Dad didn’t make me go to school on Friday. He even let me cancel my appointment with Cecil.
I haven’t left the apartment all weekend. Dad left once yesterday, to get groceries and a bottle of Jack Daniel’s. When Mr. Atapattu knocked on our door to watch “Saturday Night Smash-Up,” we pretended we weren’t home.
The phone rang a lot yesterday too. I let Dad answer. A couple of the calls were from Mom, but she knows I’m not talking to her. Farley and Alberta called too, but I don’t want to talk to them, either.
12:15 p.m.
It’s past noon. Dad is still in bed “sick.” And I’ve just discovered we are completely out of toilet paper. Dad forgot to buy it yesterday.
I can feel a Number Two coming on.
3:00 p.m.
So I found three dollars and forty-two cents under the couch cushions and went to the corner store. It was barely enough to buy two measly rolls of TP.
On the walk home, it started to pour. I jogged the rest of the way. For the first time in months, I didn’t feel breathless, and my wobblies didn’t bounce up and down like jelly.
A woman wearing sweatpants and an anorak was struggling to find her keys. She was carrying a bunch of heavy grocery bags. I opened the door for her.
It wasn’t till she peeled off her hood that I realized it was Karen.
“Henry,” she said grimly.
She looked different, and it took me a minute to realize I was seeing her without makeup. Her hair hung in wet strands around her face. She had bags under her eyes, and her skin looked gray. She looked like death warmed over.
“Can we talk?” she asked.
“No,” I said. Then, stupidly, instead of making a dash for the stairs, I dashed into the elevator and pressed the CLOSE DOOR button repeatedly. She just followed me inside.
“Fine,” she said, putting down her grocery bags. “I’ll talk, and you listen.” Then she did an unbelievable thing for a grown-up: She pushed me to the back of the elevator and planted herself in front of the doors as they slid shut. We stood staring at each other in the unmoving elevator.
“This is kidnapping,” I said. “You’d better let me go, or I’ll scream.”
She rolled her eyes. “Like anyone would want to kidnap you. Just shut up and listen, and this’ll be over before you know it.”
I shut up.
“First I want to say, I’m really sorry about your brother, Jesse.”
Hearing her say his name made me want to throw up.
“Believe it or not,” she continued, “I know how it feels.”
I snorted. “You don’t have a clue –”
“My dad committed suicide when I was fifteen.”
That shut me up again.
“I’m not going to lie to you, Henry. Some of the bad feelings never go away.”
“Gee, great. Thanks for that.”
“Would you rather I lie to you?”
I thought about that for a moment. “No, I guess not.”
“I just wanted you to know, you’re not alone.”
“Yeah, but your dad didn’t kill someone else.”
“No. That’s a whole other layer of yuck you’re going to have to get through.”
“Again. Thanks.”
She shrugged. “You’re already doing way better than me. Nobody got me into therapy, I can tell you that. Drinking was my therapy.”
“I prefer the term ‘alcoholic.’ Trying to quit again, though. I’m almost two weeks clean and sober.”
Two weeks – big deal, I thought. “Is that why you look like shit?”
She looked like she wanted to punch me in the face, but all she said was, “Probably. I feel like shit, so it stands to reason.”
I nodded.
“Thing is, I get what your dad is going through. And if he wants to talk, I’m going to listen.”
“What if he wants to do more than talk?”
She looked me right in the eye. “When you two moved in, I got my hopes up. Your dad’s not a bad-looking guy. But, as much as I like him, he’s not my type. And now that I know you are part of that package … definitely not interested.”
With that, she turned around and pressed the buttons for our floors. The elevator jerked into motion.
We rode in silence. When the doors opened on the second floor, I stepped out. “Do you still miss your dad?” I asked.
“All the time,” Karen said. She turned her face away as the doors closed.