Cruise Control (5 page)

His voice sounds afraid, and as fast as I've slid into my combat mode, I slide back out again.

I notice more of everything around me—the back of the Camaro, the wires overhead, a scrap of paper blowing along the sidewalk.

Finally I say, “Okay,” real softly. I hardly even recognize the sound of my own voice.

“I'm okay,” I say again.

Tim says, “You sure?” still holding me back.

I say, “Yeah, I'm sure.”

Tim lets me go.

The guy on the ground lies there holding his side, half leaning up on one elbow.

“Who …” he starts to ask, then winces. His eyes have that beaten look, scared and hurt and even though I never touched his face, it's red and scraped-up from rubbing on the ground.

“Who … are … you?” he mutters.

I stare at him and don't say anything for a couple seconds; then I answer him, real smart-ass: “I'm my brother's keeper.” I pause a second, then say, deadpan, “And I'm an excellent driver.” This last line is from the movie
Rain Man
, about these two brothers, Tom Cruise and that Dustin guy who's autistic.

I say, “You got any other questions, ass wipe?” hoping he'll say something stupid, hoping he'll say
anything
.

Tim grabs my arm, but I jerk it loose.

“Sorry,” Tim says quickly, but then, “Let's get out of here, okay, before the cops come.”

I look once more at Mr. Red Camaro Buff Boy. He doesn't say anything, but I notice that there's a big wet spot on the front of his sweatpants. For half a second I actually feel sorry for him.

In the car again Tim stares out the front and is real quiet.

“What?” I ask him, already knowing what he's going to say.

Tim answers, “You coulda killed that guy. One day you're going to go too far.”

I know he's right. A sick feeling rushes through me and I know he's right. I just don't know how to stop it.

I say, “You don't understand.”

Tim stares at me for a few seconds without saying anything, then finally answers real softly, “Yeah I do.”

I'm not sure what he means, and I'd like to say something back, but I can't think what else to say, so we just drive in silence.

I
pull up to Tim's house to drop him off. To be honest, his place is kind of a dump. On Queen Anne Hill the view houses like ours are really expensive, high-end cribs, but some of the old, old houses like Tim's are actually run-down, cruddy-looking rentals. I've noticed that Tim never looks over at me when we pull up in front of his place. He always hops out of the car real quick, like now. I think he's embarrassed not only by what a cracker box he lives in, but by the crap that happens inside too, like with his stepdad.

“Peace,” Tim says, not looking at me, as he closes the car door.

I answer, “Later.”

Back home, as I come through the front door, Mom calls, “Paul?”

I answer, “Yeah.”

“Are you okay, sweetie?” she asks, walking up to me from the kitchen and hugging me.

“I'm fine.”

“You sure?”

Mom feels guilty for acting nutty when Shawn was having his seizure. This happens all the time.

I say, “Really, Mom, I'm fine. How's Shawn?”

Cindy walks in and answers my question. “He's asleep. But his seizure was really bad.”

I say, “I know.”

I notice that my knuckles are bright red from hitting the Camaro guy. I kind of hide them behind my back.

Mom's forehead gets all wrinkled and her face suddenly looks about a thousand years old. “His seizures
are
getting worse.”

I don't say anything. The truth is I feel numb. This is why fighting feels so good to me: After I've let out all my anger, there's always this numbness, a calm feeling—I don't know how to describe it.

Cindy says, “Mom and Dad are going to take Shawn to the doctor.”

I say, “Yeah? Good.”

I don't even know if I mean it. The doctors have never helped Shawn, never helped any of us. What's the point? But of course I don't say this. I just stand here and try not to worry. I don't know what else to do, so I let the numbness take me away.

This is my life, our lives. This is what being around Shawn means. No matter what else happens outside, there's always Shawn, always his seizures, always another useless doctor, always … everything about him. At times I even get why Dad left. Of course, getting it doesn't mean forgiving.

It's been three days since Shawn's seizure on the porch.

Mom and Dad took Shawn to see his neurologist (brain doctor), and I guess the doc adjusted Shawn's drugs. Maybe that's helped a little bit. Shawn's still having a lot of seizures, but they aren't quite so intense. They definitely aren't as bad as that one he had on the porch. A lot of the time I try not to think about Shawn at all, try not to worry about him or feel sorry for him or feel sorry for myself because of him. Most times my feelings about Shawn are so confused, I wish that he'd just … I don't know … that he would just go ahead and … I don't know …

I'm up in my room when I hear Mom call up the stairs. She wants Cindy and me to go down. When we get there, Mom says, “I need to tell you guys something.” She stops, like she doesn't know how to say it. “I need to discuss something with you guys,” she tries again.

“You said that,” I say to her. I wonder what we've done … she looks serious.

But she says to us, “You're not in trouble. I just have to tell you something.”

“What's going on?” Cindy asks. She sounds suspicious.

“It's about your dad,” Mom answers.

I groan. “Now what?”

“I haven't even told you what it's about,” Mom snaps. But I don't let her finish.

“If it has to do with Dad, you don't have to,” I snap back at her. I go sit on the couch, and Cindy sits next to me. I can tell she wants to hear what Mom has to say. Cindy is such a dork. Maybe I should just let Eddie Farr have her; they could raise a nice little family of total imbeciles. Actually, Cindy isn't like Eddie. In fact, as goofy as she acts a lot of the time, she's smart at school stuff; she just doesn't have any common sense.

Mom interrupts my thoughts. “You're mad at your dad. I know that, but you need to set that aside for a moment and just listen.
The Alice Ponds Show
is going to do a program about your dad's newest project—”

Cindy interrupts. “The thing about the schools?”

“No,” Mom says.

“What new project?” I ask.

“Your dad's writing a new book. It's about Earl Detraux.”

“Oh no!” Cindy moans and curls up on the couch. I can see she's really upset.

I say, “Who? Who's Earl Dayglow?”

“Has Dad gone crazy?” Cindy asks from behind her knees.

“Your dad thinks it's an important story. He thinks—” Mom starts to answer. But Cindy interrupts her. I can tell this whole Earl guy thing is something bad.

So I ask again, “What's going on?! Who's this Earl guy?”

“He's that monster from eastern Washington who murdered his kid,” Cindy hisses.

I still don't know what they're talking about, but as they go on, I catch the drift. I guess this Detraux guy killed his retarded kid and got sent to prison. I'm still not tracking real close, though, so I say, “I don't get it. Why's Dad into that?” Mom gives me this whole bull story about how Dad's writing is all about getting other people to understand what it's like for families like ours—who have kids like Shawn. Yeah, like he'd know anything about that. I start to get really pissed off again in time to hear her say, “He wants you both to know that if you want to, you can join him on the program and talk about life with your brother. The people at
The Alice Ponds Show
—”

I can't believe this!
The Alice Ponds Show
is one of those I-married-my-sister-who's-in-love-with-our-cousin's-Pomeranian types of programs. I yell, “Right! Alice Ponds. I'd rather have ground glass pounded up my nose!”

“Paul,” Mom starts.

But Cindy interrupts, “Join him? Why?”

Mom makes this big excuse about Dad thinking he's going to help people by going on the show … blah, blah, blah … it's all bull, of course; after all, my dad's behind it.

Mom goes on to say, “Your father—”

I interrupt. “My father is a hopeless jerk, and I wouldn't help him do
anything
, least of all go on a freak show and talk about my brother.” I pause for a second and glance over at poor idiot Shawn sitting there drooling. Thank God he doesn't know what a complete and total ass our old man is. “Alice Ponds?” I say, unable to believe that even Dad could stoop this low. “Alice Friggin' Ponds!”

I feel a huge rush of anger. Now the whole country is going to see my brother, the whole world is going to look at him and feel sorry for him and for my dad, but nobody's going to
really
know the truth. I have no idea what goes on in Shawn's head, and he has no idea that I even exist! But millions of people are going to have the totally wrong idea that they
know
us: “Do you ever talk to your brother?” “Does your brother like to be read to?” “Does your brother like Christmas? Easter eggs?” “What's his favorite TV show?” “How does your brother communicate his feelings to you?” “If you could have one wish come true for your brother, what would it be?”

My brother this and my brother that! Hell, I barely even
have
a brother!

Good job, Dad. Just friggin' great!

U
nbelievably, my brain-dead sister actually decided to accompany Dickhead Dad to L.A. for
The Alice Ponds Show
. They taped the program a couple days ago and it's showing this afternoon. The gods have seen fit to torture me, meaning that by an utter fluke of horrible luck, I don't have basketball practice today. So when I get home from school, there's Mom and Shawn and Cindy all parked in front of the TV, and guess what's coming on in about five minutes? Yep, good old
Alice Ponds
. I'm stuck without any decent excuse for not watching. It's ridiculous, all of us curled up nice and cozy to watch this total catastrophe of total garbage!

I look at Shawn. For once I'm glad that he's so out of it. How horrible it would be to have your sole function in life be a prop in your own father's “artistic” pity party? Disgusting.

The show starts and it's all the usual crap. Alice Ponds is a total phony.

I'm not paying much attention, really. Alice says something and Dad says something back and all the morons in the audience, who make Eddie Farr look like Albert Einstein, start asking totally stupid questions. It's hard to believe that this show could actually be as bad as I thought it would be, but it's
worse
.

I walk over to the kitchen and grab a handful of potato chips. As I walk back toward the couch, I notice that Mom isn't looking so I slip Shawn a little piece of chip, laying it on his tongue. I have no idea whether Shawn likes this or not, but it's a little ritual we have going. Whenever I can, I feed Shawn bits of stuff he wouldn't get otherwise. His regular diet is oatmeal and mashed-up eggs and other nasty stuff that nobody should have to eat, but Shawn can't swallow very well and this soft food is easier on him. Can you imagine being too messed up to swallow? When he eats, he drools even more than normal, so Mom has this huge bib she puts on him. The bib catches the drool and all the food that slips back out of his mouth when he's being fed. Mom hates for him to eat without his bib, which I can understand, but I don't care—some food pleasures are just too good to pass up. So when Mom isn't looking, I slip my bro treats.

To be honest, most of the time it's hard to know how to be good to Shawn. I know it's totally weak to feel this, but nobody understands unless they have a brother or sister like Shawn themselves. There're kids at school who volunteer for one weekend a year to help out at the Special Olympics. For me, these kids are the worst, always talking about how cool retarded kids are—like they really know what it's like to be around a human veg twenty-four seven. And another thing, in our family we're all supposed to act like Shawn's condition isn't any big deal. We never talk about it, and it's obvious that Mom wants us to just accept him. I try to do this, but when I have a friend over and we walk into a room and it smells like shit, I mean literally like feces because fourteen-year-old Shawn has just taken a big dump in his pants—it's kind of hard to pretend that everything is normal family life. I try to love Shawn, and most of the time I do, but sometimes it's too hard. So one of the ways I let Shawn know that I care about him is to sneak him bits of tasty stuff when Mom isn't watching, just in case somewhere inside himself, he knows I'm his brother.