Recovery Road (20 page)

T
he next day, I try again. I park and walk around Pioneer Square. I check the River Walk. I see other street kids, other homeless people, but I can’t find Stewart.

I try the skate park across the river. I see Jeff Weed in the afternoon and ask him.

“Yeah, he’s been around,” says Jeff, unsure of what my purpose is. “Don’t know where he is today.”

For the most part, people try to help. One kid says he may have left town. I can’t tell if this is true or if he’s been told to say it.

I finally give up and go into a Starbucks downtown. I get coffee and sit at the window and call Susan. Then I call Gina in Northampton.

“You gotta prepare yourself, Maddie,” Gina tells me.

“For what?”

“You know.”

This sends me into a panic. “He’s not going to die down here! I won’t let him!”

“He’s going to do what he’s going to do. And you can’t stop him.”

Later, in my car, I see the short Mexican kid from under the bridge. I honk and pull over and try to talk to him, but he runs away when he sees me.

I run after him. I chase him down the street. “No, I’m your friend!” I yell. “I’m the chica from yesterday!”

He vanishes down an alley.

That night, I track down Kirsten on the computer and call her at her mom’s house in Centralia. She’s pregnant by a new boyfriend. She hasn’t talked to Stewart in a year. She thinks he got into drugs again. In any event, he stopped living in their apartment and paying their bills. She was forced to move home.

“I miss him, though,” she tells me in a shaky voice. “Have you seen him?”

“Just once.”

“Is he bad?”

“Yeah. Pretty bad,” I tell her.

“Thanks for trying to help him. I would come down there, but my mom doesn’t think I should. You know, with the baby coming.”

“Yeah,” I tell her.

I spend a couple more days wandering around downtown. But time is running out. He’s obviously left the area, or made it impossible for me to find him. And I have to go back to my own life. Both Susan and Gina are adamant about that.
I have to go back to UMass.

On the last day of my vacation, I set my suitcase on my bed and begin organizing my stuff. As I do, a rush of panic comes over me. I can’t leave him here. I
can’t
.

But even as I think this, even as tears form in my eyes and fall into my suitcase, my hands continue to pack.

I
fly back east, over the clouds, a perfect blue sky enveloping me, cleansing me, freeing me from my past.

At least that’s what it feels like.

Gina picks me up at the airport. There is nothing to say. She knows how hard it is. We exchange a long and tearful hug.

It’s good to be home. Our off-campus house is my home now. More than my parents’ house. It’s where I feel the most like myself. I lie in my bed here, surrounded by my books, my plants, my laptop. I have become a new person in my time at UMass. I was right to come here.

After a couple days, I get back into school stuff. I pick my new classes. I find out I’ve been admitted to an advanced Emily Dickinson class at Amherst College. So that’s good news.

The day before the semester begins, Gina takes me out to dinner. We talk about normal things: a guy she met over vacation, a new professor in her department.

She thinks I should date this semester. She thinks some new romantic possibilities would be good for my mental health.

I don’t know how that’s going to work. I couldn’t even make it to Simon’s New Year’s party. She’s probably right, though. I resolve to get a haircut, and buy some new sneakers.

Sure enough, I get asked out twice in the first week of school. I say yes in both cases, and politely sit with both of the young men, drinking coffee and smiling at the appropriate times.

B
ut I still think about Stewart. I think about him every day. The New England sky is so different from the Pacific Northwest. It makes him seem so far away.

Then one Tuesday night after dinner, I find myself walking across campus to the far edge of town. I do this because I saw an old movie theater there and I want to check it out.

It’s a long walk, but I’m happy for the exercise. I feel strangely at peace. I’m not lonely tonight. I’m going to the movies.

The theater is called The Academy. It’s a lot like The Carlton. I pay my five bucks and get some cheap popcorn. I thank the local girl who stuffs my bag until it’s overflowing.

Inside the theater, I sit by myself near the back, a dozen other people scattered around me. The lights go down and I begin chomping popcorn and letting my brain drift slowly into the story.

The next Tuesday, I do it again. I walk across campus, through the cold, to The Academy theater. It’s a good way to relax, get away from campus, take a break from the pressures of college life.

It’s something I still do to this day. Not every Tuesday, but a lot of them. Movie night. And of course I think of Stewart whenever I go. Maybe I’m waiting for him to come join me, come sit with me, come flop his big feet over the seats in front.

That’s the thing: You can change things. You can repair mistakes. You can restart your whole life if you have to.

But some things you never get back. Certain people. Certain moments in time when you don’t know better than to shield your heart.

You don’t see those moments coming, you don’t know it when they’re happening, but later, as the plainness of life begins to show itself, you realize how important they were. You understand who really changed you, who made you what you are.

And so I never really say good-bye to Stewart. I keep him inside me. My first love. My best friend. My Lost Prince.

And if he ever returns he’ll know where to find me. The Academy theater. I’m still here. Feet up. Chomping stale popcorn. Saving him a seat.

BLAKE NELSON
is the author of many acclaimed novels, including
Destroy
All Cars, Girl, Rock Star Superstar
, and
Paranoid Park
. He lives in Los Angeles, California, but you can visit him on the web at www.blakenelsonbooks.com.

“Smart and entertaining.”
—
New York Times Book Review

“Captures the grand visions and the generalized irritation of teen idealism.”
—
Los Angeles Times

“An elegant and bittersweet story of a teenager who is finding his voice and trying to make meaning in a world he often finds hopeless.” —
Publishers Weekly

“You can’t get out of this novel without loving James.… Blake Nelson’s novels about smart kids who don’t quite fit give a good ride, and leave the reader with plenty to think about.” —
Newsday

Copyright © 2011 by Blake Nelson

Cover art & design by Christopher Stengel

All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Press, an imprint of Scholastic Inc.,
Publishers since 1920.
Scholastic, Scholastic Press
, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 557 Broadway, New York, NY 10012.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data available

First edition, March 2011

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.

E-ISBN: 978-0-545-33297-2