the operating room. He's going to text.
” He waved the phone.