The Weight of Zero (18 page)

We spend the entire night at the kitchen table, on Anthony's laptop, creating Nonny's FB account. For the relationship status, Michael types Nonny is “in a relationship” with Mitzi. For her profile picture, Anthony puts his baseball cap sideways on Nonny's newly stylish head and calls her “ '90s Nonny.” For a favorite quote, he types in some Italian profanity courtesy of Google until Nonny makes him delete it. Michael adds Muse for favorite music (Nonny likes the “orchestra parts”) and
People
magazine for books.

The only slightly awkward part is when they want to send a friend request to me and I have to tell them that I'm not on FB. Obviously I can't say the reason why, which is that Dr. McCallum has outlawed it.

When Mom texts me at eight-thirty to tell me she's in the driveway, I'm stunned. The hours flew by and I laughed as hard as I did that day at St. Anne's with Kristal. A surprisingly awesome day, even if Michael and I didn't get any alone time in the basement. I have a feeling another opportunity will present itself soon.

“So, you spent a long time with this boy,” Mom says inside the Accord, a minute into our drive home. “Anything going on I should know about?”

“Nah, not really,” I say.

I can't tell her that Michael and I are technically “going out.” My mother would take it too much as a sign of progress, when I know this won't last. Michael doesn't know
me.
God knows how many defensive lies I told his family tonight. I sat there at their table, served by Nonny, and lied to all of them. Lies I can never undo or explain. Shame rises hot and fast. They're such good people.

Anxiety, my constant companion, wakes up to further erode the day's goodness. My heart picks up its pace as I think about Dr. McCallum's warnings. He often babbles about a “game plan,” something we'll devise together because, as he has explained, “patients with bipolar disorder often get depressed again after a period of stability and even after doing everything right—establishing a good diet, good sleep patterns and exercise habits, and taking their meds. It can be really discouraging.”

No shit.
It's infinitely more than discouraging. It's catastrophic.

On the verge of tears, I look out the window so Mom can't see. It's so brutally unfair. I want more time. I really like Michael, and I would love to let this,
us,
unfurl naturally. But as Dr. McCallum has warned, Zero is coming, maybe preceded by a manic episode of God only knows what. An image of me revved up and hyper in front of Michael pops into my head. I shut my eyes. He can never, never see that.

I have no choice. I need to squeeze out as much good as I can with Michael. In whatever time remaining.

“Oops,” Louis Farricelli says as he deliberately flicks his pen off his desk and right in front of me. After I picked the same pen up off the classroom floor and returned it to him not three seconds ago.

He leers at me. His cheeks and double chin are compressed upward by the neck brace so he looks like a perverted Pillsbury Doughboy. “I
love
to make you bend over,” he whispers.

He's turned darker since his injury. There's something ugly and angry percolating under that mass of muscle and flesh. His celebrity status at Cranbury High is already declining, accelerated by the freshman quarterback, who, according to Michael, is completely kicking ass. Before our eyes, Louis Farricelli is atrophying into an eighteen-year-old has-been.

I ignore him and his pen and sit down as Mr. Oleck turns on the Smart Board.

Louis Farricelli hisses like a serpent, “Heard crazies like you are complete freaks in the sack. Maybe we—” But by hyperfocusing on Mr. Oleck's voice, I can mute the asshole behind me. Just like I can completely not see Riley and Olivia and their crew at the back of the room. They've backed off from the heckling and pranks, for now at least.

I think it might be Michael. He's like my Patronus Charm.

After history class, Michael and I walk together to our next classes. It's a routine now. Today, Monday, he has AP physics and I'm off to non-honors precalculus with the poorly named Ms. Stinkov. Some days, Tyler walks with us because he has U.S. history near our classroom. He still doesn't say a whole lot, but as soon as I walk away, I hear him resume his normal conversation with Michael. I get it.

After school, as usual, I'm stuck waiting for Mom. I don't see Michael on the sidewalk out here anymore. He's in a bunch of different clubs—Model Congress, the newspaper and, I think, a gamers' one. It's a little lonely without him.

I stare at the parking lot entrance willing the Accord to appear. Nothing. I text Mom three question marks followed by three exclamation points. This is getting freaking ridiculous.

I really don't want to be late to St. Anne's today and miss any wrap-up of the Immaculate Conception meltdown. It was all Kristal and I could text about last night. She's sure that Alexis will come but that Amy has been transferred to a rehab center or hospital.

The Accord barrels into the parking lot at the same time my phone choos. It's Michael. “What are you doing on Friday? Can you come over? Help me give out candy to little kids?”

That's right. It's Halloween in four days. The past two Halloweens have been anti-holidays. Burning orange reminders of everything that's been tsunamied by the gray of Zero. Out of all the holidays, Halloween is the most friend-centric one. And for someone who had lost her friends, it was best ignored, with the TV in Mom's room cranked loud, the door shut tight so as not to hear the laughter on our street, or the joyous shouts of “Trick or treat!” And Mom, beside me on the bed, eyes blankly staring at the screen, silently praying that the bowl of candy outside our front door would stave off the ringing of the doorbell.

But now, it feels different. I can actually remember, in my body, that Halloween feeling. That jangly, twitchy buzz from candy corn, popcorn balls and the jumbo Hershey's chocolate bars that Mr. Willetz from two doors down always gave out. The exquisite selection process of the costume. The world turned upside down—in a good way—for one black velvet night.

I slide into the front passenger seat. “Michael asked me over to his house for Halloween,” I tell Mom.

Mom glances at me before accelerating, but I can't read the expression on her face. “Oh,” she says. “Do you want to go?”

“Yeah,” I answer.

“You know, he can come over to our house too,” Mom says. “I'm not working this Friday.”

I see Michael and me on the living room sofa with Mom orbiting around us, offering food, drink and Jenga. Our three voices would never match the volume at the Pitoscia house. “Um…well, he asked me to go there first,” I say. Knowing Michael, I'm sure he'd come to my place instead if I asked. But I don't want to.

“That's fine, Catherine,” Mom says quickly. “But just please invite him to our house sometime, okay?”

I study Mom's profile. Her eyebrows are scrunched together as if she's not sure how to navigate this change to our Halloween protocol. “So, are you guys like dating or going out?” she asks.

I want to lie and say we're just hanging out, no big deal, but I'm not feeling it. Lying to her so much is tiring sometimes. So I tell a half-truth. “It might be going in that direction….We'll see.”

Mom gives me a smile, but the usual exuberance is missing. Her worry is almost palpable inside the tight confines of the Accord.
What if this boy hurts her?
she's thinking.
Catherine is still so vulnerable. She can't take any more rejection.

Don't worry, Mom,
I think.
I can't be hurt anymore. I've got a plan.

I can't say that, though, obviously. So I'm silent and Mom is silent. But when we roll up to St. Anne's, Mom pulls me close for a hug, and I let her.

Pulling gently away from her, I say, “You should make plans for Friday night. Do something fun with Aunt D.”

“Maybe I will,” she says, and her smile reaches her eyes again.

When I enter Room Three, Kristal looks up from her DBT card to give me a small, serious nod. I do a quick inventory of my IOP colleagues. Amy is missing, and Alexis sits alone on their sofa, just as Kristal predicted. And today, for the first time, Alexis hasn't changed into sweats. She's still in the Immaculate Conception uniform of plaid pleated skirt, white polo shirt, maroon knee socks and loafers.

I whisper to Kristal, “This is not good,” and take my spot next to her on the sofa to supply the usual BS on my DBT form.

Everyone finishes in record time of course because of our missing member. Nobody makes a peep, not even Lil' Tommy, whose Docksides beat a rapid rhythm against the sofa.
Ba da. Ba da. Ba da.
We all look at Alexis.

Sandy takes a deep breath. “Well, I hope you all had a good weekend. Does anyone need to talk about anything?”

Again, nobody says a word. John clears his throat and adjusts his Red Sox cap. Garrett cracks his knuckles. Alexis stares at the floor. The room is quiet except for
ba da. Ba da. Ba da.

Sandy nods as if expecting this. “Okay, well, first I need to make an announcement. Amy will no longer be in our group. I can't tell you any more than that. I know you understand why.”

I glance at Kristal. She's holding herself rather rigidly, staring at Sandy.

“Okay,” Sandy continues. “Some housekeeping notes. We're starting a new step-down program. The first week of December. Instead of five days a week, the step-down group will meet two days, from three o'clock to five o'clock. The step-down program follows the same format that we use here: group discussion, activities, exercises. At this point, it looks like I'm running that group. So, we've already advised your treatment providers. It's up to them to give the okay for you to join that program.”

Wait, what?
There's an end date to our happy little group? I feel a surprising amount of disappointment.

Sandy goes on about how another group will be starting in December. Their session will probably begin at the same time that the step-down program ends—five o'clock. So to avoid any delays, the step-down program will be taking place in a different room. “It's a great space. They're finishing it up now,” Sandy says, pointing to the wall opposite the Room Three door. “Right next to this one. I just poked my head in today. Real pleather sofas,” she says, and this gets the appropriate chuckles.

Sandy takes a breath and picks up her Starbucks cup. After two gulps, she looks around at us. “Okay, let's open it up now. Does anyone want to share anything?”

Alexis raises her hand. She looks at us, her face a mixture of embarrassment and defiance. “So, about last Friday…” Her hands in her lap have suddenly mesmerized her. The pause stretches out. She seems to have lost her chutzpah.

“It's okay,” Kristal says. “You don't have to talk about it.”

I can't believe Kristal said that. She's always encouraging people to share. Me especially. And this particular topic was all she could talk about last night.

Alexis looks up quickly. Her eyes are brimming with tears that avalanche down her cheeks at the sudden movement of her head. Kristal rises and joins Alexis on her sofa. And then Kristal does a not very covert head tilt, indicating that I should hop aboard the Alexis Consolation Train.

This is not my thing. Alexis doesn't even like me that much. I can't get up and walk over there. But Kristal is giving me big eyes that scream “Get your ass over here.” And Lil' Tommy and Garrett and John are all looking at me now, expecting me to move. Even Sandy offers me an encouraging smile.

I'm not doing it. Alexis is going to ask, “What the freak is Catherine doing here?” And then she'll demand that Sandy order me back to my designated sofa.

Alexis gives a big sniffle and Kristal is almost glaring at me now.
Fine.
I get up and move across the square created by the four couches, bump my shin against the coffee table and sit next to Alexis, who actually shimmies closer to Kristal, farther from my lame carcass, and leans into her shoulder. I knew it. Jesus Christ. I thought this was supposed to be a safe zone.

But just as I'm urging my feet to propel me back to my sofa, Alexis's right hand reaches out and grabs my left hand. Her hand is sweaty and cupping a soggy Kleenex, but I hold on to it as she cries out her history with Amy.

After Alexis is finished, Kristal does the most talking. She is kind and encouraging, but there's a strange formality to her speech. Like she's reading a script. I don't know if the others sense it. I'm guessing it's because Amy's relapse has scared Kristal, made her feel more vulnerable.

“I know exactly how you feel, Alexis,” Kristal says, the bangles on her wrists silent as she grips her knees. “Trust me, it feels unbelievable to move on with your life and stop obsessing about food. That sense of control you get while you're doing it? It's a crock. It only lasts as long as the bingeing and purging do and then all the bullshit just rolls back in. You get that now, right?”

Alexis nods, her eyes holding Kristal's.

“If I can stop doing it,” Kristal says, “you can too.”

It's 11:15 p.m. and Mom is doing God knows what in her room. Every night, after my regular homework is done, I read the books on the 6888th that Bev Walker gave me and take notes on the laptop. And every night, without fail, Mom shuts me down at 10:30.

Last week, Mom freaked out when she came to kiss me good-night. I had taken
To Serve My Country, to Serve My Race
upstairs with me. The book talks all about the women of the 6888th, or WACs as they were called. (WAC stands for Women's Army Corps. That was the unit in the army that women could belong to.) I had gotten to the part in the book where the first group of WACs was sailing to England. As they got close, a German U-boat engaged them, forcing the converted cruise ship they were on to do all kinds of evasive maneuvers. It must've been scary as anything, with alarms ringing and the boat swerving left and right. The WACs could've been blown to smithereens before setting a toe on English soil. I couldn't put the book down. I wondered if Jane was on the ship, or if she had come over on the second one.

Of course, when Mom saw me on my bed with the book, she completely overreacted. Instead of being grateful that I was reading again, she had barked sharply, “Catherine, you need your sleep!” and then snatched the book out my hands like it was a bomb. So now, our new nighttime ritual, in addition to the Lamictal rash check, includes her locking down the laptop and taking both of my books hostage for the evening.