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That’s what it feels like. Another hit to the jaw.

HOW CAN THEY DO THIS?

They gave BIRTH to us. They WANTED to form a family.

What’s the point of a family if you can’t stay together?

WHAT IS SO SPECIAL ABOUT GHANA?

We were SPPOED to have Christmas together. You were looking forward to it. You were going to buy a new botanically correct plastic TREE this weekend. Shop for gifts.

Now what? What can you buy the parents who have EVERYTHING? Who face the

IRRESISTIBLE temptation of “exciting research opportunities” in exotic lands, SO exciting that they have to hold a FAMILY MEETING to announce the glad tidings of their imminent

departure, and oh, by the way, hold that cheer and 86 the tree, Christmas has been postponed until further notice.

You should have known when you got home from work and saw that the DINING ROOM

TABLE had been set up. No kitchen-table dinner for news like this, no sir!

You wish you HAD suspected, because you might have thought of an INTELLIGENT argument,

you might have somehow CONVINCED them that they were doing the wrong thing, that it

wouldn’t KILL them to WAIT until spring or summer OR JUST FIND A JOB CLOSE TO

HOME, FOR GOD’S SAKE.

But you didn’t.

Instead you just blurted out, “You’re leaving before Christmas? You’re not even going to be here for THAT?”

Which only made them defensive, and Dad went on and on about how this was a once-in-a-

lifetime chance, and hey, the trip’s not going to be too long, really, just TWO OR THREE

MONTHS, and afterward they’ll be home for a long time — besides, Grandma and Grandpa

would LOVE to have you and Ted to Pasadena for Christmas, they’ll spoil you silly!

“It’s not the same!” you said.

Now Dad was sweating and Mom was looking all concerned, but their firm voices and pitying eyes meant they’d talked it out, weighed the options, maybe even reserved the tickets —

probably during all those whispered conversations you heard behind doors that were shut solid because YOUR OPINION DOESN’T COUNT.

And you knew that arguing was no use, that you were too emotional, you weren’t going to convince them of anything, and the best you could do was make them feel awful.

Which you did.

And that was just fine.

So what are you doing?

Sitting up here in your cramped little room, writing your guts out.

While Ted and Mom and Dad mumble downstairs.

You are out of here.

Mon. Night

Tues. Morning

Whatever

Why do things happen the way they do?

Why do you have arguments that make you think the world is coming to an end, and your own trivial, stupid self-pity makes you run away to a place where the end of the world rushes up to meet you?

Was it FATE that you went to Alex’s after you left your house. Or had you KNOWN? Had you read between the lines and ANTICIPATED what had happened?

No. Don’t give yourself too much credit.

You just wanted to see him, that’s all. You thought that somewhere deep inside he’d understand how you felt.

How HE was feeling hadn’t entered your mind at all.

You just rang and rang, but no one answered.

You remembered that Mrs. Snyder had a book discussion group on Monday night. Somewhere in the neighborhood. Paula was at her sleepover.

Alex? Asleep probably.

So you stomped back out to the car, still angry at Mom and Dad.

You almost drove away.

But the noise stopped you. For a moment you put aside your rage and listened.

A car engine.

It sounded funny. Muffled. It was coming from the Snyders’ driveway, but the driveway was empty.

And the garage door was closed.

Your mind blanked.

But your body reacted.

You shot out of the car. Bolted up the driveway. Grabbed the garage handle and pulled.

It was locked.

So you pounded hard. But your only answer was the soft purr of the engine beyond the door.

You raced to the Snyders’ back door and yanked up the welcome mat.

You grabbed the spare key, ran back to the garage door, and opened it.

Fumes. Exhaust everywhere.

Your eyes itched. Your lungs filled. You squinted, coughing.

Through the haze you spotted the car-door handle, so you pulled it.

The door swung open.

Smoke wafted out, revealing a leg.

Alex’s.

He was sprawled across the backseat.

You dived in. You put your hand to his chest.

It was rising and falling. Slowly.

You reached under the seat, turned off the ignition, then hooked your arms under his and pulled him out. Onto the lawn, away from the exhaust.

You checked for a pulse. There, but barely.

Next thing you knew, you were in the kitchen calling 911. Maybe the door was open, maybe you used the key, you don’t remember.

When the ambulance came, you were slapping Alex’s face, shouting his name, trying to revive him.

You were aware that Mrs. Snyder was there too, that she’d arrived just about when the

ambulance did, that she was crying and shouting at you — but you weren’t hearing her. You were watching Alex. You were seeing the white-sleeved arms lifting him. You were listening to the briskly shouted words, hoping for an encouraging sign. You saw your friend being

swallowed up by tubes and straps as he floated on a stretcher into a waiting ambulance whose doors slammed shut, locking him away from you.

Then you were riding with Mrs. Snyder in her car, the windows open to air out the fumes, following the ambulance as it shrieked through the streets, stopping traffic and running red lights.

She pulled into the hospital parking lot in time for you to see him being carried into the building, and one of the technicians had the presence of mind to tell you Alex was alive, he was breathing OK. And you held onto hope even though you were aware of what the technician didn’t say —

that Alex was going to be all right. That he was going to live.

All you could do was pull yourself together enough to find the waiting room with Mrs. Snyder, whose face was red and swollen and streaked with tears.

As you sat huddled next to each other on a sofa, the events began replaying in your mind —

could you have been quicker, should you have given mouth-to-mouth, should you have dragged him out first and THEN turned off the car?

Mrs. Snyder was sobbing, saying she shouldn’t have gone to her book discussion group, she should have stayed home, Alex was acting so strange today, so HAPPY, as if he knew it was all about to end, as if he were looking forward to a trip.

And the word SUICIDE was elbowing its way into your brain — that’s what it was, a suicide attempt, your best friend tried to take his own life, and even though you knew that from the moment you found him in the car, it stunned you to finally give a name to what he did.

His words were coming back to you — the hints and signals that now seemed so LODU AND

CLEAR. And you realized that all along, while you thought he wasn’t confiding in you, he WAS. He was telling you EVERYTHING. In the muttered comments about life being

worthless. In the way he insisted that NOTHING MATTERED. In his refusal to find job in the obvious places. Even in his silences he was opening his soul to you, showing you that somehow, for reasons he couldn’t understand, it had been emptied.

And today he was cleaning out his locker.

HE WAS CLEANING OUT HIS LOCKER.

Could anything have been more obvious? Did he have to hold a sign up to your face? Write you a good-bye note?

You should have stayed with him then. You should have called Mr. Winslow and told him you couldn’t work and spent the day shoulder to shoulder with your best friend until he snapped out of it, no matter how long it took, no matter if it meant taking him yourself to Dr. Welsch.

You told Mrs. Snyder that you should have seen it coming — or maybe she said it to you, you can’t remember.

Time passed — five minutes, maybe a half hour, but it seemed like months — and Mrs. Snyder spent most of it on the phone, arranging for Paula to stay at her friend’s house for the time being, explaining the situation to the parents but lying like crazy to Paula, telling her Alex has food poisoning. Finally a doctor called you both into a quiet hallway, where he said that Alex was alive and sleeping. His blood and lungs showed early signs of carbon monoxide poisoning, but he was in stable condition.

Stable.

Which is better than critical.

It means he’ll live.

The doctor told us we couldn’t see Alex yet, he was still under observation, that we should go home, get some sleep, and wait for a call in the morning.

You felt a little relieved as you walked back to the waiting room. You called Mom and Dad from a pay phone and explained what had happened. You told them that you wanted to stay until you KNEW Alex was better. Mom insisted on coming to pick you up.

She arrived a few minutes later. You tried not to cry but you couldn’t help it, you’d been holding it in all day — and before long Mom’s shoulder was wet on the left side from your tears and on the right from Mrs. Snyder’s.

Mrs. Snyder wanted to wait overnight, in case Alex woke up and needed her. Mom couldn’t convince her to come back and rest.

So Mom and you left together a little after 10:00. On the way home, you filled in all the details for her, and you repeated them to Dad and Ted a few minutes later, around the kitchen table.

You could barely get the words out, and as you spoke you relived the scene a hundred times, and you HATED when they told you that you’d DONE THE RIGHT THINGS, when they tried to

make something POSITIVE out of what was really a botched rescue of a botched life, the last-ditch effort a friend who listened but never heard, who reacted instead of acted, who stepped in only after it was too late.

No. You don’t KNOW it’s too late. He may pull through fine.

But what’s FINE, Ducky? What’s fine for ALEX? Sliding back into the prison of himself?

Knowing that the one time he tried to DO something about his situation he FAILED? And now, in addition to the gloom and the emptiness, he’ll have to deal with the humiliation that everyone KNOWS what he did?

Will you, Mrs. Snyder, Ms. Krueger, and everyone else who cares about him have to spend each day worrying, monitoring him, suspecting every absence from school, interpreting each change in his attitude, fearing any sudden show of happiness?

Will he be able to live with all that?

Will he try again?

And if he does, will YOU be ready? Will you read the handwriting on the wall when things begin to spin out of control?

How could he DO this? How could ANYONE do something so stupid? Give up a WHOLE

LIFE, a hundred thousand sunrises and starry nights and comforts and conflicts and triumphs and dreams? How could he do this to US? DEVASTATE the people who love him. Did he realize that if he’d succeeded, our own lives would be torn apart.

Listen to yourself, Ducky.

You’ve changed.

No more hopeless optimist.

The OPTIMIST in you would see a silver lining. He’d see that this might be a wake-up call to everyone. That now Alex will get the RIGHT kind of attention. That maybe he’d gone as low as he can go, and now he’ll start the climb out.

Maybe.

You can only hope.

And be there until it happens.

What a Difference a Night Makes

It’s after 3 A.M.

Mom has just left.

She and Dad haven’t been able to sleep either.

She told you over and over that you couldn’t have done any more than you did. That YOU were the only one who suspected how serious Alex’s problem was. That you shouldn’t blame yourself for not predicting a suicide attempt. NO ONE wants to believe that will ever happen.

She reminded you that you saved his life. No one else did.

You listened. You tried to let that idea in. You don’t know if you can.

Then, as you were thinking, fighting back tears and exhaustion, she took your hand and quietly offered to cancel her travel plans. She and Dad had discussed it and agreed that they didn’t HAVE to go to Ghana. They would stay if you needed them around.

You weren’t expecting that. And your brain was too fried to even process the idea.

But Mom said not to worry. You didn’t have to answer right away. You could think about it.

Sometime.

Like tomorrow.

Today.

Whatever.

Transcript of a Phone Call

at 8 A.M.

Mrs. Snyder: “Is this Ducky?”

Ducky: “Yes! HOW IS HE?”

Mrs. S: “Wide-awake. Walking around and talking with the nurses. He’s going to make a one hundred percent recovery.”

You shouted the news. Mom, Dad, and Ted all rush in, relieved.

Mrs. S: “He had JUST passed out when you reached him, Ducky. So the damage wasn’t too severe. I hope you realize what you did. I don’t know how I can ever repay you.”

D: “You can’t! I mean, this NEWS is repayment! When is he coming home?”

Mrs. S: “At noon.”

D: “TODAY?”

School.

You’ll be in school.

You CAN’T.

You can’t imagine facing other people today.

You look at Mom and Dad, and they’re reading your mind, both nodding yes. Dad’s making a gentle palms-down gesture that implies STAY.

Mrs. S: “Ducky, I just spoke to my brother Dave, who’s a doctor in Chicago. I told him what happened, and he asked tons of questions — How has Alex behaved? What has he said? It turns out that there are warning signs all of us missed. Signs that can be mistaken for other things, like depression. Alex has some serious problems, Ducky. Things that are beyond all our love and attention. Anyway, Dave’s affiliated with a recovery center there, and I’ve enrolled Alex. I hope to have him on a flight by tonight.”

You can’t believe it. After all this, Alex is going to be sent away.

D: “Can I come over at noon to talk to him? My mom and dad will let me.”