Other Broken Things (14 page)

He takes my hand between his two and it feels so good and so confusing all at once. I want to hop into his lap and make out with him. But I want to be drunk to get to that place. Like somehow if I'm drunk all these things I'm feeling will be okay. All this want would make sense if we were just fooling around while we were high and it wasn't a big deal. But it
is
a big deal. He's a lot older than me. I'm newly sober. He's an ex-con, and I'm supposed to be applying for college or figuring out what the hell to do with my life. There are a million things wrong with this. And this is hardly the easy path.

“You
are
special, Nat.”

It's too much. How he's looking at me and how my heart is beating and how I can't stop staring at his mouth and wondering what he'd taste like, if he's a good kisser, what his hands would feel like.

“You should go,” I whisper, and he lets out a long sigh. Almost like relief.

“I should.” He squeezes my hand once more and drops it. Then he opens his door and slides out of the car. “Talk to Kathy. She can help more than I can at this point.”

I nod but don't say anything else. He doesn't know about his brother or what Kathy's going through, and it's not my place to tell him. They obviously have some sort of history and I'm not about to get involved with that.

I breathe into the tube to get the car started, then make my way home, thinking the entire time about my hand sandwiched between Joe's and how I didn't really want him to let go.

*  *  *

That night I slip downstairs into our basement gym and work out hard. I even have a go at the punching bag, but I'm too rusty and my arms start to hurt after five minutes. Mom comes down and watches me for a while.

“Do you miss it?” she asks.

“What?”

“Boxing.”

I shrug. “You don't want that kind of daughter.”

She shakes her head. “We never should've asked you to pull back. We lost you after that.”

“I'm right here.”

“Lost,” she says again, then after a pause, “You could go back.”

“It's too late. I'm not in any kind of shape for it. I'm not good enough.”

“Jerry says you're good enough.”

I pause my bicep curls and stare at her. “When did you talk to Jerry?”

“He called a few weeks ago asking about you. He didn't want you to know, but I'm tired of all the secrets and lies. He asked if you were really sober.”

“Why is that Jerry's business?”

She stands and crosses the room to me. She grabs the towel folded on the treadmill and hands it to me. “Because he thinks you have talent. He thinks you could do this, if you really wanted it. You're not too old to start training for the amateur circuit. You'd need to work hard, but . . .”

I drop the weight at my feet and hold my hands up. “Don't pretend this is okay with you. That you'd be fine with a fucking boxer as a daughter. Dad made himself perfectly clear on that score two years ago. ‘Our kind don't box professionally.' ”

She shakes her head. “Do you really want this?”

Tears press against my eyes and I can't speak. I can't have this. I've been resigned to it. I gave it up, let it go. All the signs told me no, it wasn't for me. I dig deep and bury the hope her words spark in me. Then I wrap the towel around my neck and leave her standing in the basement alone.

It's two o'clock
in the morning and I'm woken by thumps on my window. I peek out and of course it's Brent with a handful of rocks from the rock garden at the end of our driveway. Rocks, not pebbles. What an idiot.

I pull open the window and hiss down to him, “Stop. You'll wake my parents. I'm coming down.”

There's no point trying to get him to go away. He's obviously drunk and on some sort of mission. I pull the front door open and he's leaning against the side of my house.

“Two a.m. Really? This is the house you come to after boozing all night?”

He grins, but his gaze is glassy. Definitely drunk. “I wanted to talk to you. School starts again in two days, and I want to clear some stuff up. You've been avoiding it long enough.”

I sigh. “And you couldn't stop by tomorrow?”

He tilts to the side when he shakes his head. “No. Now.”

I roll my eyes, but pull him inside, whispering, “You have to be quiet. My parents have their white noise machine on, but they'll hear stumbling and loud voices.”

He nods and grabs for my hand. I let him keep it in his grasp, if only to make sure he stays steady as he follows me to my room. When we get there, I shut the door and fold my arms, leaning against the wall as he stumbles toward the bed and lies down with a moan.

“Your bed is so soft,” he says.

“Mom put a feather bed on top.”

He rolls to his side and smiles at me. “Your mom takes care of you.”

I shrug.

“That's good. Someone should take care of you.”

My arms tighten across my body. “Did you want to tell me something? Because I'd like to get this over with so I can go back to sleep like normal people.”

He reaches out and waves me closer to him. I take a few steps, but stop before I get too close. “You used to be awake at this time,” he says. “You used to party later than any of us. I've never seen someone get by on so little sleep.”

“I slept. Just mostly during the day on weekends.”

He grins. “Yeah.”

“So?”

“Do you remember that night?” he says, and suddenly he sounds a lot more sober than he did a few minutes ago. “The night you drove me home and got your DUI.”

Every part of me is tensing. I've been avoiding this for weeks, and even now with Brent in front of me, my brain is starting to fuzz out and push my thoughts away. “Of course I remember that night. You were wasted. I got a DUI. The end.”

He shakes his head and rolls onto his back, staring at my ceiling. The silence between us lasts long enough for me to wonder if he's maybe fallen asleep, which would be fricking perfect. But then he releases a long sigh.

“Do you remember what you told me at the beginning of the party? After you'd already had a few shots?”

He's going at it head-on. There's going to be no way out of this, but still I try. “No. It was months ago.”

“You want to know why I got so drunk after?”

“No. I don't. I don't want to talk about this. You need to get out of here. My parents—”

“Are you just going to pretend, Nattie? Be all breezy about it, same as you were that night?”

“Oh, fuck off, Brent. There's nothing to pretend. It's irrelevant. I can't even believe you're bringing it up.”

He sits up and holds himself steady for a second, like maybe the room is spinning. “I can't believe you won't talk about it. I keep trying. And you keep shutting me down.”

“Get out. For real. Get the fuck out of here before I scream and my parents call the cops.”

Brent rises and shakes his head. “So this is it? You're not going to let me—”

I flap my arms at him. “Stop. Get out. Now. I'm serious.”

He heaves a sigh and stumbles to the door. I follow him downstairs and realize I'm probably going to have to drive him home. But when he exits the front door, he starts walking down the street. No car. Thank God for that at least. It's freezing and I should probably offer him a ride, but I don't want to continue this conversation. I don't want to answer his questions. I don't want to think about that night or what I told him. I thought I might be ready for it, but I'm not. I'm nowhere near ready. I want it all to pour out of my head like it never happened, but my brain isn't working in my favor now. It's like a cat with a mouse. Which means there's really only one choice for me.

*  *  *

“Where did you get the vodka, Natalie?”

Mom's harsh voice breaks through the fracture in my brain. I crack open an eye and immediately shut it. I'm slightly buzzed still and it's too bright.

“Answer your mother.” Dad. Great.

“Twenty-four-hour Walgreens.”

“Do you have a fake ID? Let me have it.”

I roll onto my back but keep my eyes shut. “No. No fake ID. There's just a really friendly cashier guy who works nights there.”

“Thank Christ I put that Breathalyzer on her car. I can only imagine the type of scene she'd have made if she got pulled over for another DUI. The neighbors would never stop talking about it.” Dad again. Part of me wonders if I should care that the neighbors' gossip is really the only important thing to him, but my brain hurts too much to think about it. He's Dad. That's how he rolls.

“I think you should call your sponsor,” Mom says now. “Tell her about your slip. Get back on the program.”

My
slip
. Yes. That's how Mom would see it. Like all I need to do is dust myself off and start working the steps again, when really all I can think about is having an orange-juice-and-gin breakfast drink to take the edge off the pounding in my head. To forget my mom's mention of Jerry. To forget Brent's visit. To forget that this is my life.

“I'll call her later. I need a few more hours of sleep,” I say.

Dad huffs. “Clean her up, Sarah. We're not going through all this again.” Then I hear his footsteps and my door shutting. It sounds like a slam, but it could be my head.

I slit my eyes open again and glance at Mom's face. Tearstains on her cheeks and red eyes. I'm horrible, but I don't have the energy to make this right. Instead I say, “I'll call Kathy as soon as I get up. Promise. I just need a few more hours . . .”

“You have thirty minutes,” she says, tilting her chin slightly so I know she's going to be firm on this. “Then I'm coming back in here to wake you up and get you in the shower.”

I wave at her and she turns away, tiptoeing toward the door and opening and shutting it softly behind her. It's considerate. I know she is trying to give me a break. I also know, as my eyes flutter closed again, that neither of my parents asked why I was drinking in the first place.

Kathy's waiting
for me at the Starbucks. Her eyes narrow as she gazes at my face.

“You missed your sponsor meeting this morning. And community service. Left Joe in the lurch for the pancake breakfast.”

I raise a shoulder. “I'm here, aren't I?”

“Do you want to be?”

Well, that
is
a legit question. Much better than anything Mom has said to me so far today.

“I don't know,” I answer.

“Fair enough. Wanna tell me what happened?”

I shake my head. “Not really.”

“Natalie, no one expects you to be perfect. Mistakes, relapses, slip-ups, they come with the territory. I don't know anyone who quit drinking that ever cold turkeyed it without making one mistake. But there's a big difference between fucking up and knowing you're an alcoholic and need to try again, and fucking up because you don't think you have a problem. So which is it?”

I pull out my cigarettes with shaky hands. I can't smoke inside, but I need the feel of the box, as much as I need to ignore the six texts from Joe waiting on my phone.

“I have a problem,” I whisper.

Kathy nods. “Yeah, you do. Now. You want to tell me what happened?”

This is part of the Fifth Step. I know if I start to tell her everything, it's all going to tumble out of me and spill into the space between us. And part of me isn't ready for that. Not with Kathy. Not when . . .

Her phone pings and she glances down. A flash of anger and something else crosses her face. Maybe hope?

“Your ex?” I ask.

She nods. “I told him I needed time to think. He's respected that, but he calls or texts every day. I think he wants me to know he's committed. I'm stupid for even hesitating. I'm the one who hurt him. I'm the alcoholic. This should be a dream come true, him wanting me back.”

“But . . . it's not?”

“Like I said, it's complicated. That's all. It's hard to live with someone who has seen the shittiest part of you. It's hard to live with someone you hurt so much, because you're constantly reminded of your past mistakes. You know more people break up after they get sober than before. The rate of divorce in recovering alcoholics is really high. Part of it might be resentment, but I think part of it is the difficulty of being with someone who has seen you at your worst.”

Which sort of decides it for me. Kathy can't be the person I spill everything to. She's not the “other human being” in my Fifth Step:
Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
My stuff is ridiculous in comparison. Even I'm rolling my eyes at how stupid it would all sound to her.

“Yeah, that's hard,” I agree. “Well, look, I don't mean to bail on you, but I sort of owe Joe an apology and I thought I'd go do that.”

She blinks and I can see she's still distracted, which is maybe why she says, “Okay. But show up next week. Call me tomorrow. Relapses don't have to be the end of it. You can shake this off.”

I nod and get up, grabbing my box of cigarettes. “Yeah. I know. Call your ex. He seems like a good guy.”

I don't actually know. He could be a douche, but the smile she gives me makes me think probably not. She's looking for permission with him and if I can give her that, then that's a good thing, I guess.

*  *  *

“Why didn't you call?” Joe asks as he pours me a cup of coffee and slides it in front of me.

This is the first time I've been to his place, which is actually a small trailer, only like no other trailer I've ever seen. It's clean and sort of eco-fancy. Like I'm probably leaning on a counter made of recycled materials and the coffee was probably made using energy from the solar paneling on the roof.