Cal

Notes for the GAN
2002-05-11 22:48:53 (UTC)

Cautious

We walked through the backyard on Thursday instead of
around the front like we usually do when Heather and I go
for walks. The neighbor had cut the grass, so it coated
our shoes while we didn't talk. She's moody sometimes for
no apparent reason, but this time . . .
Three weeks ago, Pete, the boy who asked her to prom,
stopped coming to school. Two days later we heard he had
mono. Two more days and his mom says he has leukemia, was
rushed to the emergency room at the University Hospital, is
in the ICU. This boy is seriously ill. Nobody I talk to
can even imagine it. Pete just turned 15, he's hyper, he's
funny, he has a nice smile and got kicked out of his last
school for sexual harassment.
I'm a senior, and two friends and I went to see him two
days later. Heather wasn't allowed to miss school to go;
she cried. Me going is probably the next best thing to her
going, I'll tell her everything. I hate driving in the
city, finding a place to park. Going with the boys helps.
They're mor outgoing, they ask a woman on the street for
quarters, Matt buys a counterfeit CD on the corner.
That day, visiting Pete was so odd. It was like someone
took normal, healthy Pete and took his clothes and stuck
stuff all over him. Beneath the oxygen mask, he was the
same kid. Matt made him laugh easily fifteen or twenty
times in the half-hour we were there. There was talk about
hot Asian nurses.
Heather has seen him easily five times since then. The
nurses assume she's the girlfriend, greet her with waves
and smiles. She's easy to recognize, long hair,
distinctive smile, purple umbrella. Pete definitely
doesn't make it to prom, though we have a good time
anyway. We pretend she's my date so she can sit at the
table with the seniors.
Thursday, we planned to go see him. His mom called and
cancelled--he wasn't feeling well enough. So we went for a
walk. That's what Heather does when she's too upset to be
home.
We're quiet until she speaks . . . that's how I usually
play it. She says something, and I realize how depressed I
am. The walks break the surface tension in my glass.
Hell, my glass falls off the table and shatters on the
floor. I realize how bad I really feel about my situation
with my father.
He got frustrated with me a couple weeks ago and put me at
the level of roomate. I'm supposed to get my own
groceries, keep to myself, wash the dishes as soon as I use
them. More than that, though. My dad won't talk to me any
more. He doesn't care anymore.
She walks on the guardrail. I say it's for cars to crash
into, but she just giggles, assumes I'm just stating the
obvious like we always do. She turns down a construction
road that's blocked off from cars, ducks under the bar. I
pause, wondering if this is the construction site I wasn't
supposed to play on from all those public service
announcements. She assumes I'm not sure whether to go over
or under the bar. I quickly duck under it, and realize I
have to pee.
We talk for a while, and the muddy road seems ridiculously
deserted and silent for being a quarter-mile from an
overdeveloped suburb. It seems to cross the creek five
times. We both want to jump in and splash around, I can
sense it. She says it first. I love that about her.
I decide, with her help, to talk to my father about what
I'm feeling.
Standing at the door to his office, which used to be my
bedroom, I feel ridiculous. My arguments, which felt so
obvious and solid on the muddy road staring at the creek,
seem just as muddy and watered-down. He responds, not
sitcom-esque as I had imagined, but more like a bad drama.
I went to bed early and crying.
Friday was college orientation, which I can talk about
later. I find a letter from my bank, which my dad has
accidentally already opened. I'm in overdraft in my
checking account. I expect him to yell at me, aske me why
I did this, how I'm going to fix it. Instead, he sits at
the table with me and tells me how to get them to erase the
fees. There aren't many times like that in my life, that I
just know that something's clicked into place. When I
realized an hour later that we had made up, I resisted the
urge to call Heather. Sometimes those moments are better
snuggled up in myself.

Life is just preparation for the GAN --Cal




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