Jagged Little Pill, page 16
I storm out of the house.
It might be too late to chase down Bella.
But I can chase the truth.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Jo
Frankie is sitting on a bench, looking cold.
Which isn’t terribly surprising. It’s New York City. It’s nighttime. It’s winter and she’s got on that leather jacket, a T-shirt, and stupid shorts. I can’t help but shake my head as I walk toward her, so angry at how selfish and stupid she’s been. It’s the first time I’ve ever been disappointed by her clothing choices, and for a second, I think of her ridiculous mother. Her mom who is back at home, having meltdowns over all of this. Her mom who was right about this one thing, I suppose.
She looks up from the bench and does a double take when she sees me.
“Oh my God,” she says, getting up and running over to me. “Thanks for coming, I . . . I didn’t have enough money for the train home, and then my debit card wasn’t working, and I didn’t want to call Mom or Dad, and . . . where’s Dottie the Datsun?”
She smiles at me, a dimple cratering her cheek, like everything is just . . . okay. Like she can reference my disaster of a car and wipe away the last day of heartbreak.
It’s not okay.
It’s never going to be okay again.
“I’m parked around the corner,” I say, nodding behind me. I turn around and make my way down the street. New York City. Parking was hell on Earth, and if my car is still there, I will be utterly amazed. The parking sign had parking signs, and I’m pretty sure the meter had a ticket on it for daring to be there too long.
“Awesome,” she says, walking after me. “That was, um, pretty crazy, back at my house?”
I don’t turn around. I don’t say anything.
“I’m surprised you showed up,” she says.
“I’m your best friend,” I say through gritted teeth, even though that doesn’t feel entirely true right now. “I’m not going to leave you stranded in a neighborhood you can’t even name.”
“I’m in the East Village!” she exclaims proudly.
“No, you’re not.” I reel around. “Maybe you were before, but you see that?” I point at the huge white arch looming over a nearby park, bright white against the dark. “That’s the Washington Square Arch. You made it about a mile from the East Village before you called me.”
“No . . .” Her face scrunches up. “No way, I was exploring and walking around for a while!”
“In a circle maybe,” I scoff, and keep walking, looking for my car.
“You’re mad.”
“Oh!” I laugh. “Can you guess why?”
“I’m sorry. I am,” she says, hurrying to walk next to me. “I was going to tell you and—”
“And yet you didn’t.” I stop walking and glare at her. “Because you knew what you were doing was wrong, playing us both like that.”
“I didn’t think I was going to fall that hard for him, you know?” She looks down at her shoes and back up at me. “I just, I fell in love with him.”
“Of course you did.” I keep walking. “Congrats. I’m glad you found something healthy and rational. I’m clearly not as legit as your fuckboy Phoenix.”
“It’s not like that,” she says. “I didn’t think we were in a serious, like, real relationship, you know? You and me.”
I stop walking again and have to take a few breaths. I know she didn’t mean to end that statement with “you and me,” our go-to sign of affection, but there it is. Like a dagger in the back.
“Right.” I grit my teeth. “Because why would you take this seriously. Take me seriously.”
“You know I didn’t mean it like that—”
“I thought you were . . . I thought you could have been the one person who saw me. Who really saw me.”
“I do! I am! I—”
“Listen,” I snarl through my teeth. “I want you to know that, even though you’ve hurt me? I’m happy for you. All right? You and Phoenix. I want nothing but the best, because you’re my best friend, regardless of how you’ve just . . . cast me aside like that. But for someone who is always so terrified and so worried about being that throwaway person to other people, to your family, it’s pretty fucking brutal. You talk about how you feel left behind and ignored, forgotten about at family events and by your brother. But the second someone new and shiny came along, the second, you did to me what you fear the most.”
“Jo—”
“You abandoned me. And you abandoned your friends, the people counting on you. Bella’s trying to plan the rally all on her own now, you know that? I’ve been getting texts from people the last twenty-four hours, wondering where you are. Your family, people at school.”
I ball my fists, trying not to cry. I’m not gonna let her see me cry. I practiced everything I wanted to say enough in the car, teared up enough in the car, tried to use them before I saw her.
“And with my family, my family, treating me the way they do . . . it’s a walk in the park for you, you know that?” I shake my head. “Does he know . . . does Phoenix know how you told me you’d love me until you died?”
“I—”
“Because you’re still alive, Frankie! How isn’t that a serious relationship?!” I snap, turning away and walking a few feet before turning back. “And another thing—”
She’s standing still, looking at her phone. I charge over.
“What the fuck?!” I yell, nearly slapping her phone out of her hand. “Is it him? Now? You’d talk to him right now in the middle of—”
“No, no, Jo,” she says, trembling.
“Do you think I give a shit what he has to—”
“No!” she screams. “It’s not him, it’s . . . it’s my mom. Something’s wrong. We have to go!”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Nick
I can’t remember the last time I was in a hospital. The plastic of the chairs in the waiting room feels weirdly like the seats in the bus and the train station downtown and makes me feel like I’m just . . . sitting here, killing time until I head off somewhere new.
Like . . . this is the start of something, in a place where things often end.
Mom.
Damn.
How didn’t I see it?
Dad paces around in front of me, his feet making a rhythmic snap against the hard white floor, almost like a clock that’s ticking at half the speed but shows no sign of slowing down. He keeps rubbing his face with his hands, as though he can wipe away what he saw. What we both saw.
Mom, on the floor in the living room, pills spilled all over the ground.
Not moving.
A doctor walks through the waiting room doors, and all the eyes of every other person in here seem to look up at him. I see their heads rise, their bodies shift. Like this man carries all their hopes and answers. And in a lot of ways, I suppose he does.
“Healy?” he asks, and Dad just bolts over to him.
“Are you Dr. Woodson?” Dad asks, as I get up and walk over to join him. Dad immediately wraps his arm around me, like he’s bracing me for something awful, but it feels more like I’m the one holding him up.
“Yes, you’re, um, Steve?” he asks, and then holds up a clipboard, looking at some papers before his eyes flit back to us.
“Yeah, yeah.” My dad nods, his tone eager. “Can you give us any updates? How is MJ? Ah—Mary Jane?”
“Well, it’s . . .” The doctor looks at me and back to my dad. “Would you rather talk about this in private?”
“No, it’s okay,” Dad insists. “This is my son, Nick, he saw . . . everything.”
“I understand, it’s just . . .” The doctor sighs.
“Please,” Dad says. “He can handle it.”
“Okay.” The doctor nods. “Well, in addition to the oxycodone, we found fentanyl in her system.”
“Wait, what?” Dad gasps, and lets go of me, stepping toward the doctor. “That’s . . . no, that isn’t possible.” He tries to peek at the clipboard and the doctor shifts away from him. “Please, what’s going on?”
“Mr. Healy. Nick.” Dr. Woodson exhales. “Oxycodone is often contaminated with fentanyl. It can happen if she got counterfeit pills off the street.”
“No.” Dad shakes his head. “No, she . . . had a prescription. She got in a car accident in the summer and was still having trouble with her back. I’ve seen the bottles, and look, I know sometimes she would maybe take one or two extra, and there was the wine . . . Oh God.” My dad has his hands on his face again. “I just . . . I thought it was fine, she had a prescription.”
“Actually, um . . .” The doctor looks at me again, wincing, and I can tell he still isn’t sure how much of this I should be hearing. And honestly, I’m not sure how much I should be hearing either. “Your wife doesn’t have a current prescription. Not with any of the doctors you wrote down.”
“This has to be a mistake.” Dad looks out at the waiting room. I can hear that same shifting noise again, and everyone is looking away this time, which means they were staring at the scene unfolding. “She’s an amazing mother. She is. She’s obsessed with her health, makes these . . . these gross Paleo meals. Does she look like a drug addict to you?”
“What do you think a drug addict looks like, Mr. Healy?” Dr. Woodson asks, and wow, if that doesn’t feel wildly uncomfortable.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Dad mutters, looking down.
“Doctor, is she going to be okay?” I ask, stepping up.
“Um . . . well, we have a lot to discuss,” he says, which isn’t a yes or a no, and I’m not sure how to take that.
“Nick, could you go wait for Frankie?” Dad asks, barely looking up at me.
I sigh and nod, and he pats me on the shoulder, holding on to me for a minute with a firm, loving shake, before I walk over to the waiting area again. But instead of taking our old seats, I gather our jackets and move closer to where Dad and the doctor are. Or, at least, the closest I can get.
No prescription.
I think about the last week or so. That heated argument on the phone that wasn’t with Dad but with someone else. The blur of a person rushing away from our house. The pills and the wine on the countertop. The way she’s been sweating and teetering like she’s about to fall apart. All the signs—all of them—were right there.
I squint as though that’ll help me hear better and lean back into my chair, the two of them not too far behind me.
“There could be serious long-term consequences with an overdose like this, Mr. Healy. I just need to be honest with you there.” Dad mumbles something in response to the doctor, and he keeps going. “We have her on buprenorphine to help with the withdrawal symptoms, which are going to be pretty severe, but once she’s discharged, I really recommend inpatient recovery.”
“Okay, okay,” Dad says, clearing his throat.
“I’ll be back in a few minutes, and then you and the family can come back and see her,” Dr. Woodson says. “She might still be out, but I think she’ll be awake any minute now.”
“Thank you, Doctor. Truly,” Dad says, and I glance over just in time to catch Dad walking toward me. He stops by where our seats were and turns to see me. He smirks and shakes his head.
“You think you’re just so smart, don’t you?” He sits and tussles my hair. “How much of that did you hear?”
“Besides the part where Mom might have to go into a facility? Not much.”
“Listen, Nick, I know it’s—”
The doors to the waiting room swing open, on the opposite side this time, and Frankie barrels in. She makes eye contact with me and Dad, her eyes wide, frantic, and runs over to us.
“This is my fault,” she says, collapsing into my arms, and I hug her tight.
“It’s not, it’s not,” I say, rubbing her back.
“Dad, I’m sorry.” She lets go of me, and Dad’s face breaks as he hugs her. “I was so angry and feeling alone and just . . .”
“Don’t worry about it, sweetheart,” Dad says, letting her go. “It’s not important. We’ll all get through it, we will.”
“Mr. Healy?” Dr. Woodson is back and waves us over. He looks at Frankie, a bit confused for a second.
“My daughter,” Dad says. “Frankie, this is Dr. Woodson.”
“We’re taking good care of . . .” The doctor glances at Dad and back at Frankie. “Good care of your mother.”
Dad nods, and I can’t help but smirk. The doctor risked it all instead of saying “stepmother” or something and got it right. Good for him.
“Good,” Frankie says, crossing her arms. I half expect her to let him have it for that moment of hesitation, but she just looks at me and shrugs. It feels . . . almost like a splash of normalcy again, like we’re at the breakfast table busting each other’s chops. I wonder if we’ll get there again.
“All right, follow me.”
Dr. Woodson leads us through the waiting room doors and down a hallway. Everything is lit by the same harsh fluorescent lights I assume are in every single hospital ever, because it’s absolutely what you see on television and in movies. The floors and walls are immaculate, and save for the shuffling of feet and the sound of rolling carts, it’s almost silent here. We pass a few patient rooms, and I can make out some feet standing inside, bodies all blocked by large paper-fabric curtains, so there are people here.
It’s just . . . they’re all so quiet.
Like Mom. On that floor in our living room. Silent, barely breathing, lolling back in Dad’s arms like a child’s rag doll, while I frantically called an ambulance.
This is going to be one of those things that I carry with me forever, like a snapshot staple-gunned to my brain.
Dr. Woodson slows down and stops at a room.
“Here we are,” he says, and we all move to walk inside when he stops us. “I, um, just want to prepare you. It can be really jarring to see a loved one hooked up to all these machines and tubes, but know that we’re doing everything we can to help her recover. And what you’re going to see might look scary, but it’s not.”
Frankie looks at me and rolls her eyes.
I can’t help but smirk. Even now, after all this, she’s still my snarky disaster of a sister.
“And when you’re ready, here.” The doctor hands my dad a little pamphlet with a lovely building on the front, all big, bold glass windows, and sprawling green lawns. “Deptford Recovery Center” in a friendly font on the paper. Dad opens it up and looks through it, nodding.
“Thank you, Doctor,” my dad says, and gives Frankie a little nudge with his elbow. “We appreciate it.”
Dad steps inside. Frankie and I follow, and every step feels like one step closer to some kind of new future. Like, this changes things. Nothing is going to be the same after this. And I’m not sure what barreled us forward here to this moment, all of us together in Mom’s hospital room while she recovers from a near fatal overdose, but I think it was a little bit of all of us.
Me, trying so hard to keep an eye on everyone and be perfect, that I missed everything and messed things up.
Frankie, wanting so badly to be seen and loved, that she tried to push away the people who see and love her.
And Dad, for all his time away and trying to bring Mom closer, which only pushed her the same distance that he’d been pushing himself.
It’s that car crash. That was the moment that flung us here. She was alone in the car, so none of us really know what it was like for her. Bad enough that she needed pain meds, but not bad enough that she needed them for that long.
The accident is still happening, only the twisted metal and burning rubber is my family, misshapen and broken in ways that maybe aren’t repairable.
Mom stirs a little in the bed, as Dad caresses her hand, his eyes closed. He’s whispering something, maybe a prayer, I don’t know, when she wakes up. She blinks her eyes a bunch, but they are just so impossibly red, I’m not sure how she can even see through them. And maybe she can’t, because she closes them again, before smacking her lips together and breathing deeply.
“Are you . . . embarrassed?” she asks.
“Damn it, MJ, no,” Dad says, near tears. He inches closer to the bed. “Just embarrassed that I wasn’t paying attention.”
“Even if you were, I don’t know if you would have noticed.” She coughs a little and swallows, clearly having a hard time. She points at something off to the side, and I notice some water across the room. I fill a cup for her, and Frankie takes it from me, her eyes pleading with me to have this moment. We don’t even need to say anything to each other.
Frankie walks over and hands Mom the cup, but Mom reaches out, brushing Frankie’s hand.
“Frankie,” she says, still not opening her eyes. “I’m . . . I’m sorry . . .”
“No, I’m sorry, Mom.”
“I’m good at hiding things,” Mom says. “Me and your father, we’ve been married twenty years and he still doesn’t know shit about me.” She laughs a little and then coughs, and my dad just shakes his head. “But you . . . you’ve been hiding so much.” She forces her eyes open, squinting at Frankie, and reaches her shaking hand out. Frankie bends down, and Mom cups her cheek with her hand. “I’m sorry. If you were hiding, I should have been seeking. I’m your mom. It’s my job.”
Frankie lets out a little sob and leans onto Mom’s shoulder in the hospital bed. Mom winces at something, and Frankie pulls away.
“It’s okay,” Mom says, gritting her teeth and gesturing at herself. “It all hurts.” She looks at my dad, her eyes widening a little more. “Steve, I need help.”
“Well, you’re about to get three months of it, I think,” Dad says, smiling a little, though he’s definitely crying. He holds up the pamphlet the doctor gave him. “There’s an inpatient program here, in a nearby building. The kids can visit on the weekend. There’s even a therapy dog named Augustus.”
“Wow,” Mom says, sarcasm oozing from her scratchy voice. “I cannot wait.”
“Maybe . . .” Dad looks at me and Frankie, like he’s unsure about what he’s going to say. “Maybe we can help each other too. Like the therapist said. I never wanted you to think work was more important than you, than the kids.” He looks at Frankie. “I know—I know I messed up pushing you away, and I missed a lot. I’m sorry, all of you. I’m a mess.”
