Me Being Me Is Exactly as Insane as You Being You (42 page)

“How long are you here for?”

“My flight's in a few hours.”

“Oh.”

“They let me come home for Thanksgiving.”

“From Savilleta?”

“What? Yeah. How did you know?”

“. . .”

“. . .”

“Why do you have to leave so soon?”

“Visits aren't supposed to be more than two days.”

“Oh.”

“It was a big deal they let me. And we're not supposed to see, you know, other people.”

“. . .”

“I . . .”

“. . .”

“. . .”

“What?”

“I got your messages, Darren.”

“So did . . .”

“And your letter.”

“. . .”

“And your playlist.”

“I got your drawings.”

“. . .”

“You're an incredible artist.”

“Thanks.”

“You are.”

“. . .”

“I didn't take your drawing off my arm for a month.”

“I shouldn't have . . . I'm really sorry about . . . Ann Arbor and—”

“Zoey.”

“Yeah?”

“. . .”

“. . .”

“Can I see you? Tonight?”

“I . . . Darren.”

“Huh?”

“We're not supposed to.”

“I know.”

“It's just . . .”

“Ben Zwiren told me. I know.”

“You know Ben?”

“Sort of. Yeah. He told me.”

“The program I'm in. I'm mean, we're not supposed to.”

“To what?”

“You know.”

“. . .”

“Have boyfriends.”

“I know. I'm not—”

“You don't know.”

“What?”

“What happened.”

“I don't—”

“Why they sent me away.”

“I want to see you, Zoey.”

“I'm a fuck-up.”

“I really want to see you tonight.”

“And I'm trying not to be.”

“. . .”

“Darren, I'm sorry.”

“. . .”

“Sorry.”

“. . .”

“. . .”

“Zoey?”

“Yeah?”

“It's my birthday.”

“Today?”

“I'm sixteen.”

“Happy birthday.”

“. . .”

“. . .”

“It's been a shitty birthday.”

“Sorry.”

“A super shitty birthday.”

“Sorry.”

“. . .”

“. . .”

“Zoey, my life . . . I don't think it could be much better than yours right now.”

“Darren, you—”

“No, I mean, it's a mess. I'm a mess.”

“I'm sorry.”

“. . .”

“. . .”

“I'm going to be there in a half hour, Zoey.”

“Darren.”

“Will you sneak out for me?”

“Darren.”

“Please? For me?”

“. . .”

“. . .”

“Darren.”

“What?”

“I've been working hard.”

“Okay.”

“To not be like I was.”

“That's good.”

“So, I can't.”

“. . .”

“. . .”

“What if I promise to help after?”

“. . .”

“To help you keep working and stuff.”

“. . .”

“And you'll help me.”

“. . .”

“And then I'll wait until you're ready.”

“. . .”

“I'll wait. I promise. As long as you need me to.”

“. . .”

“Please.”

“. . .”

“For me.”

“. . .”

“. . .”

“Okay.”

“You will?”

“. . .”

“Will you?”

“Yes.”

“I'll be there soon.”

“Hurry.”

“I will.”

“Wait, Darren.”

“What?”

“I missed you so much. I'm so sorry I—”

“It's okay.”

“Hurry, please.”

“I will. I promise. I will.”

3
Things Darren Does Before Walking to Ray's Car

1.
 Walks back to the fight, which is ongoing. Ray has disappeared. His three family members are speaking all at once, each of them at a volume located precisely halfway between talking and screaming.

2.
 Says, “Hey.” Says it again. Says it a third time. Actually, he screams it this time.

They all stop and, still heaving, look at him. Everyone's expression is some version of
Where'd you come from?
or
What are you doing here?
or
Oh, right, Darren's part of all this too.

“You want to know what I want for my birthday?” Darren asks. “You want to know? I want to be somewhere else right now. With someone else. I”—he looks into the restaurant, at all the people calmly eating their delicious vegetarian dinners, people who look totally normal and not insane—“I love you guys, I do, I mean it, but I can't . . . I can't.” He digs his hand into his pocket and feels for his keys.

“Dad”—he looks at his father, and ignores the muscles in his own neck that seem determined to swivel his head over to his mom—“if you want . . . if you want, I'll go to Dr. Schrier's with you every week until I graduate. I'm serious.”

“Darren,” his dad says, “that's not necessary. We can just—”

“So whatever is. Whatever's necessary. We'll do that. I will. Okay? I promise.”

Then he lets those muscles do their thing.

“Mom,” he says to a wet and shiny face that apparently belongs to her. She runs her sleeve over it. “I'm okay.” He's trying so hard to mean it. “I'm okay.” Maybe saying it over and over will eventually make it true. “I'm okay if you have to move. I am. So go. It's okay. It'll be okay. I'm okay.”

He has to close his eyes. It's the only way he's going to make it through this.

“Nate.”

“What, D?”

“You're my only brother. You know that, right?”

“Duh. Yeah. So?”

“You're my only big brother. Okay? The only one.”

“Yup.”

“Right? The only one.”

“Yeah,” Nate answers quietly.

Darren opens his eyes. Looks back into the restaurant. Where he won't be eating tonight.

“Look,” he says, turning back to all these people with whom he shares every last bit of his genetic material, for better or for worse. “I need to go see someone. I'll come back. I promise I will. But”—he swallows—“don't wait up.”

3.
 Hugs them, like he means it.

6
Great Things about Lake Shore Drive

1.
 The way it curves gently.

2.
 The park it cuts through.

3.
 The lake that sits on one side.

4.
 The buildings facing it on the other.

5.
 How it's exactly the right place to drive when you're listening to Bill Evans play “Lucky to Be Me” all by himself. Like somehow the whole thing turns the car into a time machine.

6.
 And the way all that makes it possible for you to believe, even for just a moment, that maybe, just maybe, you could be happy living in this part of this planet after all. Assuming Zoey feels more or less the same.

14
Ways This All Ends, for Now

1.
 He pulls up in front of Zoey's house, and there she is, stepping out from behind the garage and rushing toward the car.

2.
 He unlocks the door and she hurries inside. “Go,” she says with some urgency.

3.
 He drives. Drives past two or three houses. But can't stop wanting to see her, to really look at her. So he pulls over. And there she is, sitting right next to him.

4.
 Zoey Lovell.

5.
 The piercings are all there. Her hair is shorter. Closer to some version of normal. And her face, it's hers, but new as well. Different. Like it's open now, like it's opening up right now, just for him. Thankfully, the spot's still there. She's beautiful. But in a way that makes the word seem hopelessly inadequate.

6.
 “This is bad,” she says.

“No it's not.”

“You don't know.”

“What don't I know?”

“Pretty much everything.”

“So tell me everything.”

“This is going to set me back. I don't know how far back.”

“I'll wait.”

She looks down. Considers something for a few seconds. Smiles.

7.
 He takes her hand. That still wears the ring. Thank God she kept the ring. He lifts her hand and kisses it. He actually does this, and somehow it doesn't feel ridiculous at all.

8.
 They kiss, on the lips. Maybe for the first time ever.

9.
 “Drive,” she says. “Just drive.”

10.
 There are laws against sixteen-year-olds driving at night, against sixteen-year-olds driving with passengers under the age of twenty-one. And there are probably additional laws against sixteen-year-olds with passengers under the age of twenty-one crossing state lines at night. But she told him to drive, and he needs to get past the city and all its lights.

11.
 With one hand he drives, and with the other he holds her hand. His parents used to do that. He'd watch them from the backseat.

12.
 She talks. She talks a lot. She tells him things. All sorts of things. And that list, the one from the website, the one with nowhere to hide, she recalls a lot of it for him.

He just holds her hand. There are things from the nightmare list that make him want to pull away. Not want to, but almost have to. But somehow he doesn't.

Maybe because her list, it somehow matters and doesn't matter. It's Zoey and not Zoey at the exact same time. Sure, now he knows for certain what he only sort of knew before, but he also realizes, he finally gets it, just listening to the sound of her voice, that there are a million other, better ways to know her. And those ways have nothing to do with an update or a confession or anything like that.

He tries telling her this with his hand and how he drives and the precise way he says almost nothing back to her. So she keeps talking, gradually making one thing incredibly clear to him: She's trying to undo her list, to write another list. To not have a list. To be Zoey without a list.

13.
 Maybe everything would be better without all these horrible, endless lists. But maybe they're unavoidable and the point is just to find someone to share yours with. Or someone to write some new and better ones with. Maybe that's the point of the whole thing: Find the right person to write your lists with.

14.
 And assuming it is, here's how he'd start:

6
Things to Do Right Now

1.
 Drive for hours with Zoey Lovell.

2.
 Get off the highway at a random exit somewhere in Wisconsin.

3.
 Make a few turns until you're driving down a road no one's ever even bothered to pave.

4.
 Get out of the car at the edge of a massive, silent field.

5.
 Stand under the stars with her.

6.
 Realize that this planet isn't so bad after all.

I wrote the first draft of this book in fifty-one wonderfully manic and optimistically impulsive days. Seven drafts and almost three years later it reached its final form. Many people helped along the way, and I'd like to thank them.

Dan Shere and David Levin offered useful notes, friendly encouragement, and reliable enthusiasm. Joel Grossman demonstrated, repeatedly, what unbridled excitement for this book might look like. Noam Hasak-Lowy was Noam Hasak-Lowy throughout, which is no small thing. James Mignogna let me know what needed to be known, at least by this book's future readers. Josh Radnor inspired me to think twice about the words I use. Sara Levine, in addition to being a valuable local ally, encouraged me to reconsider the form of these very acknowledgments.

Stephen Barr agreed to tell me what it really was like. Robert McDonald provided crucial, insightful, and honest criticism on a late draft. Ezra Garfield, Emily Downie, Hannah Chonkan-Urow, and Ariel Hasak-Lowy agreed to take on additional homework and, after completing said homework, delivered smart, cogent, and vital feedback late in the game. Ariel Hasak-Lowy gets mentioned twice because she, in fact, read it twice.

Elizabeth Gerometta and Genevieve Buzo, whom I still haven't met, unearthed the absurdly elusive title.

The team at Simon & Schuster did all manner of wonderful things to transform this from a messy file on my lonely laptop to an actual and rather snazzy-looking book that now lives out in the great big world. Jessica Handelman (cover genius); Hilary Zarycky (interior design virtuoso); Christina Pecorale, Victor Iannone, and the rest of the sales team; Carolyn Swerdloff, Teresa Ronquillo, and Lucille Rettino in marketing; Faye Bi, Michael Strother, Katherine Devendorf, Sara Berko, Mary Marotta, and Mara Anastas (commander in chief)—thanks to all of you for giving my writing such a warm home.

Simon Lipskar, my original and future agent, convinced me, however effortlessly, that “writing is writing,” thereby diffusing at least one stubborn source of self-doubt.

Dan Lazar, my present and future agent (I know, it's complicated), helped this often-convoluted writer find his place within a readership he often assumed couldn't possibly want to have anything to do with him. Dan also provided reliable wisdom and steady guidance. And I remain grateful to him for having a master plan, even if it hasn't quite worked out yet.