The cop didn’t take me to the police station. Instead, he drove east along the outskirts of Bluffton, past the swimming pool where I fought kids when I was little; past Smith Park, where I burned the Christmas trees; past the hospital where I went to have my head checked after the concussion; and finally into my neighborhood.
The cop was young, not a guy I’d ever met before through Grandpa. He hadn’t said anything the whole ride. When we got near my house, I said, “Why aren’t you taking me to the station?”
“For that crap over at Boulder Junction?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
“We have your girlfriend over at your house. Mike Meisel from BCA is there.”
“Grace is at my house?”
“You and her are lucky. The guy you punched out at Boulder Tap had a warrant on him. He didn’t want anyone calling the cops. Left the scene before the sheriff even got there.”
“I don’t know what’s going on, then,” I said. “Why am I in a cruiser?”
“Like I said, Mike Meisel is at your house. This is a courtesy pickup.”
“But you turned on your flashers when you parked at Joey’s.”
“Mike said I needed to impress upon you the seriousness of the situation.”
The cop pulled up in front of my house. The sun had gone down completely, so all the lights were on inside. There were several cars parked. Grandma’s, Dad’s, Grace’s, and a dark-colored SUV I figured was driven by Mike Meisel, Grandpa’s friend from the Wisconsin Bureau of Criminal Apprehension.
“Looks like a party,” the cop said.
He had to get out to open the door for me because the back door of the cruiser was locked. When I got out he wished me good luck.
I had no idea what to expect but followed the sidewalk away from the curb. One foot after the other. Where would I run even if I wanted to? Part of me wanted to run. The part of my brain that said, “Do it.” But Grace was inside. And I broke Joey’s stereo. He was no longer on my team. Riley’s dad would drive me right back home if I ran there. Twiggs’s parents would probably do the same. And what if I got away, would I run from my family forever? So stupid. Just having the thought to run was so ridiculous.
I entered the house, scared. In the living room sat Mom, Dad, and Grandma. Mike Meisel sat on a dining room chair, which had been pulled in. Grace was standing, pressed against a wall.
Mike Meisel stood up when I came in.
“Looks like we got him, Gin,” Mike said. “I’m calling it a day.”
Grandma Gin, who was still dressed in her Badgers tracksuit, stood and hugged him. “Thank you for coming by,” she said.
“Good luck.” He winked at me on his way out the door. All the cops were wishing me good luck. Didn’t seem like a good sign.
Other than Grace, the rest of the people in the room stared at me with pale, exhausted faces. It was odd to have Grace there, joining them. Back when we were Bonnie and Clyde, she was on my team, not theirs.
“So?” Mom finally said. “You’re not dead.” Her lower jaw began to tremble.
“No,” I said. “I’m fine.”
“You look like shit,” Grandma Gin said.
“I’m not perfect. I’m a little messed up.”
“Why?” Dad asked. “Will you please sit down and tell us why this is happening? We thought these times were behind us.”
“You beat someone up at that terrible bar?” Mom said. “Why would you go there?”
I took a breath and sat on the couch next to where Grace stood. Grace immediately left, crossed the room, and sat down on the chair where Mike Meisel had been. She wouldn’t look at me.
“Time to confess your sins, boy,” Grandma Gin said.
“I don’t like to talk,” I said.
“It’s time to talk, Isaiah,” Dad said.
“You’ve all never been that interested in what I have to say,” I said. I turned to Grace. “Except for you, Grace. You always listened.”
“Please don’t drag me any further into this,” she said, still not looking at me.
“Leave her alone, Isaiah. She’s a child like you are,” Grandma said.
That made Grace start to cry. That made me start to cry. That made Mom and Dad start to cry. Not Grandma, though. She continued to glare at me.
“Talk, Isaiah,” Dad said, sniffling.
I thought about my green notebook. All in third person, to keep me from frying in my own sadness. Good idea, Joey. Before Joey made me write, I don’t think I’d have had the words to say.
I took a breath. “I miss Hannah,” I said. “Since summer, I can’t stop dreaming about her again. I haven’t dreamed about her for years. And she’s so real in these dreams. I miss her so much and I’m older than her now, you know? I’m going to graduate from high school. She’ll always be in high school. I think that’s why she keeps showing up.”
“I miss her, too,” Mom whispered.
“But Hannah’s not all. I miss Grandpa. I miss Christmas and Dad’s Hanukkah menorah being out with the Christmas tree, which we never put up anymore, anyway. I miss Aunt Melinda coming down. I miss all of us sitting in a room together and nobody paying attention to me because I’m on the floor messing around with my football cards, and there’s food around and everybody is laughing and Grandpa is telling stories about weird cases he’s been on and . . .”
“Oh, Isaiah,” Mom said.
“I wasn’t a criminal when I was a little kid, you know? I was just so jumpy.”
“Kids are jumpy,” Dad said. “We never thought of you as a criminal.”
“I don’t know. I liked to dig in the dirt and mess up couch cushions and I spilled shit and made all these messes all the time, Mom, but I wasn’t a criminal.”
“I know, Isaiah,” Mom said. “I know.”
“I was just goofy and I just wanted to do my thing and there were all these people around the house talking and laughing and I felt . . . I felt like the world was this really good place.”
I swallowed hard. Nobody said a word.
“But then Grandpa was killed. And then Hannah. Grandpa and Hannah. Grandpa and Hannah. This sounds stupid, but I don’t know a lot of things that I can trust, okay? I don’t know what I can totally count on, right? But I know I can one hundred percent count on death. It’s real. It happens. And it can happen any place, at any time. And that scares the shit out of me and it makes me so sad, because I don’t even know what it is, except it takes people away. And the absence of those people proves the world is breakable, that it isn’t this really good place, that it can all be taken away and it will be, because . . . we all know it will be. What am I supposed to do with that information? Everything is going away and we don’t know when.”
I looked at Mom and Dad.
“At first, I turned to you guys because I thought you’d show me what to do. Here’s what I got: I watched Mom scream at Dad. I watched Dad stop talking except when the pressure from Mom was too much and he went back into his office and broke things.”
“That only happened once, Isaiah,” Dad said.
“Once was enough, I guess. When I went and did stupid things after Hannah died, did you ever think maybe I was just pulling a kid version of what the adults in my life were doing? I couldn’t deal with the pressure of all the death. I destroyed shit. I made death a living thing. You guys have spent years making death a living thing, okay?
“Even you, Grandma. Aunt Melinda won’t visit because you’re mean to her. And Mom is mean to Dad and Dad is mean to Mom. If adults act so shitty all the time, of course I’m going to think the world is a terrible place. Kids like me and Grace just get taught it again and again, don’t we? The world is terrible, filled with nastiness and bad people and then you get the gift of death as a reward! I mean, why shouldn’t I burn down Christmas trees or break windows at a seed store . . . ?”
“What now? What seed store?” Grandma Gin said.
I didn’t pause to answer her question. I revved up. Words tumbled out fast.
“Why wouldn’t I go to a shithole redneck bar and beat up assholes who are trying to drunk drive? At least my motivation for that is to keep innocent people safe. Hell, there should be a whole football team of dudes like me driving around, stopping assholes from harming the innocent. Where’s that team? I want to be on that team.
“The great thing about football is none of that living or death shit matters. The great thing about football is it requires you to prepare for nastiness on the field. It will be violent, okay? It will be so hard. It will totally hurt. You have to use your head and your heart to get through a game with any kind of success. It hurts! But you’ll do it with teammates, who might make fun of you sometimes, but who will have your back if they’re worth anything. They will fight for you. They will celebrate you when you do great stuff. They will hug you when you mess up and tell you to get back out there and go.
“I can trust death and I can trust my teammates on the football field.
“But I know, I know. It’s flawed. It’s not the perfect game because what it does to your body is real. That head thing. My bell. I get it rung. I really did it last week. I understand there’s a good reason why I shouldn’t play. I really do. If I didn’t actually believe you, Mom, believe I’d be better off in some ways without it, I might be fine. I’d figure out a way to get around you on this. Hell, I turn eighteen on Tuesday. I mean, I probably can play without your permission if I want to. I definitely can play in college. Keep playing this sport I love, this sport that makes my life make sense. But I know. What if I’m killing myself? What if I’m doing it for a hyped-up kids’ game? Maybe I can only trust in death, not my teammates in the long run, because playing football will kill me.”
Everyone stared. That made me mad.
“You know who I absolutely can’t trust to have my back? You guys. You, Mom and Dad. You, Grandma. What I’ve learned since our people died is that you all have your own backs. Dad moved into that shitty little apartment, which means I can’t stay with him even if I want to. Mom will move me around like a puppet to please her own needs for security, goddamn anything I might want to do with my life. Grandma will shut the door right in your face if you happen to disagree with her on something. Ask Aunt Melinda how that feels.”
The three of them stared at me without speaking. Grandma didn’t show any emotion, but Dad and Mom looked like they might break. I wanted them to break.
I nodded. Swallowed hard. “Since Grandpa and Hannah, you’re all in it for you. You’re all crying victims instead of teammates. What am I going to do if I don’t have football now? How will I be protected? Who will protect me? You think I’m going to count on you guys for shit?”
“Stop, Isaiah,” Mom said. “It’s time to stop.”
“Don’t like what you’re hearing?” I spat.
“It’s not that,” Dad said. “It’s all a surprise, though. Have you been holding all this in for a long time?”
“How many years has Hannah been dead?” I shouted.
“Calm down, Isaiah,” Grandma said.
“Isaiah?” Grace said quietly, “You do know your dad and grandma have been looking after me for the last year. Really, Gin’s been looking after me for lots of years. And she had like half the state police out there looking for you today, too, you know? Isn’t that having your back? They’re not as bad as all that.”
Dad sat up straight and said, “I got that shitty little apartment so I could afford to keep paying half the mortgage on this house, Isaiah. I didn’t want you to have more disruption in your life, even if your mom and I couldn’t work out our problems. No way did I ever take happiness in being away from you,” Dad said. “Any time you want to stay over, you come over. You can sleep on the bed. I’ll sleep on the couch, okay?”
Mom held her hand over her mouth. Her eyes were watery, bloodshot. Her cheeks were fired red. “I think you make some good points, though, Isaiah. I really do,” she said in a near whisper. “I think maybe we should talk about it some more in the morning. I think I need to rest a little.”