Painless (7 page)

Part Two

Chapter 15

Today I’m eighteen, and I’m watching Luna pull into the driveway, which is a surprise. I didn’t know she was coming over, and it’s early evening. Joe’s not here, and Veronica left early.

The last few weeks I’ve planted my body in front of the piano and hit the keys, or I’ve driven the car around and around the driveway. I haven’t played video games. I’m
not in the mood to see my make-believe friends lost in a cave or mountain or die over and over again, even if I can revive them.

My head’s been stuck in a black cloud.

Joe has practically moved in. The study is his office. “Stay out of the study,” he said to Veronica and me. “I have everything arranged so I can find what I need.”

I’m super-kid. I’m super-polite. I’m not going to annoy anybody.

I meet Luna at the front door, and she wraps her arms around me. It feels good to be squashed against her, and I wonder if she can tell how fast my heart’s beating. “I’m sorry I haven’t been around,” she says into my ear. Then she steps back. “I have two jobs now, and I’m working all of the time.”

“I understand,” I say, smiling. I haven’t seen Luna since we went to the lake a few days after the funeral. We rented paddle boats, but I could only be outside for a half hour. Then we came back to my house, and Spencer arrived. We played our guitars for a while.

“Want to go to dinner?” she asks.

I get it now. Joe’s probably giving me a party somewhere.

And I’m hoping my father or mother will be there. The last time I asked him about them, he said, “I’m working on something.”

He’s always said no before and nothing else.

“Sure,” I say to Luna.

She pulls in front of an Italian restaurant, and we go inside. She speaks to the hostess who leads us to another room where people shout, “Happy Birthday, David!”

Happy Birthday, David
is written on a streamer on the back wall.

I don’t really know any of these people.

Joe walks over to me, and I smile. “This is great,” I say, not sounding like I mean it. We head toward a long table. On the way, Joe says, “Nice to see you,” to everybody we pass. I’ve never heard him talking so friendly before.

I glance around the crowd, and I don’t see anybody who could be my father or who might be my mother. I mean, if they were here, they would’ve said hello by now. Something inside of my mis-wired brain had hoped Joe would’ve found them. That would be the ultimate surprise for me.

But this is enough for now. “This is fabulous,” I say to Joe. I have a little more pep in my voice.

Luna and I sit at a round table with names on cards. Pretty soon Spencer, Cass, Cameron, and Marcello take their places at my table.

They’re the only people my age at the party. The other people are Nana’s age.

I lean over and whisper to Luna. “Do you know these people?” I ask.

We make eye contact. “Probably people who came to the funeral,” Luna says. “Your grandmother’s friends.”

“It’s cool,” I say. In a way. I’m with Luna.

Then I see Veronica and her husband, and Spencer’s parents. I wave to them.

A waiter brings plates of spaghetti.

“You were in the army, right?” I ask Cameron, my down-the-road neighbor who sits on his porch in a wheelchair most of the time. I cut my spaghetti with my knife. Luna keeps glancing at my hands, probably to make sure I still have my fingers.

“Yes.” Cameron says he’d been stationed in Afghanistan and came home after he was wounded in an explosion.

I take a sip of water and swallow.

“It must be really difficult for you,” Cassandra says to Cameron.

“It’s hard for all of us,” he says.

Cass rolls her eyes.

The time’s coming when I’ll have to be independent or else. If Cameron can do it, I can do it.

Then Spencer moves over next to me. His eyes are red around the rims and bloodshot. I wonder what’s happened.

“So did you break up with Cass?”

“How’d you know?” he asks.

I shrug. “You’re not sitting next to her. You haven’t spoken to her. She’s flirting with Cameron.”

“She said she didn’t want to have a long-distance relationship.” He says she was his soul mate, and he’d thought about transferring to her college to be with her.

I don’t know how they ended up together. They’ve spent a lot of time together in the band and fell in love, just like in a romance novel with a bad ending. I don’t know anything about girls, but I think there’s more to it than not wanting a long-distance relationship.

“I can’t believe you’d give up Vanderbilt.” I shake my head. “You chose it because of the music program and the scholarship.” I clear my throat. “It’s a great scholarship.”

“I know,” he says. “I shouldn’t be complaining. You have bigger stuff going on.”

“Different,” I say. I figure losing somebody is important, no matter what the cause.

“Did you get my graduation invitation?”

“Yes.”

“I want you to come,” he says. “It wouldn’t be the same without you.”

“I’ll be there,” I say. I don’t know how I’ll get to graduation, but I know what I’ll wear.

After dinner, Geo plays “Happy Birthday” and everybody sings.

A waiter refills my water glass, and then I hear static. I watch Spencer step onto the stage. “Thank you for coming to David’s celebration,” he says. “I’d like to propose a toast. Would everyone please stand.”

I don’t stand. I can’t move.

“David, happy birthday. May you have a hundred more.”

Everybody repeats, “May you have a hundred more.”

Then people raise their glasses and toast me. I hear sniffing, and I look over at Luna. She’s trying not to cry.

“Hey, Joe,” I say the next morning from the doorway of the study.

“Hey, David. You can come in.”

Piles of papers and folders litter the desk.

Nana told me once that Joe isn’t as heartless as he acts. He was engaged years ago, but his fiancée died in a car accident. Joe doesn’t have any other family but us. Now he only has me, and I bet he’s depressed about that.

“Thanks for the party,” I say, standing in front of the desk.

“You’re welcome. I wasn’t sure if you had a good time or not.”

“It was great.” I glance down at the desk and its scattered papers. “But I always hope my mom or dad will appear out of nowhere. Has the detective said anything?”

“No.”

“He is still looking, right?”

“For now,” Joe says.

I see a glossy Twin Falls brochure and pick it up. “I didn’t think I would have to move to Twin Falls,” I say, looking at a photo of the shuffleboard court.

He takes the brochure and sticks it on top of a stack of papers. “We’ll see how you do living alone.”

“I’d like to take the driver’s test again,” I say. “Would you take me?”

“Again?” Joe says.

“I failed the first time.”

Two hours later, I walk out of the DMV. I wave to Joe, my driver’s license in my hand, and I’m thinking about how free I feel. I can go anywhere.

Chapter 16

Spencer jumps into the pool. I have to get an early start these days because in a couple of hours, it’ll be harder to maintain my body temperature even in water. I take a deep breath. Hold it. I keep expecting to see Nana on the deck watching me. When I’m in my room, I expect her to open my door and ask if I did the body check.

Other times I’ll hear a car outside, and I’ll look out the window, hoping Luna’s stopped by. I don’t call her.

The only time I’m actually unsupervised is in the evenings and when I’m sleeping. Sometimes during the night I awaken with feelings of dread, and I can’t breathe.

Veronica’s keeping an eye on me when nobody’s around. She’s almost as old as Nana. I remember that at the funeral she didn’t walk to the front of the church to see Nana. She didn’t place a rose on the casket at the cemetery. I bet she was thinking the same as me.
That will be me one day.

“Coming tonight?” Spencer asks, drying off with a towel.

“I will.”

“As you come onto the field, turn right and go to those bleachers,” he says. “Hardly anybody sits there. The other side gets way too crowded.” Then he says he has to go to graduation practice. I did not know anybody would need to practice for something they’ve waited twelve years for.

“I’m going to Spencer’s graduation,” I tell Veronica.

She stops dusting the china cabinet. “You should’ve invited Luna to go with you.”

I would’ve if she had answered my emails. “I’ll be fine.”

“She’s a nice girl. You need a girlfriend.”

“She’s all right,” I say and look away.

“She likes you.”

She’s stayed away.

It’s eighty degrees when I get out of the car at the high school, but I have come prepared with a wet bandana around my neck and a cooling vest hidden under my clothes. I don’t know if this actually will work to keep my body temperature down. My watch will tell me if my body temperature starts rising.

The parking lot is packed with cars and people headed to the graduation ceremony. I slip my dad’s graduation gown over my head, put on the cap, and grab my cane. I head to the bleachers on the opposite side of the field where hardly anybody’s sitting.

I know this seems crazy. I know. I don’t need anybody telling me that, and I’m afraid I’ll see somebody who knows me. I won’t run and hide. I’m not going to be ashamed. I swallow. I’ve finished high school, only I never had a ceremony.

Until now.

The band’s playing, and the graduates come onto the field dancing. Their gowns are blue, just like mine. Getting an adrenaline rush, I stand and kind of dance along. Then the kids line up on the field and “Pomp and Circumstance” plays. They walk around the field, and I see Spencer. My heart’s running away. I think I almost know how he feels, but I want the real thing. I want to be walking on the field in a cap and gown, hearing the song, holding my head high.

I wave to Spencer, and then I see him running toward me like he knows how I’m feeling. He grabs my arm, and we hurry onto the field. We get into the line and walk toward the chairs. “Congratulations,” I say and then keep going back to my seat on the bleachers.

Then I’m listening to the speeches, but not really listening.

You know what I mean? My mind’s drifting. I’m on the stage in front of the microphone.

“Congratulations to all of us,” I’ll say and that’ll be enough. Sometimes a single sentence or word is enough.

I watch Marcello get his diploma, and I applaud for him. I even applaud for Cassandra. Spencer’s name is announced, and he walks across the stage. He turns and waves in my direction. It’s like he’s saying,
This is for you too.
I cheer loudly for us.

Chapter 17

I hear footsteps. I turn and see Joe. Something’s up. He hardly ever comes out to the pool, especially when he’s wearing an expensive suit.

“Let’s sit on the deck,” Joe says.

We go up the stairs to the table and chairs. I pull out a chair and sit. “What’s wrong?”

“Ruby wants Nana’s clothes.”

“Ruby who?” I ask, pretending I don’t know. She became nonexistent for me after I heard she’d said I was dangerous and said other mean stuff about me. Sure, I hit her grandson and broke his nose, but he kicked me in the belly first.

“Your grandmother’s cousin,” Joe says.

“Was she at the funeral?” I ask.

“Yes, and she sent flowers.”

“She didn’t speak to me.”

“Get over it, David.”

I frown a little. Nana’s room has stayed shut up the past few weeks. “I thought Nana wanted Veronica to have her clothes and take what she didn’t want to the women’s shelter.”

“I didn’t know that. I’ll talk to Veronica. Ruby is going to be here in the next half hour. I’ll be in the study.”

“So you already told her yes.”

“You stay in your room,” he says.

“I will,” I say. “Whatever happened to her grandson?”

“I don’t know,” Joe says. “Why?”

“Because nobody’s ever said,” I say.

First, I get the baby monitor out of my closet. Nana would keep it turned on when I was a little kid. I place the receiver on my dresser and go to Nana’s room with the other part. Her room’s dark, kind of like my brain right now. I turn on the light, and the room looks the same as it did the night I stayed with her and she died when I was sleeping.

“What are you doing?” Veronica asks.

I spin around. “Ruby’s coming over for Nana’s clothes. I thought you were going to take them to the homeless shelter.”

“Joe said I could get a few things,” Veronica says. She opens Nana’s walk-in closet. It’s filled. Veronica pulls out a blue silky dress. “Jan wore this when she left on her honeymoon with your grandfather.”

I turn around and place the baby-monitor transmitter on the dresser and plug it in. A tiny green light blinks.

“You’re going to listen in?” Veronica says. She has Nana’s nice coat in her arms, a couple of silk blouses, the blue dress, and a red robe.

“I am.”

“Better get the jewelry and lock it in the safe,” Veronica says and gets shopping bags out of Nana’s closet. She gives me one. I place the jewelry box in the bag. While I’m here, I may as well get the clock I made when I was a little kid and wore a helmet, and Nana’s box of special stuff from Grandpa’s closet. All of his clothes were given away years ago.

Nana’s box is mostly filled with pictures I’ve drawn and cards I made, and I’m shocked to find the stuffed elephant that hung from my IV pole when I was a little kid. It’s like going back in time. In my mind I can see my imaginary friend giving me a tiny fire truck, and my dad tying the elephant to the IV pole.

I smile when I see the
I will not
papers I wrote.

I thumb through them.
I will not kick
.
I will not touch the stove when it’s turned on
.
I will not slide down the banister. I will not do a pain test. I will not take out my stitches. I will not
injure myself to get attention. I will not glue a cut together.

The
will not
papers stopped when I was eleven. I was a slow learner.

When we’re done raiding Nana’s room, we take everything to my room, and I stick the stuff into my closet. Veronica carries her things downstairs.

I sit on my bed and read. After a few minutes Veronica returns and sits in the chair. “I’d like to wait in here,” she says.

“You want to hear what she has to say too?” I ask.

Veronica frowns. “Something’s going on,” she says.

“Like what?”

“I heard him tell her that the house and everything else were yours. I think she was expecting something,” Veronica says in a serious voice. “I don’t understand her.”

“Did you ever meet my mom or dad?” I ask.

“I was here the day he brought you,” Veronica says. “When it was time for him to go, you begged him not to leave you, but I bribed you with cookies.” She kind of smiles. “You had a speech impediment back then.”

“I talk okay now?”

“Yes. You talk fine.”

“Was Joe here?”

“I don’t remember.”

I look down at my book. “Do you trust him?”

“Yes,” she says. “Do you?”

“I don’t know.”

Then the doorbell rings. Veronica and I look at each other. “That’s probably her,” I say. Then I stand.

“Don’t answer the door,” Veronica says. “Joe can.”

“Did he tell you to make sure I stay in my room?”

“He mentioned it. Ruby says cruel things without even thinking.”

I shrug. “I’m going to the top of the stairs.”

“Wait for me.”

Veronica hovers behind me. From where I am, I cannot see the door, but I can hear. “You’ve done this before,” she says.

I nod. I hear Joe say, “Hello, Ruby.”

“Good afternoon, Joe. Beautiful day, isn’t it?”

“Yes, it is,” he says. He asks how she is, and she says fine. He asks how her family is. Her daughter and son-in-law live in Alaska, and her grandson is attending Harvard.

“Terrific,” Joe says.

Ruby asks if anyone has heard from James and says that she’s shocked he wouldn’t even show up for his mother’s or father’s funeral. But James was always a weird kid. He never had any friends. He’d rather watch butterflies than socialize. She hopes Nana left him out of the will because he’d spend it all in a week.

“She believed he was dead,” Joe says. “If you’ll come with me, I’ll take you to Jan’s room.”

Nana never told me she believed my dad was dead.

“I’m sure you’re busy,” Ruby says.

“Not too busy to help you,” he says.

Veronica and I hurry to my room and wait for the baby monitor to come alive with talk. A minute later I hear Ruby say she’s flabbergasted at the mess in the room.

She should’ve seen it before we stole the important stuff.

“You should fire that lazy housekeeper,” Ruby says. “I bet the rats have already moved in. I bet she allows that boy do whatever he wants to do. Have you considered my suggestion?”

I bite my lip and look at Veronica. She appears to be holding her breath.

“He’s not going to Twin Falls,” Joe says. “And the house is not for sale.”

“He’s a child with a serious disability. I’m not comfortable with him living here. His own mother was scared to death of him.”

“You’ve heard from Carlee?”

“It has been a few years,” Ruby says. “It was back when David beat up the mailbox across the road.”

I was around nine years old then, but I never beat up a mailbox. The woman that lived across the road tried to blame me.

Several minutes later I hear: “Nana had her prescription filled the day before she died, and the bottle is empty.”

“You need to finish up and go,” Joe says.

Veronica turns off the baby monitor. “I should not have let you do this,” she says to me.

Then I see Joe and Ruby standing at my door. Veronica pretends she’s dusting my desk. Ruby’s frowning. She eyes me. “What happened to your grandmother’s pain medicine?”

I shrug.

“He doesn’t show a grain of remorse,” Ruby says.

“You don’t live here,” Veronica says. “You don’t know David.”

“I know what he did to my grandson.”

Joe snorts the way a dog does when sniffing something gross on the ground.

I turn away.

“This is pointless,” Ruby says to Joe. “I don’t know how in the world you deal with a kid like him. I’ll let myself out.”

After she’s gone, I turn around. “She’s trying to get me into trouble,” I say to Veronica. “She wants revenge.”