What's Broken Between Us (19 page)

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J
onathan spends Saturday in his room, and I spend it in mine. I emerge around four to find the house empty. Standard Dad is at my uncle’s watching the game, and Mumsy just left, meeting sorority-sister Clara at the club for a massage, facial, and post-spa salad. Jonathan’s not in his room.

When the sun goes down and I’m still alone in the house, I start to get antsy. I call Jonathan’s phone three times—no answer each time. I try Henry’s cell and leave a message, in case there’s the slightest chance Sutton’s missing, too. He doesn’t answer, but a few seconds later I get a text.

She’s here, he’s not, I’m sorry.
Is there anything I can do?

I begin to pace. I want to rip my hair out. Everyone gone,
hiding, and I’m here with nothing left to do but wonder where they are. I can’t take it anymore, so I get in my car and go. I drive to Starbucks—no sign of Jonathan. On my way home, I pass the church where the AA meeting is taking place right now. Gary’s promise—
it can help
—is ringing in my ears. I wonder if this stuck with Jonathan, too; if maybe after everything that happened with Sutton at the Riverwalk, he thought to come here. I wait in the parking lot until the meeting gets out, in case. But when the AA meeting ends and a few people trickle out, there’s no sign of my brother.

My father’s in the living room when I get home; he stands when I come in. I watch the relief pass over his face, but notice that it doesn’t stick around.

“He’s still not home?” My voice is tight.

My father shakes his head. He motions for me to sit next to him. I curl up on the other end of the couch; he pulls the blanket down off the back of the couch and drapes it over my lap.

“I was out looking for him,” I say.

“I was thinking about going out to look for him,” he says. “But I realized I had no idea where to go.”

“I checked Starbucks. And the AA meeting.”

“Has been going to them?”

“I don’t think so. It was a long shot.”

“I wish he would go.”

“You think it will help?”

He thinks about this for a while before he shrugs. “I went once. A friend in college asked me to take him.”

“What’s it like?”

“It’s . . . intense, I guess. To me it was. But they say this prayer at the beginning—they call it the serenity prayer,” he says.

I nod. I’ve heard of it, thanks to all the addict characters in movies. “Accept the things you cannot change, or something?”

“Right,” he says. “I’ve been thinking about that . . . about the things I maybe could have changed. About the things that maybe I still can.”

“I think the prayer is for letting go.”

“Yeah,” he says. “Well, I’ve done too much of that already.”

“Dad?”

“I was a rebel.” It’s a Standard Dad way to start off a lecture—
this is how I relate, I know what it’s like
. I feel a strong urge to laugh. “But I was responsible, too—and your mother, she was . . . let’s just say she had her own ideas and her own agenda.” At this, the faintest smile appears. “We never wanted to be like our parents, who hated music and scrutinized everything on television; everything we did, said, wore. We stayed out all night, went to great parties, made the usual mistakes. But our parents had no idea, and the things we did, we hid from them, knowing they’d disapprove anyway. It tore us from them, made them impossible to trust. Your mother and I didn’t want to be like that. We wanted to keep our lives; we wanted to work hard and play hard, and we wanted you guys to have your own lives, too. We thought that would make us all closer. Plus, who were we to punish you kids? Your mother always said that punishment was inhibitory, it created shame. I still believe some of that . . . but now . . . I
don’t know. Maybe learning the hard way is the only way; maybe nothing I said would have made a difference.”

I can picture my father at age twenty-four, getting married, graduating with a DDS, talking about kids in the distant future, paying a mortgage—I can see him not wanting to get lost in the world of his parents; having an idea for creating trust—no space for rules, no reason to lie.

In their perfect vision, we would learn to be independent like they were, and we’d love them for letting us make our own decisions. But our mistakes were too big. Maybe it could have worked—maybe it’s not his fault it didn’t.

The truth is, there are things Jonathan and I needed them for; things I don’t even know how to talk about or pinpoint, but still feel like I’m missing. Or maybe everyone feels this way—like they’ve failed or been failed somehow. Families: letting each other down since the beginning of time.

“I don’t know why Jonathan drove that night,” I say.

My dad hesitates; he taps his fingers against the arm of the couch three times, thinking. “What about what he’s
doing
?”

Of course my dad has noticed Jonathan’s reckless behavior; what’s surprising is that he’s talking about it with me.

“I don’t know,” I say. “It’s not good, though, Dad.”

“What do you think is wrong?” he says.

“I don’t know where to start,” I say. “He’s going to speak at my school on Monday. I’m afraid of what he’s going to say. I’m afraid it will be like
Lifeline
.”

My dad’s face turns concerned, but there’s something
defensive in his voice. “I’ll try to talk to him.”

For now,
try
is good enough.

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I
don’t see much of Jonathan the rest of the weekend. I only hear him when he comes in on Sunday night, dropped off by a car that rumbles like Wren’s Jeep. It idles in our driveway, and from my room I listen as Jonathan runs back down the stairs just a minute after I heard him come up. I blow open my door, ready to catch him. My father catches him first.

“Where have you been?”

“You can’t leave for days and not tell us.”

“There are rules in this house.”

“We’re serious about your curfew!”

I stand at the top of the steps, hidden from view, as I’m not sure I want to be seen now that my dad is yelling. It’s the most
I’ve ever heard my dad pull from chapter 3: “Punishment.”

Jonathan stands there, tapping his foot, hands on his hips, smiling, like he’s ready to pat my dad on the back and say “Worthy effort” or “Good one.” But my dad moves in front of the door, blocking it.

“Come on,” Jonathan says. He’s speaking in a low, taunting tone—the same one he would always use on Sutton when he caught her being mean to someone in the halls. I only catch the rest of what he says in snippets. “I’m legally an adult,” and “Give me a break.” He ends with, “Do you hear yourself?”

I think my dad is going to crack—but his expression hardens, and he has to take a moment to collect himself. This is the Standard Dad he never wanted to be—I wish I could whisper in his ear that he’s been him all along, the joke version. Now he can take the role to new and brave places.

“Call your friend who’s outside to let her know you won’t be going out tonight.”

Jonathan’s very still, staring at our dad, waiting for him to snap back to predictable and lax. My dad looks like he’s holding his breath, but he stands his ground; he doesn’t move. Even after Jonathan rolls his eyes, laughs like he’s mocking a child, throws up his hands with a “whatever, man,” and turns back up the stairs, not even acknowledging me as he passes. He slams his bedroom door and locks it—and my dad hasn’t moved. I wait for my dad to look up here, ready to give him a thumbs-up. As cheesy as that seems, I think maybe he needs it. It’s hard for me, too, watching my brother shut himself away. Before I can catch
Dad’s eye, my mother opens the door of her room. She rushes to Jonathan’s door, starts to knock, but—knowing better—gently tries the door handle.

She storms past me, down the stairs, and when she’s in front of my dad, she shakes her head the same way Jonathan did. Then she walks away from him too.

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“
H
ellooo,” Dawn coos on the phone on Monday morning. I’m sitting in my car at the back of the school parking lot, since the first bell hasn’t rung yet. She pauses, waiting for me to match her enthusiasm. “Finally, Amanda! Even though it was technically your turn to call me.”

“Oh,” I say. I hadn’t actually noticed. “So I guess I lose this round.” I don’t point out that if these are the rules of phone tag, she lost the last round.

“Where’ve you been?”

The answer is a combination of things I don’t know how to explain to her. Especially the part about spending this morning having a ham, egg, and cheese croissant with Henry, and
kissing with greasy lips in the parking lot afterward, and how even though it was as good as it gets being there with him, my mind was still on my brother, currently a shut-in, soon to be on the stage of the Garfield High auditorium.

“I’ve been around,” is what I tell her.

She says, “That’s lame-o” a word she never added an excess letter to before, and goes on about her weekend of debauchery.

“Crazy, right?” she says, capping off a story about skinny-dipping. “You’ll see when you get here.”

“Mm-hmm.”

“I can’t believe you won’t get your acceptance letter for another few months. You totally have to apply to the same dorm as me.”

“Mmm.”

“I know you’ll get in. I mean, your SAT scores alone were—” She’s yammering on about nothing to fill the silence. The distance feels like detachment—I didn’t think it would happen to us, but here we are. I can hardly find room to be sad about it, I’m so disappointed and bemused by what her life at UCSB has become.

“I don’t know, Dawn. I’m not sure I’ll be happy in Santa Barbara. I’m not sure it’s the kind of place I want to be next year. Or ever, for that matter.”

She takes this as the insult it was meant to be, as all I know of Santa Barbara and UCSB is what she’s told me, and she gasps. She surprises me by crying.

Dawn’s aware I’m applying to other schools, some in the city,
some in Michigan, some on the East Coast. Mumsy didn’t give me an application-fee limit, and my hidden talent is writing personal essays, so why the hell not? Still, I didn’t actually think I’d look at any other acceptances as anything more than ego boosters and safety nets, and I’m sure Dawn didn’t either.

“You’ve never been to college.” She’s fast to continue because she knows this is the kind of obvious statement I don’t have the tolerance for in an argument. “And you’ve never been to California.” She sniffles. “Disneyland doesn’t count.”

Fair enough.

“You have no idea what it’s like here,” she says. “You don’t know what it’s like to be around all these new people, to have no one to answer to, to have the freedom of going to bed whenever you want and not having eight hours blocked off for school. Study hard, play hard—it’s what people do here. They balance their life, but they don’t close themselves off from new things, and they aren’t afraid of being crazy once in a while.”

My head started spinning at the word “balance.” I blow up the second there’s a break in her tirade. “I’ve always had freedom!” Doesn’t she see? I have that—no curfew, no bedtime, no one wagging their finger at me if I decided to go “crazy.” “I would never want to use my so-called freedom on keggers and karaoke bars!”

“Sorry I’m not spending all my time in my room on the phone with you, or shut up in the library!” The sadness fades from her voice and is replaced with fury. “Sorry every Friday night isn’t a movie night for me anymore. Sorry I’m actually talking to people
at parties instead of sequestering myself in the corner, complaining that it’s too crowded.” She pauses for a second to catch her breath. “Not every night out ends in a tragedy, Amanda!” Her anger is so explosive, I think it must have been building inside of her for a long time.

I’m speechless. It’s true I’m depressing, uptight, closed off, like Jonathan said at the diner. Unnecessarily bitter, ridiculously cautious. But I have no idea how
not
to be those things.

“And not all frat guys are douche bags,” she says in a small voice.

My chest is aflutter; my feelings are warring between
excitement
, because obviously Dawn likes one of these frat boys, and irritation, because this proves more than anything else how much I really don’t know about her life there. But the desire to ask her about him is so strong, I almost forget that I’m hurt and furious.

“And I know about what really went down between you and Graham,” she says. “Or should I say, you and Henry.”

I sit there with my mouth open, no words coming out.

“You’re not the only one from home I talk to. And nothing in high school stays a secret.” She says this with the certainty of someone who really has left all of that behind her. It’s real jealousy I feel now.

“I’ve only been here fifty-eight days, Amanda,” she says. “I’m still getting the hang of it. I thought you of all people would understand.”

“Dawn, I . . .” But I don’t know what to say. I’m so used to apologizing; always, always, always having something to be sorry
for. It’s not supposed to be like this with Dawn.

“Just forget it,” she says, hanging up.

By now, I know: people only ever say that about things that are impossible to really forget.

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A
t school there are Chicago Cares posters everywhere, T-shirts for sale, a giant pot in front of the auditorium for planting “the seeds of your wishes for the future”—the whole shebang. The assembly starts after second period, and everyone is buzzing with energy as we’re shuffled into the auditorium, too happy about missing class to realize what they’re here for.
Ignorance is bliss.

I spot Henry farther down the same row I’m in. Since the seats curve in a half circle around the stage, I can see him perfectly. It’s the closest to comfort I’m going to get.

The same woman who spoke at the homecoming assembly enters the stage. She talks more about Grace, this time less about
how she’s gone and more about how she was killed, divulging details of the accident. For shock value, I think. And then she introduces Jonathan.

I hate that Grace will always be remembered like this.
For
this. Associated with a car accident that should have been prevented. The words “died instantly.” My brother.
Lifeline.
Smokey the Bear. And now, this speech.

Jonathan comes to the stage. No one applauds, though I notice a few people looking around, like they aren’t used to silence after a speaker introduction. Jonathan’s in jeans and a T-shirt. The jeans are new, and they fit. The shirt is an old one, and too big, but it’s one of his favorites. Light blue—like his eyes—with
The Rolling Stones
written four times across the front. He raises the mic before he starts.

“My name is Jonathan Tart. I’m only here because my probation officer forced me to be here. And because this makes my baby sister nervous, and I still get great pleasure in annoying her.”

A joke. And people actually laugh, a little.

“But now that I’m standing here, I think I should have listened to her. This is uncomfortable as hell. I used to love a crowd. Now I want you all to have rocks, and I want you to throw them. Because honestly, that would hurt less.”

He looks away from us for the first time. But not for long.

“I’m not going to pretend you guys don’t know what I’m talking about . . . you knew her . . . some of you . . .”

Jonathan looks around at us all, not leaving anyone out.

“So I could tell you how much this sucks, how horrible
prison is, how probation feels just as shitty; and waking up every day is even worse. But this is a ride you’ve got to try for yourself.”

His scanning eyes stop right on me.

“So do it.”

Someone in the crowd gasps. It would go unnoticed if it weren’t so completely silent otherwise. Gary stands up from where he was sitting beside the Chicago Cares woman. I didn’t even notice him before.

“Get wasted. Whiskey is what I’d recommend. And you’ll know you’ve had enough of it when you’re having so much fun, you’d rather die than go home. That’s when you should pile all the people you love into a car and drive the way you think you always do.”

Jonathan’s cold eyes stay focused on me.

“Russian roulette—it’s just like that, just as thrilling. Pull the trigger, and let your trip begin.”

He leans into the mic.

“And then one of you assholes can be up here instead of me.”

The room has gone perfectly still. I don’t think any of us is breathing.

“Thank you.”

He walks away, quickly stepping to the side of the stage, then down the short staircase leading to the auditorium. He walks out of the closest doors, Gary trailing after him, the Chicago Cares woman standing there with her mouth hanging open.

Henry’s looking over at me; his hand is over his mouth. The crowd is a mash-up of so shocked they might laugh and so
appalled they might cry. A lot of eyes are on me, a lot of them purposely looking away, some of them still searching the crowd. Graham’s a row behind me, a few seats down. He’s chewing on his bottom lip, leaning forward like he wants to rush over to me, even now. I try to look strong for him.

I shift my gaze back to Henry. He’s still staring, but now he uncovers his mouth, straightens up. Then he shrugs. He mouths something. Maybe,
What was that?
Or,
That’s that.
I think he might be trying for a smile.

There’s nothing for me to do but shrug back.

At least Jonathan was unforgettable.