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Ethan is rarely good for anything.
I’m pissed at him for skipping lunch this week. I’d told him it was important that he be here, but he apparently had better things to do.
It’s just Dad and I in the cafeteria, he’s telling me about his book while I try to discreetly text Ethan.
Me: Where r u ?
Ethan: Had a meeting. I’m not ready to go back to campus.
Me: I needed u to be here. It’s important.
Ethan: Sorry. We can catch up later
“I can hear you texting,” Dad says.
“Sorry,” I respond automatically.
“Why aren’t you eating ?,” he asks
Because this food sucks. I want to say, but refrain
“What is it, Jonah ?” he asks me. “You seemed very upset last night,”
I’d never noticed how closely he paid attention to me.
I had been embarrassingly upset last night.
I’d gone to the bathroom at Children’s Hospital and came back to see Corinne sitting with Abigail, telling about her as the little girl whose entire family had died without her. The combination of hearing that and reading my Dad’s book had made me more emotional then I’d counted on.
I left before Corinne could see me and went home, shut the door to my bedroom and tried to quietly bawl my eyes out.
But none of that was why I was nervous right now.
“Um, I read your book,” I tell him.
Dad pauses mid bite. Ethan I had never been banned from reading his books exactly. When my Mom saw me trying to read it in 5th grade she said it’s be better for when I was older, but that time had never been decided. As I got older it just seemed lame to read it.
After a while Dad nods.
“Well, I expected that would happen soon. Tell me, how scarred are you ?,” he laughs.
“Not too badly. It was good.”
I knew that they’d fought sobriety when they were my age, my Dad struggling more than Mom. I knew that at the end of the time period his book covered she was leaving him to go to college in Chapel Hill.
I know what happens after the book ends; she never leaves. She stays and gets pregnant with Ethan and threatens Dad until his marries her in a church. He writes another book and gets a Pulitzer Prize in nonfiction. He learns to like marriage and they’ve been together ever since.
But I never understood why she stayed with him. Why she didn’t go and start the life she always wanted. I never understood until now. I’d heard him read the passage a hundred times, but I never understood it until now.
Existences are dependent. I realized that many parts of my existence were dependent on Strauss Bridge.
It is a simple suspension bridge that stretches from northern parts of the Eastham campus to the former town of Williamstown, which was incorporated into Waverly in 1926. My grandfather was born in Williamstown, a place that no longer exists thanks to the bridge.
This bridge is magnificent. Even now I can picture the view; in my vision there are two parasailers in the waves, a dozen tern swooping near the crashing waves and picnic blankets of co-eds in white bathing suits suntanning. The water is a misty gray line, the waves are soft undulations and the shoreline extends to green grass. You can’t hear or see the highway from the bridge and only on the clearest day can you make out the tiny impression of the Boston skyline.
I made Michelle walk me from my apartment to that bridge twice a day. It was a 9 minute walk. One morning, when all I had left were pinpoints of visions I walked there on my own. I was scared shitless, at one point a stranger had to jerk me out of the way of a moving car.
But I made it there and I stayed watching through those pinholes and cementing this beauty into my vision. Because this place was going to exist in my vision whether I was seeing it live or not. Dr. Wells said I only had a couple of weeks left at that point and I had decided this would be the last thing I saw.
“How well do you really know Morton Gates ?,” I ask him.
“I read,” Dad says quickly. “Why do you think I know him ? What does this have to do with the book--”
“Did you try to commit suicide ?,” I ask him, but don’t give him room to lie. “I saw your name in a copy of Gate’s notes. He wanted to interview you a long time ago. He wanted to ask why you wanted to jump.”
“How the hell did you even know I wanted to jump ?,” he asks, he’s angry.
“You wrote it,” I tell him.
I’d always assumed when he said the view from Strauss Bridge would be the last thing he saw it was because his vision was going, but knowing what I know now it meant something else entirely. It would be the last thing he saw because then he’d be dead.
“Jonah....Yes, I was going to,” he tells me. “But Michelle saw the suicide note I was writing and made me get help. I got better.”
“But why would you do that
?,” I ask him. "Everyone thought you were going to be so successful--"
“Isn’t it obvious ?,” he tells me. “I was young. I was never going to see again. That was a lot to take on at that age. I still wanted to see the world. Mixed with the drugs and your mother breaking my heart…it was a mistake. Your mother saved my life , she was there for me and never stopped being there. I’m thankful for that every day or I wouldn’t have this family.”
“So why do you cheat on her ?,” I surprise myself by asking. It feels like a betrayal he gets to talk so kindly of her.
“I didn’t cheat on her,” he says bitterly. “I made a mistake and didn’t make clear boundaries with a colleague. It was one time.”
“What about the trips ?,” I ask.
“What trips ?,” he asks exasperated.
“The ones you always take by yourself. You can’t get around with someone helping you, right ?” I tell him. “Who went with you to San Francisco or The Appalachains when you lost your agent or that cruise when Grandpa died--”
He stands up.
“Let’s go to my office,” he says to me sternly.
“No,” I tell him.
“Jonah--”
“Tell me,”
He surprises me by sinking into the chair and taking an unsteady drink of water.
“I wasn’t on vacation, son.” He says. “I… was in rehab. Shit, Jonah I knew one day I’d fall of the pedestal you put me on, but I didn’t think it’d be all in one day.”
I have a lot of memories of my Dad and none of them involve him injecting heroin. I can't imagine my father going to a street corner. He also didn't look or act like an addict. He’d always had mood swings, but I’d assumed that was just a writer thing. Now that I’ve poked at this it seems to have opened a flood gate in him.
“I’m not proud of this, but coming back from a suicide, losing my vision and then throwing two kids into the mix was a lot for me. I got stressed and I got weak, but I always got help. Which isn’t any cheaper than the drugs. I’m not proud that mostof my book royalties went into my arm.”
“When was the last time you used ?,” I ask,
“I’m not going to lie to you,” he tells me and I brace myself. “Two weeks ago.”
Right. Thanksgiving. I finally get it. This is why my Mom walks on eggshells around him and everything in our family is about propping Dad up. This is why we left our house and moved into a rental 5 years ago. It’s because if he gets stressed he starts using.
“But I didn’t let it go far. Before that it’d been 4 years,” he tells me, like it’s good enough
“You're always telling us about how it killed all your friends. Aren’t you afraid it will happen to you ?”
“Jonah...addiction is rarely logical. I don’t ever want you or Ethan to know what it’s like.”
“Promise me you won’t do that anymore,” I tell him.
“I can’t promise,” he says. “I don’t want to break promises to you like I’ve broken to Ellie and Sam over the year. Just know I try, I really do--”
“I don’t want to lose you,” I choke out. “Maybe I’m not supposed to say that, but I am terrified of losing you. If you tried to kill yourself once how do I know you won’t do it again--”
“I fight everyday not to go back to how I was…that was a dark time.” he says. “And I know I’ve been tearing this family apart--”
“It’s not all you--,”
“Yes, it is” He says. “I made your mother’s entire adult life about helping me that eventually it forced her away, I put so much pressure on Ethan to do something he doesn’t want and he’s left too and you, well, I’m burdening you to be my caretaker--,”
“You’re not,” I lie and he knows it.
“I can’t promise you I’ll
stay clean, I just can’t. But I promise I’ll work on putting our family back
together. No more secrets."
“You really think you can fix something or someone that’s so broken ?,” I ask.
He seems to think on this.
“No,” he admits. “But, I can sure as hell try.”
***
After lunch I call Matty.
“What, Jonah ?” he answers.
“I need you.” I said. “Let’s get coffee.”
“You’re buying.”
----