These Gentle Wounds (8 page)

Twelve

Five years. I've grown a foot and gained forty pounds in the past five years. Our country has elected new presidents. The National Hockey League has added a few teams and restructured the divisions. But my father has stayed the same.

It's weird because I expected him to have changed. Instead, he just looks grayer. I can see the muscles bulging on his neck, and it makes me a little sick to think that he works out and could probably squeeze himself into his old hockey gear.

That thought makes the back of my neck start to tingle. I pull my shoulders up and rub my temples, which doesn't keep my head from feeling like it's going to split apart.

His mouth opens and I push myself back into the chair, waiting to hear the vulture sounds, but I don't. All I hear is blood rushing through my head.

Ms. DeSilva is staring at me the same way that Jim stares at Kevin's meals; like I'm a science experiment she's waiting to turn color or boil over.

His lips are moving, but I don't hear anything. Just
whoosh, whoosh, whoosh.

I look down at my watch: 18 minutes, 3 seconds, 1 tenth. Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick.

I get up and walk over to the glass wall. It's cool under my hands and I can see myself reflected, along with him. I wonder if this is like the interrogation rooms on cop shows on TV. The ones where they can see in but we can't see out. I wonder if Kevin is on the other side watching me. I wonder if he's going to be angry that my blood is so loud I can't hear anything else.

I feel Ms. DeSilva's arm, gentle around my shoulders. She's turning me so that I'm facing him. He puts his hand out. I look at it. It's calloused like I remember. And large. I used to think I only remembered his hands being so big because I was a kid, but no, they're still really big. Even now.

In my head I can see those hands punching Kevin over and over. My whole body shudders until I look away.

Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick. 13 minutes. 42 seconds. 3 tenths.

I sit back down, wishing I could think about Sarah, but I don't want to think about her here. I want to think about Mom, but something about that seems wrong too. I don't want to betray her by doing that with him right in front of me.

Instead, I think about hockey. I think about skating really, really fast around the rink. It's the closest I can get to flying. It feels free, and light, and cold, and everything is clean, and pure, and white. If I was asked to build a rink, I'd build one shaped like an Olympic swimming pool, long and thin. I want to skate for an hour in a single straight line, gaining speed all the time like I'm doing in my head now.

I can feel the wind in my face and over the whooshing sound I can hear blades cutting into ice. It's one of my favorite sounds in the world; the call of some metallic bird flying through a frozen sky.

My breath speeds up as I zip across the surface of the ice. I want to keep skating until I'm a million miles away from here.

Something clamps down on my shoulder and I struggle, but it's stronger than I am. My eyelids flutter as I'm pulled from the rink in my mind.

When I open my eyes Kevin is there, but he isn't supposed to be. I wonder if he's going to get into trouble. I look at my watch.

8 minutes. 12 seconds. 4 tenths. Tick. Tick.

Everyone is buzzing around and making me dizzy. I wonder if this is what it feels like to pass out.

Kevin leans down and puts an arm around my neck. “This is over.” His voice is loud and sharp and sounds like someone else.

“Yes,” says Ms. DeSilva. “I agree. I think we need to stop for now.”

“What the hell have you done to him?” I hear, in vulture rasps.

“Get the fuck out of here,” Kevin says, in a tone I haven't heard him use in years. I get a whiff of Ms. DeSilva's perfume as she crosses in front of me, and suddenly we're alone. Just me and Kevin. I breathe a sigh of relief.

“Are you okay?” he asks. His voice is still weird, like he'd punch something with it if he could. His hands are clenched so tight his knuckles are white.

I nod. “Yeah. I was … I was skating,” I know it sounds weird, but I expect my words to reassure him even though they don't. “What's wrong?”

“You can't … ” He turns his back to me and I think for a second that he's going to lose it and hit something. I pull back hard in my chair. “Damn it, Ice, don't … ”

He takes a deep breath and then lets it out. Ms. DeSilva comes back in and shuts the door. “Is he okay?” she asks Kevin.

People do that sometimes—talk as if I'm not there. Sometimes it's fine, because it means I don't have to answer, but usually it's just really annoying. I'm not sure which it is now.

“As okay as he ever is,” Kevin hisses, spinning away from me.

“Does this happen often?” She looks from him to me. I'm not sure if I'm meant to answer or if she's still talking to Kevin.

“Yeah, my brother does stupid shit all the time,” Kevin says as he paces in front of the conference table.

When I stand up, my head swims a little and I have to grab onto the table to steady myself. “What are you so pissed about?” I ask.

“You really don't get it, do you?” He scowls.

Ms. DeSilva sighs and sits down. “Gordie, I think you and I need to talk.”

“Sure.” I pull out a chair and sit down. Now that my father is gone, all of this is much, much easier. I just wish Kevin would calm down before he gets into trouble.

“Do you have these … episodes … often?” she asks.

I exhale. I don't talk about spinning. Ever. And this wasn't really a spin, it was … I don't know what it was. Escape, maybe.

“I … it depends … some lately, but … ” I fold my arms tight over my chest.
I'm okay. He's gone and I'm okay.

“Have you told anyone? Jim? Or the counselors at school?”

“Jim … I guess he knows, but … why does it matter?”

“It matters, you idiot, because your psycho father is going to dump you in some hospital and throw away the key after that performance.” Kevin is raging now. He's charging up and down the room, looking like he wants to beat the hell out of me.

“You said that I should just listen to him,” I whisper.

Kevin gets right in my face. “Did you hear one word he said? Did you?”

“No,” I admit. “But … ”

He slaps the table and all of Ms. DeSilva's papers jump. I do too.

“Okay, let's all take a deep breath,” Ms. DeSilva says. But she doesn't get that I'm not breathing. I'm trying, but it's like something is sitting on my chest and pushing the air out of me. My hand is going nuts and I let it. I don't care anymore if she knows. I'm not sure what I've done wrong. And if it's what made my father leave, I'm not even sure I care.

“Kevin, do you mind giving us a few minutes?” Ms. DeSilva exchanges a look with him. My brother glares at me like he wants to break me in two and storms out.

The air in the room settles once he's gone and Ms. DeSilva takes a deep breath, sounding like she's trying to suck it all up.

“Okay, Gordie, can we start from the beginning?” she asks, only I'm not sure which beginning she means. Does she mean today? Or with the first awful thing I can remember my father doing? Or with The Night Before?

“The beginning?”

She nods. “I need you to help me. You need to tell me what's going on so that we can figure out where to go from here.”

I don't want to talk about anything, not even with her, but it feels like the words are pushing against my lips; if I start talking, I might not be able to stop and that scares me so much I think I might be shaking, but I'm not sure.

I push my sleeve against my mouth, but that doesn't help and the words pour out of me like rapids around the soft cloth.

I explain to her about the spins. I tell her about the memories. I tell her everything I can think of, except for The Night Before. She nods and takes notes.

I try to not think about how everything I'm telling her is being committed to paper.

“You talked to some counselors, right? I have notes here that the school arranged sessions for you?”

I try to nod and shrug at the same time. “They didn't get it,” I say, feeling like a total loser. “I tried.”

I must look like crap, because she moves over and puts her hand on my arm.

“No one is saying you didn't try. It's okay. Just tell me what happened.”

“They … ” I think back and try to let some of the memories in without letting the rest overwhelm me. “They gave me a bunch of drugs and … I couldn't study or play hockey. And then Jim talked to them, or Mr. Brooks, or someone, I guess, because they stopped. I … I got used to it, I think.”

I glance down. My watch is stalled. Flashing 0:00:00 over and over and over again.

“Am I in trouble?” I ask her.

She squeezes my arm and shares a grim smile. “No. You aren't. I promise. Why didn't you tell me before?”

I think back. “I didn't want you to be mad at me,” I say, feeling like I'm ten again. “I knew you wanted me to talk to them.”

She lets out a huff of air. “It was never that I wanted you to talk to them. It's that I wanted you to talk to someone who could help you deal with everything that was going on. I still want that.”

My muscles tighten and I know I'm on the edge of going into full panic mode. She puts her hand on the back of my neck and says, “Hey, it's okay. I'm not going to force you into anything. Just understand that there are other doctors and other methods and if you ever change your mind, you just need to let me know. Okay?”

My teeth are clenched even though her words should make me relax.

Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.

She stares at me and waits for me to calm down. She doesn't realize she could be waiting for years.

“How often do these spins happen?”

It's kind of like asking someone how often they blink or how often they're hungry. The spins are just there. They're just me.

“Sometimes.” It's only been for a couple of weeks this time, but it's hard to think back to when I didn't seem to either be spinning or coming out of a spin, so I grab at the only thing I can.

“When I found the letter, it got worse.” My hand shakes hard. I close my eyes. There's silence and then I hear her gathering her notes together.

“Okay,” she says softly. “Are you ready to go get your brother and head home?”

I nod. I wish we could teleport there and I didn't have to deal with Kevin until he calmed down. But one question is beating itself against the walls of my head and as we get to the doorway, I have to stop to let it out.

“Can I ask you something?”

“Of course,” she says as she turns back around.

“Why?”

She looks puzzled, so I give it another go. “I mean, why did he … ”

“People have different ways of dealing with grief,” she says before I finish. “I guess he couldn't handle losing your mother and your sisters and brother.”

At first I'm confused, because I don't think that has anything to do with the question in my head. Then I realize that she only sees the outside of my father—smiling with those sharp teeth. She doesn't know what he's really like, so, of course, the question she's answering is “Why did he leave?” not “What reason could he possibly have to come back?”

I can't take talking about this anymore, so I shut up and follow her out the door with my stomach tying itself in knots.

It doesn't take long to find Kevin pacing in front of Ms. DeSilva's office, his hands still clenched like a boxer's. I nudge by him and go into her office to grab my backpack as they exchange a few words I don't catch.

Kevin and I don't talk until we're halfway home. I don't need to hear his words to know he's still pissed at me. The air in the car shimmers with his anger.

“Kev … ” I start, but really I don't know what to say.

It doesn't matter, because his hands tighten on the steering wheel and he cuts me off. “Not now. Okay, Gordie? Not now.”

I lean my head against the window. Someday he's going to get mad at me and leave and I'm going to be completely alone, just a freak who was meant to die but didn't.

Kevin doesn't say a word until we're out of the car. He comes around to where I'm standing, leaning against the door and massaging my hand. He looks at the ground, not at me. “Sorry I got so mad back there.”

His apology hangs in the air between us. I can see its furling edges as it spins over and over. I want to reach out and touch it. I want to hold it in my hand. Put it in my pocket. Keep it.

He still looks angry, though. He looks right into my eyes, right through me, and crosses his arms and swallows so loud I can hear it. “It's silly, but … I'm scared too,” he says. “Of him, I mean.”

When I was really little, I was afraid of lightning. Instead of going to Mom's room—we never knew what shape she'd be in—I'd go to Kevin's and climb onto the foot of his bed. At some point he'd wake up and know I was there. We'd pull ourselves up to the windows and watch the storm together. Kevin isn't scared of anything. Never was. When I was little, and with him, I never was either.

All I can do is stare back.

His words circle around and make me dizzy.

When I'm freaking out, Kevin always knows what to do to help, but this is the first time that I'm the one trying to help. I don't know if I know how.

I rest my hands on his arms, which are still crossed tight. I will him to be okay. I make silent promises to be nicer to Jim, to eat whatever Kevin cooks, to ace my next test. But it doesn't matter. His eyes look shiny, which makes my stomach feel like it's cracking in two.

Something wet hits my hand. I think I'm bleeding until I reach up to my eyes and find that, for the first time in five years, I'm crying.