I told Go-boy about the old jail—about how all the kids started destroying it, how the older folks pulled on that rope, and how the whole town hauled it away and piled it in a corner of the dump. Set it on fire. I was rambling, avoiding the awkwardness of a silent hospital room. I said, “They were all wearing your SAME-SAME shirts.”
He sat at the end of the bed, his feet flat on the floor, his posture rigid, his eyes staring at the space between Kiana and me—at his own reflection in the bathroom doorknob. He forced a nod.
“Joe,” Kiana said. She was sitting on a chair next to him. She lifted her hand from her thigh and almost touched his forearm, almost caressed him, but pulled back. She said, “Sean’s perfect. Or, he’s . . . it’s like nothing happened. He’s so funny.”
I could see she was unsure how to tell Go-boy about their little brother’s healthy recovery. She too was uncomfortable with the silence, a first for her.
“Sean keeps telling everyone that he wants to catch some humpies. When I tried convincing him he had to go to school, he was so confused, and he said, ‘What happened to summer this year?’” She paused. “Everyone calls him Memory now.”
Go-boy was wearing the same clothes he had on the day he tried to hang himself. This was our second visit and Kiana had remembered to bring a small duffel bag full of t-shirts and socks. I wondered why they didn’t make him wear a gown. They must have made a special exception for the behavioral health patients.
Kiana pulled a ratty stuffed animal from the duffel bag. It was a brown otter and it must have meant something to the two of them. She set it on the end table. Go-boy didn’t look at it, but he could see it in the doorknob’s reflection.
“Joe,” Kiana said.
Go-boy blinked. His jaw was still swollen. It had turned out it wasn’t broken, just dislocated. Fluid had filled his cheeks, dilating his face, making his eyes look sunken and small. His expression made me wonder if we were doing any good by being here. He’d only been in the hospital for five days and had, by law, another nine before he could leave. Go stared at the doorknob. In it I imagined he saw the whole room in reverse.
“Joseph,” Kiana said.
He looked at her for a quick second, then turned and looked out the window behind me.
“Joe.” She was trying to talk to him now for real, trying to start one of the hundred sentences she’d planned out ahead of time. Encouragement, no doubt. Support. She had been carrying it all for her family, all year, and now she was carrying it for Go-boy too. And even though Go knew everything she needed to say, she still needed to say it. But it was impossible—with his new medications and the hangover of emotion, he seemed both angry and inebriated.
I said, “I got some drums. From the school. Flo got a new set and so I put her old one in my room.”
“Joseph,” Kiana said again. Her bloodshot eye had almost faded to normal, but now, here, in the hospital, trying to get her older brother’s attention, both of her eyes were getting red.
“The drums are good enough for me. They’re old, but they sound good. The kick pedal is crap, though. Flo said I can use them until I get my own.”
I looked at Go, then followed his line of sight and saw the doorknob. The silence he was giving was predictable, and still impossible. I kept talking about nothing.
“Joe, everything—” Kiana started, then hesitated and trailed back into thought.
I didn’t try to talk anymore. I just waited. I leaned back against the window. I wanted to let Kiana and her brother have their silent struggle without trying to break it up with distractions. I didn’t want to change anything. Kiana’s desperation and pain had always been private, until now. I wanted to see all her stress—and all the year—all catch up to her, right here, in the hospital. I wanted to see this, not out of spite but because it was making me feel something too.