Alex made it to the front door of the hospice, finally.
He couldn’t put it off forever.
Instead of opening the door, he leaned against the building and lit another cigarette. Today was gonna be one of those one pack-of-smokes kind of days.
The only time he wasn’t thinking was when he was smoking. On the inhale, there was no room left for anything else inside him. And on the exhale, all bad thoughts, memories, feelings went out with it. It was his only relief. Problem was, it was only temporary.
He took a long drag and watched the ash eat away at the cigarette. Burn baby, burn. His fingers were starting to feel the heat already. This one wasn’t going to last long.
“You going in, or are you just here to smoke?” said a familiar voice.
Alex looked up to see Mr. Thompson, Reid’s dad, holding the door on his way out. He raised his eyebrows at Alex and pushed the door further open, indicating the entrance by tipping his head to the side.
“Not ready yet.”
“Haven’t seen you around here in a while.” Mr. Thompson stepped out of the doorway and let the door swing shut. “Heard a rumor you were moving on. That true?”
“M-hmm. Got accepted into UC Berkeley. I’m outta this place in four days.”
“Good for you.” He sounded sincere.
Guilt crept up on Alex. “I can’t be here anymore. Everyone knows me, knows what—”
“I’m not faulting you. I think it’s good. You should. You’ve got a bad rap here and it’s not right. Now you can start over fresh.”
Alex tossed the nub of the cig onto the ground and mashed it into the pavement. “Then why do I still feel so guilty?”
Mr. Thompson laughed. “Don’t I know guilt.” He shook his head and stared at Alex’s dead cigarette. “I’ll never forgive myself for everything I did to him. Everything I put him through. I should’ve been tossing the ball around with him, not hitting him.”
“But you’re sorry?”
Alex could see the lines on Mr. Thompson’s face. There were more there now than the last time he saw him. Brow wrinkled with concern, mouth creased with sadness. Made him look way older than his forty-three years.
“I’ll be sorry ‘til the day I die. But that don’t make it all better. Nothin’s ever gonna take back what I did to him.”
Alex didn’t know what to say. It took Reid’s terrible state to wake his father up and for him to realize how much he loved his only son. How much pain and anger he’d held onto all those years. Since Alex and Reid came out of that house, he was a changed man. Visited Reid every day. He read to him, told him stories, talked to him. Sat there by his bedside every goddamned day.
“I blamed him for his mother’s death. I don’t know why. Why did I take it out on him? He was just…a boy,” he whispered.
Alex was pretty sure Reid’s father never knew what had really happened between Reid and his mother. Never knew what she had asked of him. And even though Reid always thought his father knew, it turned out it was just his guilt eating at him. Just one more secret for Alex to keep. The list was getting longer every day.
Alex reached for another cigarette.
“Why don’t you go see him?” Mr. Thompson reached out and stopped him from lighting it up.
“How is he today?”
“One-hundred percent unresponsive. He’s in bed. I just finished reading him The Old Man and the Sea. I hope he liked it. It was one of my favorites.”
Alex put the smoke back in the pack. “I’m sure he did. It’s a good one.”
“You know,” Mr. Thompson leaned against the wall next to Alex, crossing his arms, “yesterday I coulda swore I saw him smile at me. Is that weird for me to think that?”
“Nah. Maybe he did. Or maybe you just want him to so badly you saw what wasn’t there.”
Alex immediately wished he hadn’t said that last part. Why’d he have to dash his hopes that someday Reid would wake up and be Reid again?
Mr. Thompson was the only person since the rescue who’d treated Alex like a normal human being. The only one who talked to him, listened to him, and looked at him without fear in his eyes. Never in a million years would Alex have guessed it would be him. But people can change. In the end, he was the only one to keep Alex sane.
Alex had made a mistake one night, two years ago, by confiding in Reid. He’d thought they were alone. He was sitting in Reid’s room, talking about Heather, Clint, and Danny, sobbing over all they’d gone through and how everyone left him alone, when Reid’s dad walked in.
Reid had been propped up to a sitting position, in a chair facing out the window. Alex sat in the chair next to him, just unloading everything.
He never heard Mr. Thompson come in, but a gentle hand gripped his shoulder.
Alex jumped and tried hard to wipe away the tears. Mr. Thompson was so calm. So unlike the man Alex had known in the past. He was patient and kind. He sat down on Reid’s bed and asked Alex to tell him the story. The real story. After everything Alex had been through and everyone he’d tried to talk to, including his own family, here was Reid’s dad, ready to listen.
So Alex told him everything.
Since then, he was someone Alex could talk to and someone who’d talk back, unlike Reid. It helped a lot. Life’s weird like that. Unexpected as fuck.
The look on Mr. Thompson’s face after Alex’s thoughtless remark about him imagining Reid’s reactions was like a puppy who’d got slapped on the nose, and Alex felt terrible for saying something so cold.
“Sorry. That wasn’t cool of me to say.” Alex cringed. “I never would’ve made it out of that house if not for Reid. He saved me. For that I’ll always be thankful…and feel guilty. I was a goner, for sure, but he stepped in. He’s a goddamned hero. And this,” Alex pointed to the shitty hospice building, “this is what he gets for it. It’s not right.”
“The world isn’t right or fair, Alex. You know that.” Mr. Thompson pushed off the wall, swung around to face Alex and looked him dead in the eye. “I screwed up so badly with him.” He choked on the words, then cleared his throat. “I’ve told him I’m sorry a million times. I don’t know if I can help him, Alex. I don’t know if he’ll ever wake up. There are moments I want to hug him, hold his hand, kiss his forehead, but then I wonder, after all we’ve been through, if my touch would give him solace or frighten him. I don’t know how to comfort him.” He looked away. “No matter what, he never acknowledges my presence, my voice. Me.”
Heavy sadness filled Mr. Thompson’s bloodshot eyes, permanently darkened with baggy circles underneath. That’s how he’d looked every day Alex had seen him in the past four years. Probably never even slept anymore.
“You can’t do that to yourself,” Alex said. “You’re here for him. I’m sure he knows it. But you gotta take care of yourself. For him, if not yourself.”
The weight in Mr. Thomson’s eyes only grew heavier.
And it weighed on Alex, too, because he wasn’t sure that Reid knew. Wasn’t sure if he knew anything at all. Most days, he laid in a bed and would go weeks without a movement or a peep, and then one day he’d just start screaming as if the devil was on his heels. Other times he’d swing his arms like he was fighting an invisible foe.
Sometimes it was just his eyes, they’d dart about the room, like chasing ghosts. But those weren’t his eyes anymore. They were so much grayer, so much darker as though someone had turned the lights out.
Moments when Alex stared into Reid’s eyes, he wondered what Heather saw that day in the house when she’d asked him, “Does it burn in the dark?” He sure as hell hoped it didn’t.
It was possible Reid didn’t understand Alex when he talked to him. But he tried anyway. He had to. It was the least he could do. He talked about when they were kids, the happier days. Things they’d done, games they played, things they’d seen. Tried to always keep it positive. Never mentioned that house, the sadness, the pain, what every day was like for Alex since they got rescued. He tried until it hurt too much to keep trying.
It was like Reid’s body was this strange shell and he was trapped inside.
So often, Alex hoped he was unaware. That he just floated around in there, blissfully ignorant of everything they’d been through and everything he was going through now. Alex prayed he was swaddled in soft clouds, bouncing and floating through a deep blue sky, impervious to all the sadness and pain around him, unaware of where his body truly lay. Alex didn’t want to think of the nightmare it must be if Reid was aware but unable to do anything about it all. That was too much to bear. A prisoner behind dark walls.
Trapped inside.
Watching.
Waiting.
Mr. Thompson chuckled. “I think it’s good you’re going. You’re so young. You deserve a chance. Forget all about this town, if you can.”
“I want to. I’ll try, but I’ll never forget Reid. He’s—”
Mr. Thompson placed a hand on Alex’s shoulder. “He’s your best friend, and he’d be happy about school. He’d be proud of you, Alex.”
Alex blushed. “Thanks.”
“I’m proud of you, too, for what it’s worth. I know it’s not easy.” He backed up a few steps and turned around to walk away. Then he looked back over his shoulder. “Take care of yourself.”
“You too, Mr. Thompson.”
It was now or never. Alex got his lazy ass off the wall and reached for the door.