The Believing Game (11 page)

“Yeah.” I said it simply.

“Look at you, Greer Elizabeth, just embracing honesty.”

“Why were you so shocked?” Addison turned to me. “You'd seen me with Wes, right? Did you really think I was some kind of racist?” He sounded a little bit wounded. “What, because of my hair?”

“It didn't have anything to do with your hair. Or even you, really. Especially the skinhead thing — when you'd told me about him, I'd figured Joshua was Jewish.”

Hannah almost choked on her cocoa. “Exactly!”

“Honestly, right?”

“Because I have a Jewish name.” Joshua seemed peeved that we ruined his big, important discussion on race. “Sure, yes.
Stern
is traditionally a Jewish surname. I mean, I'm Jewish —”

Hannah said, “I assumed that too.”

“That's lovely for you, Hannah, that you can be our resident expert in Judaism.”

“Well, I didn't mean to imply I was an expert.” Hannah's voice shrunk back into its shell.

“While you're all busy congratulating yourselves, try to realize that you are still making assumptions based on the color of my skin. Which is prejudice, no matter what you want to dress it up as.”

Addison's face looked like granite. He sat perfectly still, as if he'd checked out and left the rest of us behind to defend ourselves. I could tell he knew what Joshua meant. He didn't speak up, though.

So I did. “I'm sorry if we said something to offend you.”
Hannah nodded next to me. “Could you explain what I said that was hurtful?” Dr. Saggurti would be proud of my conflict-resolution skills.

Joshua sat still and silent. Sophie said, “I assumed that because you're black, you couldn't also be Jewish.” Joshua snapped his fingers and pointed at her. He nodded. She nodded. Addison nodded. Hannah and I just looked at each other.

“Don't question my faith because of the color of my skin. All of you white boys and girls have grown up as members of a majority population.” He raised up his hand to ward off an objection that Addison hadn't had the chance to voice. “And don't you talk to me about your African American roommate. Wes has grown up with every advantage too. None of you are aware of the assumptions you make.” Hannah pursed her lips like she had something to say. I wished I could will her into speaking up. But she didn't. She sat there and I sat there and we all listened to Joshua tell us how important his Judaism was to him. Addison squeezed my hand between us. And just as the silence stretched into something painful, Jared and Wes tumbled in through the kitchen.

“God, it is so beautiful here. We should go out for a hike.”

“We need to be a little careful,” Sophie said. “I'm sorry — I just don't know who my dad has checking up on the place.”

“Well, you know if someone called the cops, they'd haul my ass in first,” Joshua said.

Wes laughed. “Because you're black or because you're old? I'm sure I'd be right behind you, Joshua.”

He stood up. “I might not appreciate your complete and utter insensitivity, but you happen to be the only honest individual in this room. I commend you for that. Now if you'll all excuse me, I'd like some time to reflect before we
gather together for an evening session.” Joshua started up the stairs. “Don't worry, brother,” he called down to Addison. “I will leave the master suite for you and Greer.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Sophie grimace. “That's not necessary,” I said.

“Leave it be,” Addison said. “He's just making a point.”

“But that's Sophie's parents' room. We're not staying at some random bed-and-breakfast.”

Sophie started clearing the mugs and spoons. “It's really not a big deal.”

“Sophie —”

But she cut me off. “My mom and dad are pretty much separated. It's a perfectly nice bed. Someone should fuck in it.”

“Jesus. Why is it that I always catch the tail end of these conversations?” Wes propped his feet on the steamer trunk in front of the sofa. “Is that the kind of session Joshua was talking about? Count me in.”

“You're such a perv,” Hannah muttered. “You okay, Greer?”

Sometimes people surprise you. Hannah actually seemed like she cared. “Oh, I'm good. We're all just having fun, right?” My voice sounded hollow even to me. “If it's okay, though, I'm going to lie down. If you want to pile the mugs and stuff in the sink, I'll clean up.”

Sophie seemed to soften a little. “It's fine.” She looked up. “Dinner was really great. I had no idea you could actually cook.”

I unwrapped Addison's fingers from my hand. “Neither did I.” If I didn't ask him, I knew Addison wouldn't follow me upstairs. He wasn't like that. Especially after all the stupid sex comments, Addison would know enough to give me some space. Still, I cringed a little when the old wooden steps
creaked below my feet. I just wanted to find my room and lie down. I didn't want to risk Joshua stopping by for a private talk.

Mr. and Mrs. Delia's room was easy to pick out: right at the top of the stairs. It had a peaked roof and an enormous iron bed. It must have been directly above the den downstairs, because there was a second version of the stone fireplace in the middle of the room. When I closed the door, I could barely make out the voices below. Someone laughed and dishes clattered into the sink. The party went on without me. Or Joshua.

When I look back, maybe that's the first time I felt like something was truly wrong. Not even Addison's mood swings or Joshua's sleepover had sounded whatever personal alarm system of instinct was wired up my spine. But in that grand house, surrounded by my friends, I didn't feel safe. I locked the bedroom door.

When I first woke up, I'd forgotten where we were. The bed stretched a lot wider than the narrow dorm cot at school. I knew that much. The quilt felt soft and fresh. The sun had eased down and streaked the sky with pink. I could still see the feathery silhouettes of the pine trees outside, though. My eyes adjusted and I remembered the room.

Even half-asleep, I knew Addison was with me. Somewhere, under that beamed roof. We were linked like that. It took a few seconds to remember that Joshua was there too and that we'd made him so angry. I lay back on the big bed and dreaded the next few hours. I consoled myself with the idea that afterward, after whatever sharing and caring Joshua had orchestrated for that night, Addison and I would climb the spiral staircase up to this room and I'd finally have the chance to fall asleep with him right there.

I peed, threw some water on my face, and brushed my teeth. I stood at the top of the stairs and, for a little bit, I got to just look down and watch everyone. Jared, Wes, and Addison had found some old video-game thing and plugged it in. Hannah sat in the corner, in a pile of pillows. She bent over her leather journal, writing. Sophie and Joshua sat at the breakfast bar in the kitchen. Their heads bent close together, deep in discussion about something. There was a bowl
between them catching peanut shells, but at first, I thought they were dropping tiny shreds of brown paper there. When I had to explain it, I figured they were writing wishes on little scraps of paper. That seemed like the kind of activity Joshua would have planned for us.

Joshua looked up first, held my eyes for a second. He cracked a nut between his teeth and called up, “Hello, beauty.” He smiled. It's not like he looked like a jackal or something. He looked like a friendly uncle or a patient chaperone. Sophie looked up and smiled. Addison shot up and bounded up the steps.

“You're awake.” He grabbed me around the waist and twirled me down the last few steps.

“God, you two are obnoxious.” It was Sophie, but when I turned to face her, she was smiling again — same old Sophie, no trace of the bitterness that seemed to have puckered everything when we first arrived at the house. She even tousled my hair. “You actually slept — how was the room?”

“The room's amazing. Sophie. Are you sure it's okay for us to be up there?”

“Yeah, it's fine. Joshua's in my grandparents' room —”

“Tell her where we are.” Hannah set down her book. She rose and stretched. “Greer, you might want to trade.”

Jared cackled. “Greer, you have to see this. You're going to feel like you and Add won the bedroom lottery.”

“Guys, it's not that bad. I'm telling you, it's actually kind of fun.” Sophie laughed.

I peeked into their room and saw the four sets of bunk beds — eight little mattresses topped with alternating blue and red comforters. On my right, a steel set of lockers gleamed against the wall. The kids' room.

“So we can push all these beds together later on, right?” Jared reached up to pat one of the upper bunks. “Or we'll just drag all the mattresses into the center of the room and build a love nest.”

“I think you should just reserve the far bunk by the window,” Addison suggested. “That way, if you start acting up, the girls can just shove you out.” He picked up the duffel Jared had dropped on the blue bunk closer to us.

Before he moved it, Sophie blurted out, “Just leave that bed, okay?” Addison turned back and looked at me with wide eyes. We didn't need to be detectives to figure out whose bed he'd been headed toward. Sophie must have seen his look of horror because she pretty much just flung herself toward Jared. “I'll have to find a way to fight him off somehow.” She smiled brightly, moving us all on from the moment.

Jared bent to nibble on her ear, happy to oblige. She pretended to karate chop him in the solar plexus.

“I think it's time that we regroup in a room that might be less distracting,” Joshua announced. “The beds seem to have sidetracked young Jared's concentration.”

Jared raised his hands up, like he was a suspect emerging from a bank robbery. He backed his way through the kitchen and we followed him toward the great room.

Addison hung back with me in the kitchen and shot me a worried look. “It's okay,” I told him.

“I feel awful.” He shook his head. “What happened? What if she hasn't been back here since —”

I had thought about that. “If that's true — and we don't know it's true — maybe that's what she needed. She didn't have to say yes to this.” He looked dubiously at me. “It might have felt like she had to agree, but Sophie's not a sucker,
you know. She does what she wants to. Maybe this is how she wanted to come back here.”

“Addison. Elizabeth.” Joshua had apparently realized that we'd hung back. He did not sound happy about it.

“I'll try to get her alone and talk about it,” I said. “But you didn't know — you can't beat yourself up over not knowing which bed —”

Addison looked miserable. “Christ. I break everything I touch.”

I craned my head to kiss his cheek. “You're seriously the most gentle person I know.” He bent to kiss me, leaned in, and pressed me against the wall. I heard myself gasp.

And then I heard someone cough. “Ummm … Joshua asked if you would join the group.” Hannah looked like she wanted to sink into the floor. “I'm sorry if it seems like I'm always the one to have to fetch you.” She trailed off and looked back, as if worried that Joshua would yell again.

Addison kept one arm around me, but wrapped the other around Hannah. “No way, Hannah — that's on us.” He stepped ahead of both of us. “Can I get you ladies a root beer? Or other nonalcoholic cocktail beverage?”

Hannah giggled and blushed. She turned around, looked back over her shoulder. “It's okay,” Addison reassured her. “He'll wait as long as he knows I'm being a gentleman.” He reached into the fridge. “We're just gathering some drinks. Can I get anyone anything?”

“Water would be nice,” Joshua called out. “Have Elizabeth bring me some water, please.” I heard him tell Sophie to sit down. “You don't have to play hostess every second. Is there anything you want to talk to me about?”
Hannah, Addison, and I exchanged looks. Addison handed me a glass of ice water and a can of Diet Coke.

“Go see what's going on in there.”

There was not much going on. Sophie looked like she was in self-preservation mode. She sat cross-legged in one of the enormous reclining chairs. Jared sat on the floor next to her. Wes sat next to Joshua on the couch. For the most part, the room was silent, except for the crackling fire. “Sophie, you okay?” She looked up. “I mean, did you want something to drink?”

“I'm okay. Thanks.” But she wrapped her arms back around herself. I did notice one of her knees resting on Jared's shoulder.

“Anything?”

“Greer, we'd just like you to join us. That's all the refreshment we need.” Joshua said it between sips of the water I'd just brought him. He patted the sofa. “You know where you should sit.” He gestured to Wes. “That might actually be Hannah's spot. We'll see how she feels.”

Wes mumbled and dove into the other recliner. “Joshua, you just like to surround yourself with the ladies. That's how I feel.”

“Are we already talking about feelings?” Addison handed out the cans of soda he'd been juggling. Hannah stood on the edge of the room until Joshua motioned her to sit near him. I watched her eyes move around the group, taking stock of everyone's positions and expressions. I wondered if she read the room at the same temperature as I had. “What feeling are we focusing on first, Joshua?” Addison draped himself across the love seat. Sometimes it shocked me how giant he looked. He filled up the sofa like it was a chair. He cracked
open the soda and raised it up to the group. “To feelings!” he said.

“I thought that we would discuss defensiveness first.”

Addison grimaced. “Well, I don't want to toast to defensiveness.”

“That surprises me a bit. It seems to be a feeling that many people close to you embrace.”

Sophie looked up and met my eyes, as if to say,
here we go
.

Wes spoke first. “Well, Joshua, I don't mean any disrespect, but I don't really consider that a feeling we should focus on.”

“Is that so?” Joshua asked, in his bored voice.

“Defensiveness isn't really a feeling, you know. Being defensive is an action. Right? It's a behavior. Maybe we should try to pinpoint a feeling that's at the root of defensiveness.”

“You all speak like such frauds.”

“Hey —” Addison set down his drink. “That's a little unnecessary.”

“No, it's absolutely vital. Do you hear yourselves? Do you hear the people you've surrounded yourself with? I'm trying to confront you about your inability to discuss matters in any real or true way and you're feeding me this self-help crap they've been spooning down your throats at your rich-kid rehab. I'm tired of wasting my time.”

It's not like it was the first time I'd thought of it. But I really wanted to ask at that moment: What was the rest of Joshua's life like? Had he been married? Didn't he have family that would miss him over the weekend? Friends his age? How could his whole life revolve around Addison?

But then again, mine did. “Joshua, we're sorry,” I said. “You get used to talking a certain way, you know.” Addison looked at me gratefully.

“I expect you to be stronger than that, Elizabeth.” But the edge on his voice had softened a little. “Maybe we need to shift the room.”

“What does that even mean?” Wes asked. He sounded done with the whole thing. Over it already. I caught Addison motioning slightly with his hand.
Back it up. Calm down.

I tried to help, asking, “How can we do that?”

“Candles. We'll shut the lights and use candles.”

I looked to Sophie, who said, “Okay, we just have to be careful, you know —”

“No one's going to move once we light the candles,” Joshua commanded, and so Sophie pretty much leapt up for the kitchen cupboard. Jared's eyes shifted around the room, first following her and then appearing to yearn for the front door. Someone in Sophie's family must have owned stock in Yankee Candle. Maybe that's where they got all their money. By the time she finished lighting the jars, the tapers, and the little tea lights on saucers, we must have had fifteen or sixteen flickering wicks. And because they all had different fruity scents, it smelled like we'd bombed a produce stand.

As soon as we got all the candles lit, Joshua reached out and shut the lamp. He motioned for Addison to switch off the kitchen lights and he did. We were doused in shadows. It sounded as if everyone exhaled at once. I expected all of the flames to waver because of it.

“Now.” Joshua had adjusted his voice to his slow groove. “Why don't we try this again? I want you all to sit back. You've arrived with a lot of secrets bundled up. We're going to unpack them. There are some of you in this room” — I watched him zero in on Wes — “who don't seem to understand that you have obviously faltered. But we must acknowledge the fact that this faltering has led you to this
moment. I would never have had the opportunity to meet you if you'd been living your life at its highest capacity for success and fulfillment. Is that understood?”

I saw heads slowly nod across the room. “There are others of you in this room who see yourselves as flawed.” Hannah looked down at her lap. Addison's eyes slid toward me. That stung a tiny bit. Did he see me as damaged? Or did he just think that's how I viewed myself? I had this urge to reach out to him, to burrow in. But Joshua seemed to sense that and I felt his papery hand touch my arm instead. “Let the burdens fall away. That's all I'm asking right now.” Joshua's hand brushed down my wrist. He laced his fingers in mine. “I'm going to challenge you to sit for five minutes of silence.”

It sounded simple enough, but those minutes crawled. I kept my eyes closed for the first bit, and when I eased them open and peeked, everyone else sat with eyes shut. Except Wes, whose eyes flicked around the room. When they met mine, he winked. He was trying to make the best of things, but I worried about him. It wasn't easy to exist in Joshua's harsh glare. I knew why I put up with it, but probably Wes wasn't in love with Addison, so I wondered a little.

“Addison, does everyone know what your life was like before you saved yourself?”

“Yes,” I said. “We've talked a lot about that.” I didn't want to hear any more about what a brute Addison had once been.

Joshua spoke coldly. “Elizabeth. Please don't interfere with Addison's ability to be truthful. If you want to coddle yourself, that's fine. Let him be the warrior he is.” I heard choking coming from the far corner.

Wes waved off our concern. “I'm fine. Sorry, sorry.” He held up his root beer. “Went down the wrong pipe.”

“Addison,” Joshua ordered. We sat in silence for another full minute before he spoke.

“It wasn't just that I was lost. I felt like there was a darkness. But not just around me — inside of me. I felt eaten up by it. Devoured. When I drank or smoked weed or took pills, I could look away from it. I remember feeling so alone. And then so angry. I guess I drank to move from loneliness to rage.”

“Why aim for the rage? Why was that preferable?”

Addison didn't hesitate. It almost sounded like he saw the question coming. “I guess rage felt less vulnerable.” I heard his low, wry chuckle. “When I was swinging away at someone, at least I was connecting.”

“Why did you sober up?”

“It was at a party. You know, just a bunch of townies getting together. Someone's parents had left for the weekend. The kid — the kid whose house it was — I'd played Little League with him way back. But the only reason I know that” — Addison paused, inhaled. Exhaled — “His parents faced a bunch of lawsuits afterward. For providing alcohol. Unsafe environment. They lost their house.” He'd never shared that part of the story with me.