My comfort suite is reneging on its name.
It could be the air-con is blasting and it’s freezing, with a weird chlorine smell. Could be the carpet is shit brown, with what I guess are leaf-like patterns. Wouldn’t want to put ultra-violet lights on it like they do in all those cop shows where everybody in America is a murderer.
The two rooms that put the “suite” in “comfort” are connected by a little kitchenette with a coffeemaker. It’s right across from the plastic bathroom, so you can take a crap and reach over to make coffee at the same time.
Or hang yourself from the showerhead. Christ. But it's that bleak.
The enormity of where I am suddenly sinks in. Maybe because I’m not putting one foot in front of the other to reach this place – I’m HERE.
It doesn’t help to think somebody else passed through last night and slept in this bed. Took a dump in this toilet. How gross is that? And there are a hundred rooms in this motel, identical down to the little bar of soap wrapped in plastic.
The conformity suddenly makes me clammy and claustrophobic. It’s like all of America is this motel. Wherever you land, it’s the same rooms and box stores and fast food joints where they lay out everything the same so you can find it quickly until the whole damn country is just a pinball machine with the same flippers every two blocks to nudge you to spend your money – your life – more efficiently because you’ve got to make room for the next person so just hurry up and die until the whole system collapses –
I’m losing it.
Alone in Youngstown, Ohio, with a plastic gun, to kill a man surrounded by an army. The enormity of it crushes me. I’m not brave – I’m scared. I’m not ready to die – I love my little life. I’m not cool and calm – I’m flush and afraid. The way I was before my panic attack and holy shit I need to get out of here and feel real air and walk by real trees, not the plastic fern in the corner, before I’m curled up in the fetal –
The phone rings. Not the motel phone. Mine. And it doesn’t ring because the ringer is off. It vibrates in my pocket. Insistent.
I pull it out. An unknown number. Filled with dread, I swipe.
“Hello?”
“Ben?” It’s a familiar voice, but for a second, I go blank.
“Yeah?”
“It’s Mr. Hale.” Holy shit! Why is he calling?
“Hi?” I feel stunned.
“Just checking in. Where are you?”
I try to focus on the lie I told him.
“I’m in Ojai at this… retreat.” The silence on the other line pulls words out of me like a vacuum. “Remember? I had a kind of panic attack and I’m at this mindfulness retreat to help get control of my thoughts and that’s why I wasn’t in school today to, um, to give you the gun.”
I stop as the word gun hangs in the dead space of the connection.
Can’t help but fill it.
“Actually, I’ve got to go because phones aren’t allowed on account of –”
“Wait. You never mentioned you had a panic attack.”
“Um, yeah.” Shit. Concentrate, Benji! But it’s hard, yanked from one reality into another. Dematerializing like in the transporters on Star Trek, only to materialize in an unfamiliar land fraught with weird alien danger, soon to face the Borg.
"Ben? Are you there? You were talking about a panic attack?"
“Yeah. It’s no big deal, but this program is supposed to help.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about it?” Uh, oh. There’s that interrogator voice creeping in.
“I don’t know, guess I forgot.” Lame.
“You forgot.” He’s not buying it – I don’t forget anything.
“I mean, I didn’t forget. But I didn’t think it was a big deal.”
“And yet there you are, on a family retreat to address your panic attack.” Why's he checking in? Can he smell something's up with me?
“It doesn’t have anything to do with the gun.” Please, Benji, stop saying gun.
“It has to do with us trusting each other. I’m trusting you to tell me the truth, which also means not lying by omission.” Hale sounds suspicious and even a bit irritated, which is unusual. Got to switch tacks, finesse for some sympathy.
“Guess I was maybe too embarrassed to mention it.” Yuck.
“Nothing to be embarrassed about.” Hale softens his tone a bit. “You said you would email me the admission to that retreat.”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Hale. That one I totally forgot. I’ll send it to you right now. Hang on.” I work my phone like mad to send him my registration.
“Put your mom on the phone.”
“What?” The hum from the bathroom light is like water torture on my chemical brain.
“Your mom or dad. Put one on the phone.” That’s right, I’m here with them.
“They’re, uh, on a hike right now. A mindfulness walk – really slow.”
Really slow? Christ. How do I not see this coming? Is a guy like Hale going to let this go without a follow-up? A kid makes a gun in his class and he’ll ignore it with a massive school shooting today? No way. The line is quiet except for the whoosh of my outgoing mail.
“Mr. Hale?”
“I’m here.”
“Just sent it. I should get going.”
“Got it. Hold on,” Hale commands. “I don’t see your parents on it.”
“I, uh, got a separate admission because I’m eighteen.”
“So, if I call this center, I can talk to them?”
No. I never even canceled the retreat, so who knows what they’ll say. Trying to avoid refund notifications going into Mom’s email, but was that the right choice? What if they call Mom asking where I am? Impossible to know every right move –
“Ben? You there?”
“Yeah, I don’t know. It’s a private retreat. I don’t think they’ll give that information out.” I’m just spinning now, spinning a web of BS, trying to catch a much stronger insect.
“Where’s the gun?”
“The gun? It’s home. Not assembled or anything. No bullets. Just hunks of plastic.” Will he let it go? “First thing Monday morning. I’ll bring it in.”
A long silence. It takes everything I have not to fill it.
“How do you feel, Ben?”
“How do I feel?” I don’t expect Hale’s question. I feel numb. And under that I feel terrible for too many reasons to list. “I’m okay. Here in Ojai at this beautiful center. Mom, Dad, and June are here. Doing cognitive-behavioral therapy, aka mindfulness.”
“Remember, call me if you feel anything out of the ordinary. No matter what the time.”
“I will.” I feel a rush – Hale's kindness overwhelms me. He doesn’t want to ruin my life and in that risks everything. No other teacher, hell, no other person besides Mom and Dad would do this. And in return, I demolish his world –
“Ben? Do I have your promise to do that, to call me?” Hale sounds unsure about the risk he’s taking – like I’m no longer a good bet.
“I promise. And I really appreciate you trusting me. But don’t worry, I’m not doing anything rash. Far from it.” And I’m not. Killing Cretin isn’t a rash decision. This journal is living proof of that. “It’s so beautiful and peaceful up here. I completely forgot about the gun.”
Gun again. Come on, stop saying it.
“Okay, Ben,” Hale seems reluctant to go. “When you see your parents, have them call me.”
“I will. I think we go into silence pretty soon, but I’ll have them call you, maybe tomorrow.” Should I ask why? Wouldn’t that be what I would do if I were telling the truth? It’s impossible to know.
“Okay. I’ll take your word on it.”
“You got it, Mr. Hale.” I feel such deep shame. LIAR. “I should get going.”
“One last thing. It’s not what happens to you, it’s how you react that matters. So do the mindfulness part. Observe your thoughts carefully. They’re an illusion. They’re not even you. Remember, 'some of the worst things in my life never even happened.'”
“Mark Twain,” I say, feeling such a connection to Hale. Like we share a brain. We could have been such good friends. “I'll remember that. Bye, Mr. Hale.”
“Bye, Ben. See you Monday. Bring that gun.”
“For sure. And… thanks. For everything.” I want to talk more, thank him for being such a great guy, but I need to get the hell off the phone before I snitch on myself.
“No problem,” Hales says and my phone goes dead.
I stare at the sad little room and turn off the air conditioning.
I miss Gigi and June and Mom and Dad – they seem like a dream. And Hale. Is he the last person I talk to from my life? The last person I betray? What a thought. But yeah, probably.
The worst thing in both our lives is definitely happening.
Got to go check out the Covelli Centre.
Got to get the hell out of this room.