Gena/Finn (23 page)

I don't know what I think the alternative is. Sending you back to school is obviously a bad idea. Every time I try to call your parents I get that stupid chipper voicemail that makes me want to throw the phone at something. I know you were staying with your aunt and uncle, but none of the contacts in your phone mention those titles so I don't know if “David” is “Uncle David” or “David who let me borrow his cell phone once,” or whatever. And until you start talking coherently, I don't know how I can find out. But they can't keep you here. You don't belong here, where it's too bright and no one loves you. You're not going to get better here.

And I don't like your doctor, Evie, with her condescending looks and her “Miss Bartlett, I'm not sure you appreciate the severity of this situation.” I don't appreciate the severity of the situation? I don't? Who does she think took the goddamn red-eye out of San Francisco to be here? Who left her boyfriend hanging in the fucking wind? Who hasn't eaten or slept in a day and a half, Doctor?

At this point I've been with you for the past twelve hours straight and this doctor has stopped by your room one time for fifteen minutes and now she's looking at a chart and telling me she knows you better than I do.

What would you do, Evie? You'd turn on the charm. You'd tell her she's right and you understand and you agree, and before long you'd be thick as thieves and she'd be agreeing that of course you knew what you were talking about.

Me, I run away.

You know, relatively.

Specifically, to the hall.

And there goes Tyler Pierce. I guess Toby's doing better. Physically better, anyway; he looks like a ghost. He's just wandering, apparently aimless. He looked at me for a second and I feel like I'm going to drown in the awfulness.

I want to say something to him – I'm sorry about Zack – but who am I, and why should he care? I don't know Zack. I'm just a friend of a friend. I'm just some fangirl.

Maybe I need some water. Maybe I need some distance. Maybe I need to call Charlie. Maybe I shouldn't be here. I just hate everything and everybody and my heart's too big and my body's too small and I want to go home I want to go home and I don't know where home is anymore and I don't think I will ever be enough. No one's looking at me. Hospitals are a great place to fall apart in public. God, stop being crazy, Finn. No, I'm not crazy. You're crazy. No. No. No.

Evie.

It's Charlie.

He's here. He's actually here, warm familiar hands, wrinkled clothes and messed–up hair and eyes red like the times we stayed up all night together for movie releases. He has never looked better.

I can't believe he figured it out. He's a detective, or something. I didn't tell him where I was, only that I was going. Apparently he got onto my computer (nightmare city, oh my god, if I wasn't so damn exhausted I'd be freaking out about that) and read my journal.

And he's not mad.

And I feel like everything might actually be okay.

Or at least, for the first time since I heard about the accident, I don't feel that sick sinking panic, and that's got to be a good sign.

He's talking to the doctor now, and I'm not crying so much anymore, and Toby got a Mountain Dew from the vending machine.

Somewhere your real life is going on without you. Somewhere the girls in your dorm are studying and partying and gossiping about Joanne's weird roommate who went away for a weekend and never came back. Nobody anywhere, except for right here in this too–clean too–bright hallway, is trying to figure out how you're going to live now.

We're going home, Evie.

You're coming with us. I'm taking you home.

Psychiatrist Notes

Dr. Beatrice Monroe, MD, Humber River Regional Hospital
Patient: Genevieve Z. Goldman
October 1

For the first ten minutes of our appointment (Day 3), Genevieve was as silent as she'd been on September 29th and 30th but was beginning to show more signs of connection and interaction. She pushed herself back and forth a little in the wheelchair (despite the bandage on her hand) and picked up and played with a few of the stress toys on the table. I asked her a few questions near the beginning about how she was feeling and if there was anything she wanted to talk about, and if she understood that our session was being tape-recorded for my records. As with days 1 and 2, she didn't respond.

About ten minutes into the appointment, however, she looked up at my diploma on the wall and asked where I went to school. I told her, and asked where she went, but she was unresponsive.

For You:

You probably look suspicious, sleepwalking around Toronto Pearson International Airport in Charlie's hoodie. It's too big for you, and you're too pale and checked out. That's probably why we had trouble at security. I should have seen it coming. I had to let go of you to send you through the metal detector, but you handled it well, at least at first. You put your hoodie and bracelets in one of those bins with your shoes, pushed it onto the belt, and walked through the gate. One of the security guards stopped you on the other side and said something I couldn't hear, and suddenly I was breathing too fast, itching to get to you. I probably looked suspicious myself.

I couldn't do anything but watch as they patted you down. It was agonizing. You've been through so much and you didn't need strange people going through your hair in a crowded place. Your fucking hair, really? What did they think, that you were carrying heroin on your scalp? Your shoulders were so tense, you were shaking and small and afraid and I couldn't get to you.

Then Charlie cleared security.

He went over, keeping a careful distance, standing in your eyeshot and smiling, and he reached into a bin and held up the hoodie. I actually saw you relax, watching him. I remember how he used to show up at my dorm the morning of exams in college and bring me omelets and joke with me so I'd be relaxed going in.

I just love him so much.

He's off getting us something to eat now, and you're calm, curled up with your head on your backpack and cuddling a juice box. You drink it quietly. I don't think anyone in the history of juice boxes has ever drunk a juice box quietly, but you do, with your knees pulled to your chest. But you're doing everything quietly now. You're still not talking much, and when you do, it's lying half the time. Stupid lies. Pointless ones. You told Charlie he didn't need to get food because you ate at the hospital, but we've both been with you all day and we know it's not true.

In the cab on the way over, you asked me why you were coming with me.

I said the first thing that came to mind. “I want you with me.”

You watched me for a minute like you weren't sure if you believed me. “I should probably go to my parents. They miss me a lot when I'm off at school. They'll be upset if I go to California.”

What I'm not going to say, because it's too sad and because you already fucking know, is that your parents haven't called, haven't texted, haven't been in contact with the hospital, and as far as I can tell don't read the news. Or maybe they don't get the news in Ethiopia or wherever the hell; I guess accidents
on the set of third-rate cop dramas aren't exactly world headlines. Anyway, there's no indication they even know what happened. Suddenly the little annoying things my parents do –
sending me recipes even though I've told them Charlie's the cook, asking about friends I haven't talked to since high
school – seem endearing and familiar.

I didn't say any of that. What I said was, “please come with us. We'll go to the beach.”

You nodded and closed your eyes. “I like the beach.”

Group Text

hey, parents

Oct 2, 2:41 pm

Mom: Stephanie?

Mom: Is everything okay?

about to get on a plane

Dad: vacation?

coming home. was in Toronto
visiting a friend

Dad: how do you have
friends in Toronto! what else
haven't you told us!

Oct 2, 2:46 pm

just wanted to say I love you
guys.

Oct 2, 2:48 pm

Mom: Stephanie, honey, are
you sure everything's okay?

boarding, g2g

It's a long flight. We've been up in the air for about four hours and Charlie's asleep against the window. You took my Jack and Coke from my tray table without asking (I would have said yes, of course, you can have anything) and drank it straight down in one gulp. Then you leaned forward, dug through the seat back pocket in front of you, and came up with a barf bag.

“Are you sick?”

“Probably. Excuse me,” you called a flight attendant a few rows ahead and he came over, all smiles. “Do you have a pen? I need to fill out a form.” Then that charming smile, the one I remember from Chicago. I wish I didn't know you so well, so I could believe this performance.

I don't wish that at all, obviously.

The steward gave you a pen and a flirty grin and you gave him my empty drink cup. Now you've got the bag flattened on your tray table and you're writing, head ducked so I can't see.

You could have had a page out of my journal if you needed something to write on, you know. You could have had the whole damn thing.

I've been trying to pay attention to the in-flight movie. It's a chase scene, but what's baffling is that it's been a chase scene for the past ninety minutes. A kid who looks sort of like Jesse Eisenberg but isn't is riding his bike at breakneck pace through the streets of Some City, USA, pursued by the stupidest branch of law enforcement imaginable, which even equipped with squad cars, motorcycles, and fancy weapons can't manage to stop their target.

There was an episode of Up Below like this. It was just a few months ago. Tyler and Jake were escaping on foot from a group of bad guys, I don't remember the specifics now, but I remember Jake had hurt his leg at some point and when they came to a fence he couldn't climb, Tyler turned back to fight the bad guys because he didn't want to leave Jake behind. It was a good episode. A lot of fandom didn't like it much, though. I think it was actually Tylergirl – Mallory – who posted that Jake couldn't carry his own weight in a fight, and that he was always holding Tyler back.

Jake's dead. That thought just realized itself in my head, or something, because I didn't actively think it. Zack Martocchio is dead and that's a tragedy, but Jake is dead and good God, that's what's making me cry.

We're starting our descent.

on the back of an airsickness bag
on Gena's tray table

I was born with a big head, too

I was born with a big head, too much
imagination, and no depth perception

I see no point in living but

FEEL BETTER?

Use bag in the event of motion sickness

but to see you go on

hurry up please it's time

i am never without it

Patent US 2547097 A

For You:

Charlie put your bags in the guest room – look at that, I guess we do need a guest room – and left to give you privacy or make tea or line up your arsenal of psychiatric meds somewhere out of sight, I don't know. You're sitting on the bed, facing away from me, out the window overlooking our parking lot and the used car dealership and, off in the far, far distance, a line of shrubbery. This probably isn't how you pictured your first trip to California.

I offered you something to eat. You weren't interested.

I asked you if you saw it happen.

I can't believe I did that. I can't fucking believe I said that to you.

Not that I got an answer.

I straightened up a pile of DVDs on a shelf as an excuse to move a little closer. I'm not used to this feeling of dancing around you. Everything came so easily in Chicago. In Providence we fell back together without having to try. You've never been an effort before, and it's killing me.

Charlie brought in a cup of tea and couldn't find a place to put it down, so I'm holding it. Writing's pretty hard like this, but every surface is covered. We don't have guests often. We use this space for storage, for the things we don't know what else to do with.

I am so, so, tired. I left him for you. I left you for him. I love you both. Zack is dead. Jake is dead. Everything is falling apart and I want to cry, I just want to go to pieces and not worry anymore.

It's your tea and I shouldn't, but it smells warm and homey and like someone's taking care of me, and suddenly the mug's half empty.

God, I'm going to start crying.

I just love you both so much. You're hurting so much.

God, I don't know what I'm going to do except cling to you and wait for things to start making sense.

I don't know how long we've been sitting here, but the sun's gone down and you're leaning on me, eyes half open. You haven't slept since you came off the drugs in the hospital. Sleep, Evie. Dream something nice for me.

Text with Charlie

you awake?

yeah. you?

...okay stupid question

Oct 3, 3:03 am

so...coming to bed?

Oct 3, 3:05 am

finn?

Oct 3, 3:09 am

I don't want to leave her alone,
Charlie

Oct 3, 3:12

are you attracted to her?

Oct 3, 3:13

that's not the point

to me it is

really? after I left you and flew
across the country in the
middle of the night to be with
her, twice? that's fine but
whether I find her attractive is
what you're worried about?

idk

well idk either