Love Me Broken (39 page)

We have lasagna and garlic bread for dinner, my parents working together in the kitchen. The house feels warm and alive in a way that it hasn’t since Conner died. I tell myself he’d want me to go. He’d want me to be happy.

Before bed I make some phone calls—first to Rachel, to arrange our plans for the morning. We’re setting out bright and early, and I want to be sure we’re all prepared. Then I call Levi. He’s dropped off Adam’s things at Rachel’s hotel. “It won’t be the same without Adam around,” he says. “It’s a good thing I’ve got the General to keep me company now. Otherwise the house would be too lonely.”

Then third, because I knew it would be the longest call, I call Adam.

“You’re incredible, you know,” he tells me. “You make me feel lucky.”

We talk about everything but cancer: the hospital food, what to expect weather-wise from San Diego, tips on not letting Rachel talk too much.

“She’s a waitress. It’s her job to be social. If you let her start, she’ll just keep going and going.”

After we say goodnight, I plug in my phone on the charger. I look around my room, the warm light of my lamp making the space look small and dear. My desk, my mirror, my bed. I’ve got so many memories in this space: sleepovers with Nicole, that time Conner spilled red nail polish all over my desk by accident, and then later how I was glad he did, as it gave me something to remember him by after he was gone.

Then there were moments that only I know: the way it felt to wake up here in the morning, getting ready in front of the mirror, working on school projects past midnight.

My life. My life has been here.

I force myself go to bed, but the sleep is uneasy.

Part of me knows that after tonight, I’ll never sleep in this room again.

I am awake with the dawn.

My parents are up too, waiting in the front room with me until we hear the car pull up outside. I look out to see that Rachel is driving. Adam’s in the back seat, and he stays there while Rachel gets out and comes to the door. She leaves the car running. It’s her way of politely reminding us all that time is short.

I open the door before Rachel can knock, and then turn to my parents. My mother comes forward and kisses my cheek, and then pulls me into a tight hug.

“I’m so proud of you,” she whispers, and I’m at first a little confused as to why.

Then it’s my dad’s turn. His words are a little more practical: “Here’s something to cover gas and expenses,” he says, slipping a wad of bills into my hand. “And a little extra to help you settle in.”

I tell him thanks, and try to slip the cash discreetly into my pocket. I feel awkward accepting it in front of Rachel, but when I glance at her, I see that she’s talking quietly with my mom.

Then we grab my suitcases and head down the front steps to the car. It’s an older Volvo, gray, with untinted windows. Rachel opens the trunk and we slide in two suitcases next to Adam’s duffel and a small bag that must belong to Rachel. My dad has the cat crate, with Pete inside.

“Is there room back there?” he asks Adam through the open front door.

“Yeah,” Adam says, and slides over. I can’t really see him directly—his face is covered by the car hood—and he slides farther away behind the driver’s seat.

Rachel slams the trunk and climbs back into the car. Then I turn to give my parents one last hug, the three of us embracing. It feels bittersweet; we’ve just healed our family, right at the moment it is to be separated.

“Call me,” my mother says. There are tears in her eyes, but she doesn’t look blank or devastated. These are normal empty-nest tears.

I promise to call every day, and then get into the car. When I close the door, the sounds of the outside world are sealed off, and the mood shifts instantly. We pull away, and I wave to my parents through the closed window. I watch them until we turn a corner, trying to form a vivid memory before they are gone.

I let out a sigh. Then I turn toward Adam.

At the sight of him my heart sinks. He’s pale and he looks utterly exhausted, like he hasn’t slept in days. He has the oxygen feed again, the small plastic tubes running behind his ears and down toward a metallic tank at his side. He smiles at me. “Hey,” he says, and his voice sounds weaker too.

“Hi.” We look at each other. I don’t know which of us looks more scared.

Then Pete gives a small hiss, and we laugh, the seriousness of the moment broken.

“This is actually a pretty nice town,” Rachel comments. We’re turning onto Commercial Street now, and I look right, trying to see the coffee shop that’s two blocks away.

I realize that I didn’t say good-bye to Nicole. I know we were fighting, but I’d have liked to end it better than we left it. Now we’re driving away. She won’t even know that I’ve left town.

Not that she’d approve. Maybe it’s best that I leave on my own.

In another five minutes, we are on our way out of Astoria. We’re taking the 101 South along the coast, and we quickly pass by the turnoff to Seaside. I glance at it, imagining a different reality where Adam is healthy, and we ended up going to the beach picnic. And then we turn away, taking another road inland toward Portland to meet the I-5, which we’ll take the rest of the way to San Diego.

Adam is asleep when we near Portland a few hours later. We won’t actually be driving through the city—it’s out of the way and traffic is bad—but I wonder if he’d like to see it anyway. We cross through a suburb of new builds and then merge onto the interstate. Not long after, we’ve left the sprawl of the suburbs and are passing tree-covered hills and expansive farmland. It’s beautiful and depressing to me at the same time, mostly because Adam isn’t seeing this, and I know it’s better to let him sleep than to wake him for the sights. And I wonder: Which way did he take to come to Astoria? Has he seen all this already? I hope so. It makes me less guilty about him missing it that way.

Within another hour I’m past anything I recognize. I’ve been to California twice before, once for a school trip to Sacramento, and the other time for a family vacation to Disneyland. But mostly my family stayed close to home: the beaches of Oregon and Washington, daytrips to Portland or a night in Seattle. For as little as I know California, this might as well be my first time.

We have to stop every few hours so Rachel can stretch her legs or grab a cup of coffee. I would offer to drive, but it’s a stick shift and this isn’t the time to learn. Rachel doesn’t seem to mind though. There’s something settled in her now that she has her son back, something that’s more at peace than the first time I met her.

Adam wakes up intermittently, but even when he does, the trip is quiet. Rachel has the radio on to give us some noise, but I don’t think any of us are actually listening to it, all of us too lost in our own thoughts. Honestly, I couldn’t tell you a single song that’s played. As we drive, the sun rises higher in the sky, and I stare out the window at all the towns we are passing, wondering who lives there, what their lives are like. Have any of those people gone through anything like this? How did it turn out?

And Adam—I don’t know where his head is. When I look back toward him, he gives me a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes. He gets out with us at the Oregon-California border, but after that he stays in the back seat—sleeping, or pretending to sleep, I don’t know which. There’s so much I want to say to him, but I feel shy around his mother. The things I want to tell Adam are too personal. I’d rather wait.

It’s dark when we reach Sacramento. Rachel finds a small motel and checks us into a room with two queen beds. She lets me share the bed with Adam, which I think is progressive of her—my parents would never do that—even though the circumstances aren’t cause for much concern. All three of us pass out the moment we hit the sheets.

I don’t sleep well, though. I keep waking up every few hours, scared listening to the sound of Adam’s breathing. What if something happened while we were asleep and Adam couldn’t call for help? What if he doesn’t even make it to San Diego?

Rachel tosses and turns as well, and as soon as dawn lightens the sky, the three of us are checking out and loading back into the car. This day’s drive is even more bleary and tired than the day before. As we get closer to L.A., the landscape turns from green to concrete gray, and there are so many cars and buildings that I find it a bit nerve-wracking. It takes us longer to get through L.A. traffic than it took to drive through all of Oregon, and it’s getting dark when a sign informs us that we have finally entered San Diego.

Rachel’s home is a small pre-fabricated house in a community of other such houses. Adam called it a trailer park, but these don’t really look like trailers. They’re boxy and fixed to the ground with a foundation, and have small yards outside and a carport attached. Rachel pulls into the carport of a home that is faded blue. Its garden consists of three sparse rose bushes in the front. The rest of the yard is gravel. I guess Rachel doesn’t have a lot of time for gardening.

I look to the backseat as we stop and see Adam looking toward the house with a mixture of disdain and embarrassment. I realize he’s worried about how I will think of him, of how much bigger my house is compared to his. But I don’t care. I’ll probably be happier here with Adam than I’ve been at my old home this past year anyway.

There’s a small set of wooden stairs that leads up to the main door. We carry in the suitcases and set them down inside the door. The furniture and fixtures are old but clean. There’s a family room with a faded couch and a TV on a low stand. The room is connected to a yellow kitchen, with a small round table in the middle. I try to imagine Adam sitting down with his mother for countless meals here. It’s hard to imagine him in this space; his personality seems too expansive to be boxed in like this. This house doesn’t feel like the Adam I know. Maybe that’s why he ran away.

There are two bedrooms, at either end of the trailer. Rachel’s is on the side with the living room, and Adam’s is past the kitchen.

Adam’s room is small, half the space taken up by a twin bed. We set down our suitcases and Adam shows me a tiny closet that we will share. He’s avoiding my eyes, and I use the chance to look around. There’s a plain square window with cream-colored drapes across from the door, and a dresser and a short desk squeezed into the space. His bed is made; he has a dark navy comforter and white pillows. The walls are covered with various posters:
The Dark Knight
, Kurt Cobain, and
Breaking Bad
. There’s a jar of loose change and some deodorant sticks and cologne on the dresser, and a few books on his desk. The one on top is
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.
I can’t see the others.

Then we carry Pete, still in his crate, into a narrow bathroom next to Adam’s bedroom.

“We’ll let Pete stay in here the first night,” he says, “while he gets used to all the new smells. Then when he’s ready we can introduce him to the rest of the house.”

I nod. I wouldn’t even have considered that. “You’ve had cats before?” I ask, feeling stupid for not thinking of this already.

“Yeah,” he says. “Two: Eggs and Bacon. Bacon was the shy one, kind of like Pete.”

I hear footsteps and turn to see Rachel coming down the short hall. She’s barely past the kitchen when she starts talking, the space so small that she doesn’t need to raise her voice.

“I just called the hospital to confirm our appointment for the morning.” She looks at Adam. “You’re not to have any food or liquid after midnight.” Her eyes drift to a clock on the wall. “So if you’re hungry, you should eat something light now.”

“I just have to help Pete settle in first,” he says.

“Okay.” Rachel looks to me. “I’m counting on you to make sure he sleeps tonight. He needs to be strong for tomorrow.”

I nod, feeling the weight of responsibility. We are both taking care of Adam now. If I screw up, he’ll die.

We set up food, water, and Pete’s litter box, and then close the door to let him adjust. I am about to head into the kitchen when Adam stops me. He puts his arms around me, leaning in for a hug that feels desperate and almost lonely. I hug him back, tight, and kiss his neck, trying to make him feel better. We’ve had so little time to talk, and even now I hear Rachel’s footsteps in the kitchen around the corner.