Bear, Otter, & the Kid 03 - The Art of Breathing (56 page)

“I’m not going to step in and be a parent,” I say.

“But you would have to,” he says. “Eventually. If it lasts.”

“Bear?”

“Yeah?”

“When did you know? That Otter was it for you?”

He seems surprised by the question. “I don’t know. I guess it was when he came back, though it went further than that. I know that now. There was always something there. I just needed to admit it to myself.”

“But what was the exact moment?”

He sighs. “After she came back. When she threatened us. When I broke up with Otter. The look on his face. I… his heart was breaking, and I never wanted to see that again. So when I was saying good-bye, that was when I knew. When I thought it was over.”

“The day we left for New Hampshire,” I say. “When I had to say good-bye to Dominic. That was the day for me.”

“Shit,” Bear says, his voice filling with disdain. “We’re the same.”

I snort. “Wow. Thanks for making it sound awful. It’s not
that
bad!”

“Are you out of your mind?” he almost shouts at me. “Do you know some of the shit I’ve
done
? If we’re the same, that means you’re going to do it too!”

I groan. “Please, do not elaborate on that. I don’t want to know.”

“But I’ve let Otter—”

“Bear! Oversharing! Unless you want me to tell you what Dom did—”

He pales. “You shut your mouth right this second.”

“Do you think Otter and Dom are talking shit about us?”

He sighs. “Probably. We’re slightly… neurotic.”

“I don’t know if that even begins to describe us.”

“We have to start somewhere.”

“Are we good?” I ask him.

He laughs shakily. “Yeah, Kid. We are. Though why do I have a feeling this isn’t over?”

“Because it’s not.”

“I’m not going to like this part, am I?”

“Dom said the same thing.”

“Then you’re fucked.”

“Probably,” I agree. “But I have to.”

“They need to hear this?” he asks, motioning his head toward the back patio.

I nod. “Might as well get this over with.”

He watches me for a moment, and it’s like looking in a mirror. He turns and heads toward the patio door. Before he disappears from sight, he stops. He doesn’t turn, but I can hear him just fine. “I’m proud of you,” my brother says. “More than I could ever say. No matter what happens, I want you to know that.”

“I know,” I say.

“Just remember your promise. Okay? Whatever you’ve decided to do. Please. That’s… that’s all I ask.”

“You and me. That’ll never change, Papa Bear.” And it won’t. I’ll never let it.

He nods, apparently satisfied. Then he’s gone.

And I wait for them to come back in, wondering just how I’m going to say what needs to be said to them. My family. My brother. My almost-father. The love of my short, albeit extremely complicated life. It’s going to be difficult.

But then saying good-bye always is.

Where Tyson Breathes

Six Weeks Later

W
E
WALK
along that little section of beach, Dom and I. Hand in hand, because this is who we are now. And I think this is who we’ll be again, once I get my head on straight. It’ll take some work, but I’m motivated now. Not just for him. For myself.

I haven’t told him I love him, but I think he knows. He has to. I can barely keep it off my face every time he says my name. Every time his lips find mine. His skin against my own. The feel of my heartbeat under his hand. The play of the morning light against his bare back. The rough dark stubble along his cheeks. The way he smiles. The way he makes me smile back. He has to know. Even if I can’t find the power to say it, he has to know. I belong to him just as surely as he belongs to me. I’m gathering my courage.

The wind is cold this morning. The waves are white-capped and choppy. The sky is overcast, with bits of sun and blue poking through before being covered again. The fog is dissipating. The seagulls cry above as we walk through the sand. The tracks left behind are close together. Big ones and smaller ones. Like they’ve always been.

He says,
This is going to be hard.

I say,
I know.

And we walk on.

The wind whips up around us, curling up my legs and arms and through my hair. I huddle closer to him. He’s warm. My head bumps his shoulder. He smells good.

He says,
You don’t have to do this.

I laugh.
So you’ve said.

I just….

I know.

But—

Dom.

A boat, out in the sea. The sun catches its white sail and flashes brightly.

I’m on the verge of something here. A precipice. I’ll either fly or fall. It could go either way, because some days are still harder than others. There’s no magical cure, no matter how much I wish it. Bear cannot fix me. Otter cannot fix me. Dom cannot fix me. And it’s unfair to think any of them could. Only I can fix me. Silly boys. They insist I’m not broken. And maybe I’m not. Maybe it’s just something as simple as being off track. Maybe I’ll never get to be exactly how I want to be. Maybe I’ll crash and burn and everything I know and love will fall down around me. But I can’t know until I jump. And I can’t be who I want to be for them until I do. Is it selfish? I don’t know. Maybe.

Probably.

What if you don’t come back?
he asks. He lets go of my hand and wraps his arm around my shoulder, pulling me close.

I will.
I try not to let him feel that I’m shaking.

How do you know?

Do you love me?
How odd, that. To be able to ask that aloud and to know the answer even before it’s said.

Yes.

That’s how I know.

The sand is warm beneath my feet. I step on a shell and it pinches my skin. Farther ahead, I see a kite flying high in the sky. It’s green. I can’t make out yet who’s flying it. They’re still too far away. I imagine it’s a little boy with his mother and that nothing else matters to them but this sunny day and the sun and the sky and the kite and each other. Those are what matter to them right at this moment. Those little, monumental things.

What did Corey say?
he asks me.

That I’m crazy.
And that’s putting it lightly.

You are. In the best way possible.

This is getting harder with every step.
Only you would think so
, I say, struggling to keep my voice even.

Probably
, he agrees.

He wasn’t happy with me.

I don’t know any of us are
, Dom says honestly.

Do you understand why?

I’m trying.

That’s all I ask.

We step over the spot where Bear and Otter were married. We step over the spot where Mrs. Paquinn went into the ocean. Where Bear waited for Otter and instead received a phone call. Where I found Bear that one day so very long ago, by himself, his arms curled around his knees as he thought it possible that everything was over. There is history here. So much history. I stop, just for a moment. Dom doesn’t question it. I breathe in. And out.

He kisses me then. Lingering and sweet. His nose bumps mine. He traces my cheeks with his thumbs. My heart races in my chest. There are stars. So many stars. They burn brightly. For me and him.

Eventually, he pulls away.

He says,
I can’t—

There’s still time
, I tell him. Not much, but enough.

We crest a small hill near our beach. I can see the kite fliers now. The kite is green and flies high. And it’s not my mother and I. Of course it isn’t. It’s a young boy and an older boy and the wind carries their laughter. The younger one cranes his neck back and watches the kite overhead. The older one watches the younger boy. He has a smile on his face. He drops his hand onto the little guy’s shoulder. They laugh again. I wonder if they’re brothers. I hope so.

They say hey to us as we pass them. We say hey back.

The older one says,
We need to get a move on or I’ll be late for work.

The younger one says,
Aw, man! Can’t we just fly it a little bit more? Look how high it is, Mal!

The older boy laughs.
Yeah. It is. Okay. Maybe just a little bit longer.

Definitely brothers.

Bear’s not happy
, Dom says.

He’s just worried. That’s what he does. They have other things to focus on.

Have they found a surrogate?

No. But they will. Now that Bear truly wants it, it’s only a matter of time.

Ben will miss you.

I wince. This is the hardest part. He and I have grown close.
His routine….

Dom shakes his head.
It’ll take time. You’re part of him now. It’ll be okay.

I hope he’s right.

It’s getting late. I don’t have much time left to say what I want to say. It seems petty now. Trite, even. After all this man has done for me, and for all he’s letting me do to find myself without so much as a cross word, there should be more. I should be giving him everything.

But I can’t.

One day.

For now, though, I hope this is enough.

Dom?
Oh God. How my voice breaks on his name. How my throat closes.

He stops walking. Turns to me. He’s big. He’s so very big.

Ty
, he says, and this is Dom. Dominic. That lost and lonely boy who found a scared, precocious Kid and showed him how to breathe again. I owe him everything.

I… just….

Say it
, it whispers.
He deserves to hear it from you.

I—

He kisses me. The rest of my words are lost in him.

And then he clutches me tightly. As if I’m just a little guy. As if I need protecting from the world around us. As if our hearts are breaking with each passing second. And I hold him back as if all of this is true and it’s the only way things will be.

It’s inevitable, after all.

O
REGON
TO
New Hampshire

Three thousand miles.

It’ll take me four or five days. Maybe six, if I take my time.

And I might.

I wipe my eyes. Grip the steering wheel.

Moments later, I pass a sign:

NOW LEAVING SEAFARE! COME BACK SOON!

I
ONLY
make it to the Oregon/Idaho border. The tremors in my hands have gotten worse, and I’m having trouble breathing. I’m gasping for air by the time I throw open the door to the hotel room. My legs crash into a chair. I tell myself to
breathe
and
breathe
and
just fucking breathe!
It’s funny, really. Panicking doesn’t help when in the grips of a panic attack, but that’s all you can do. Panic is all I know. I slide over the lip of the bathtub and knock my head on the faucet, and stars, stars, stars again, and they are
bright
and
loud
and how they
scream
.

I stay in the bathtub for the rest of the night.

Near dawn, I fall asleep and dream of Dominic.

He smiles at me and I can breathe.

I
SIT
in the parking lot of the hotel in this little Idaho town whose name I don’t know. West is home. East is uncertainty. There are texts on my phone, saying things like
The key is under the mat, you crazy SOB
(Corey) and
Don’t buy drugs from truckers unless they’re good drugs
(Creed) and
Make sure you call us when you get there
(Anna). There are others and I read them all.

I save three of them for last.

Otter.
I miss you already. It’s too quiet here. Call me when you can.

Bear.
I miss you already. Call me every day. Maybe two or three times a day.

And the last. Dom. Four words, and I read them over and over again. A few minutes later, I save the message and head east.

I
MAKE
it farther on the second day. Grand Island, Nebraska. It’s pretty. And flat.

I sit in a diner near the hotel. It’s late. I’m the only one in here. Apparently the fry cook knows how to make vegan waffles. His name is Abraham. Told me to call him Abe. He’s funny.

I sit in a booth. The menu has pictures of the food on it. Reminds me of the place where Bear used to work a long time ago.

I try to resist, but even I know it’s useless. I take out my phone and bring up the text from Dom, even though I know what it says. I touch those four words. Just once.

What’re you looking at?
the waitress asks. Her name is Estelle (
Call me Este
) and she’s the only one working aside from Abe.
It looks like it hurts you.
She frowns in concern.

I shrug and put the phone away.
Just a text.

She hands me a glass of juice. It’s tart.
Things that hurt you shouldn’t be kept around
, she says.

It’s okay
, I tell her.
It hurts in a good way.

She nods like she knows what I mean, and I catch her glancing back at Abe in the kitchen. She smiles ruefully.
Then that’s okay
, Este says.
Waffles coming up. They’re pretty good. Surprisingly.

The waffles turn out to be very good indeed.

I
DON
’
T
know what happens on the third day. One minute I’m fine, better than I’ve been the previous two days. The next minute, I see something or hear something (I don’t know, I don’t
know
), and all of a sudden, I am
flooded
by Dominic. I can hear him, taste him, smell him. He laughs in that broken voice. He moans my name. He asks me why I’m following the ants, and then he says good-bye. I see the look on his face, the lines around his eyes. The feel of his hair under my fingers. The way sunlight through the window plays across his face as he sleeps next to me. It’s all
him
,
him
,
him
, and his voice overlaps in my head, and
everything
he’s ever said to me starts ringing in my ears, and I think I’ll explode. I think I’ll explode from the force of it all.