I know this sounds weird, right in the middle of a fight and all, but I ran right into my dad’s chest. After he held me for a while, I tried to speak. Dad, I don’t want Jeffrey to…
Then I cried until it was time for embarrassment, burritos, and a long call from Dad to Mom.
When my father hung up, he looked much more like my old dad, my pre-October dad. He was still kind of talked-out, but there was one more thing on his accountant brain.
So about that math grade…
The next day, Mom and Jeffrey came home. When they walked in, they encountered a scene that must have been fairly surprising: My dad and I were playing chess at the kitchen table, and there was a pile of my math stuff on one of the extra chairs. Dad had spent a couple of hours that morning getting me two chapters ahead in algebra. After I had explained the whole Renee Albert tutorial fiasco, he had felt sorry for his pathetic eldest boy. You sometimes forget how good your parents are at things. I mean, my dad did math for a living, 365 days a year, so it made sense that he knew the stuff. But, I mean, he REALLY knew the stuff. Then when we were done, we celebrated with my first cup of coffee ever and the chess game. (Weird. My parents would NEVER have let me have coffee before Jeffrey got sick. If there’s one thing I’d figured out about having a family crisis like ours, it’s that the old rules no longer applied—for example, I had probably gone four months without eating a single vegetable. But there were times when I wished for new rules that DID apply—like maybe, “Take a vitamin every day so you don’t get scurvy.”) I got all hyped-up from the caffeine and won the game in about nine minutes, so my father got a chance to be impressed by ME, too.
And then when my mom and Jeffrey sat down at the table, it was like some kind of normal family moment or something. Until my mom remembered she was mad at me. She asked my dad to take Jeffrey into the living room for some father-son bonding (ol’ Dad was having quite the paternal morning) and then began lacing into me. But before she could build up a good head of steam, I cut her off and explained how hard I had worked on the grades, how disappointed I was in myself, how I had turned away the world’s most desirable math tutor for the sake of Jeffrey’s health, and how my dad and I had already had it out about the “not calling Mom’s cell phone” incident.
What could she really say?
Steven, I love you. But never, ever do this again.
There. I could live with that.
The rest of the weekend was pretty tranquil for a change. Jeffrey was on a new antinausea medication, and the doctors had lowered his steroid dose, so he was feeling well enough to play more actively. Also, thanks to my little math mini-drama, both parents were looking right at me and even asking me questions about my life. Probably the coolest part was my drum lesson with Mr. Stoll on Saturday afternoon. My mom drove me instead of sleeping, which was her usual post-hospital routine, and watched the whole lesson instead of going shopping or something. Afterward, she told me she’d had no idea how good I had gotten. It felt pretty nice to know that my last four months of being a practice-pad maniac had made a noticeable difference. As things turned out, it was a good thing my mom had watched that particular drum lesson, because it would be the last one we’d be able to afford for a long while.
On Sunday, my cousins from New York City came over, which they hadn’t done in ages—my mom had called them when she noticed that Jeffrey was suddenly having a couple of good days, and her sister had dropped everything to come see us while the opportunity lasted. I’m the oldest kid in our whole extended family, so I generally run around keeping the little ones from killing each other, but that day they all got along. I sat on our back porch, drinking hot chocolate, thinking about Renee Albert, and watching my brother and the cousins pound each other with snowballs for about forty minutes—an endurance record for Jeffrey this year.
When they came in, we had a real family-style dinner—my mom had even dusted off that big thing in the kitchen called the “stove”—and people were laughing and joking around like we used to last year. I mean, an outside observer would notice that there was a puffy, bald kid there and that the grown-ups kept pausing to look furtively at him, but the mood was lighter than it had been since the diagnosis, anyway. Jeffrey even got my uncle Neil to do his famous impression of Peter Pan and Captain Hook fighting over dessert, which he only did once a year. It was a really nice time.
Then Jeffrey started falling asleep at the table; I guess all that running around had been tough on his body. The adults were all taking their time over coffee, and the cousins were in the family room watching Sponge Bob, so I took Jeffrey up to bed. Even though he was only half-awake, I got him to go pee-pee and brush his teeth. Then we went into his room to get his PJs on. He took off his shirt and I gasped: His arms were an alarming welter of dark bruises. I hadn’t thought of it at the time, but I guess all of the snowballs hitting him had taken a toll, even through his thick winter coat. He glanced up at me with this look of total resignation that should never be on a five-year-old face. I felt so bad for him that I read him two chapters of his favorite book, Flat Stanley, before I turned off his light.
Later on, after the guests had left, I said good night to my parents and got ready to go to bed myself. I had been in a nearly great mood for about thirty-six hours but unease was settling back in. When I was lying down all alone in the dark, I couldn’t get comfortable for the longest time. I just kept seeing Jeffrey’s arms over and over in my head, and it hit me: I had been in a dreamworld for a day and a half. But just because you get distracted by the silver lining for a little while, that doesn’t mean there’s not still a huge dark cloud behind it.
FEAR, GUM, CANDY
That night, I started having the Dream. I was playing outside with Jeffrey, and we were throwing something back and forth (sometimes a tennis ball, sometimes a snowball). Every time the ball touched Jeffrey, a piece of him would instantly turn black. He was still smiling and saying, Play with me, play with me! every time I tried to stop. So I’d throw again, and BAM! Again, BAM! Again, BAM! Then he’d slowly start sinking into the ground, still with that smile on his face, as my parents appeared behind him. And he’d start saying over and over again, You’re their only boy. You’re their only son. You’re the only boy now. And I’d wake up screaming at the top of my lungs. I had the Dream—with slight variations—maybe every other night for the next two months. Thankfully, Jeffrey somehow always slept through it. My parents didn’t, though; they eventually got so used to it happening that they started getting to my bed and grabbing me before I even woke myself up. Every time this happened, they would ask me what the Dream was about, and every time, I’d lie and say I didn’t remember.
My parents started pressuring me to tell Mrs. Galley about the Dream, which I just didn’t want to do. I thought, “Why would I need to tell her? What’s she going to do—send me to a psychiatrist? I’m not crazy—I’m having dreams that my extremely ill brother is dying, which makes sense!” I hated the dreams with a burning passion, but the fact that I was having them didn’t seem like a big blockbuster of a surprise to me.
So for the time being, my parents’ worries about their younger son’s physical health were compounded by their worries about their older son’s mental health. My dad paced back and forth a lot when he was home, my mom asked me a thousand times a day how I was doing, and I basically just pretended it was totally normal to wake up drenched with sweat, shrieking like a wounded banshee, night after night. In the meantime, my mom was also asking for advice about this from all of the doctors, nurses, social workers, and assorted therapy-type people in the Philly hospital, and every single one of them told her to get me into counseling as soon as she could. Some helpful soul down there also told her that “experiencing” Jeffrey’s treatment “firsthand” by visiting the hospital might “alleviate” my “anxiety.”
So she started bugging me to come down to Philly on one of the weekly trips, but every time she asked, I had an excuse handy: jazz band rehearsal. Schoolwork. Drum less
on. Anything to keep me away from the mental-health providers. Sure, I was plagued by nightmares. Absolutely, I was tormented by repeated bouts of What’s the Point? Syndrome. And there was no question that I was terrified by everything about Jeffrey’s treatment.
But I was coping, right? I was getting good grades in the third marking period, I was still improving rapidly on drums, I continued to be oddly popular at school. I had even patched things up with Renee Albert. One day on the bus, she caught me looking at her and stared back. Thinking fast, I made her an irresistible offer.
Gum?
You’re offering me gum? Really?
Yeah, really.
Aren’t you afraid I’ll try to contaminate it?
Well, it’s only going into your own mouth, so feel free.
I noticed that there were about twelve people watching this scene—like it was a jury trial or something—so I scooted across the aisle to sit by Renee and continue the peace talks in whatever privacy you can have on a packed school bus chugging along a main thoroughfare.
Come on, Renee. Are you really going to be mad at me because I protected my baby brother by sending you home?
Well…
I failed the math final if it’s any consolation.
You did? I’m sorry. Did your parents flip?
Kinda. Don’t worry about it—it was my own fault I tuned out of that class for two months.
No, Steven, you had a lot on your mind. I’m sorry I got mad at you, and I’m sorry about the things I said.
Well, you were right. I did have a crush on you in third grade.
Do you have a crush on me now?
She gave me the killer Renee Albert smile and took the piece of gum from my instantly sweaty palm.
Just then, the bus pulled up to our stop. I reached back and across the aisle to get my backpack, and Annette held it out to me, glaring like I had been chatting with Renee about Annette’s mother or something. I didn’t have time to figure that one out; we weren’t blessed with the most patient bus driver on the planet. I charged up to the front and out the door. The driver was already slamming down on the gas pedal while I was in midair, so I didn’t turn around in time to catch Annette’s eye through the window. I wondered whether she’d still be mad the next day and why I never seemed to be able to be friends with more than one human female at a time. When I got my bearings, I realized Renee was already walking away from me toward her house. For some odd reason—perhaps my brain had just reached its Female Logic Overload Point—I didn’t call out after her.
As she turned the corner, without ever looking back to be sure I was still there staring, she said something to me, and I could hear the laughter in her voice. Thanks for the gum!
I kept looking until she was out of sight behind the huge, old oak tree at the end of the block. Boy, did that girl know how to walk.
So I was hanging in there. But the weirdness of acting “normal” when nothing really was normal was exhausting. One day, I fell asleep in social studies class, and the teacher took me out into the hall to talk about it.
How are you, Steven? Is there more bad news at home?
(No, things are just swell! We spend our time knitting matching sweaters, baking wholesome cookies from scratch, and watching my brother’s hair fall out. Moron.)
No, I just have, ummm, a lot on my mind. Can I… Think fast, Steven!…go see the school counselor?
Of course, he let me go; I had already figured out that most teachers did NOT want to stand in the corridor talking about pediatric cancer when they could be safely in their rooms, handing out worksheets.
Mrs. Galley looked happy to see me, which was a nice feeling. Maybe I had only asked to see her so I could get out of class, and maybe I was merely in the mood for a candy heart or two, but I really was starting to trust this woman. She asked me how things had gone with the Math Grade Bust Weekend and in the weeks of school since then. I told her the whole story of that first weekend with my parents, and about how I was keeping up with my work and social life. She looked relieved that my ‘rents hadn’t tied me to a stump behind the woodshed and given me a beating. And I could have left it at that, with Mrs. Galley feeling like she had done a successful good deed by letting me choose how to handle my makeup work and my mom’s notification, and with me feeling like I had earned some cinnamon-flavored snackage…but it wasn’t the whole story.
Mrs. Galley, I can’t sleep at night. I have this nightmare over and over again. I’m playing catch with my brother, and…I paused, and she quickly slid a box of tissues over to me. See, this lady was good!
I talked for another half-period, at least, and didn’t stop until that tissue box was looking pretty undersupplied. She listened and listened and even turned off her incoming phone line. About five different people stuck their heads into her office, but she shooed them all away and finally locked her door. Every once in a while, she asked a question or two, but she basically just let me rip. At the very end, I summed up by telling her how out of control I felt—like I couldn’t affect any of the problems that were all around me.
I can’t wave a wand and make Jeffrey better. I can’t call my Swiss banker and have him wire-transfer a couple million dollars to my parents’ account. I can’t even make my family FEEL better about anything. All I do is sulk, cry, and yell at my parents.
But you DO make your family feel better. I know Jeffrey must appreciate all of the playtime you spend with him, and I could tell when I talked to your mother that she was very proud of how responsible you have been. Sending away your math tutor—that took real courage.
You have no idea, Mrs. G.
Yeah, but I can’t change all the ROOTS of the problems. I can’t change the basic situation.
Well, Steven, I have to send you back to class now, because I have a group of students coming in. But I want to leave you with one thing to think about: Instead of agonizing about the things you can’t change, why don’t you try working on the things you CAN change?
I thanked her and took a candy heart (OK, a few) for the road. And a couple of tissues. And I made her promise she’d call me back down the next week. While I was on a roll, maybe I should have asked her to stock up on some new desk candy, too, but there are times when you just don’t push your luck.
Over the next few days, my head was a jumble of battling quote bubbles.
ME:“What’s the point of…?”
MRS. GALLEY: “Why don’t you try working on the things you CAN change?”
Of course, that was when I was awake. When I was asleep, the nightmares just kept on coming. I was starting to wonder whether I was going to be a nervous wreck for years and years, finally losing it completely and waking up in a mental ward with a tight, white sleeveless coat on.
Then, two things happened in quick succession. I figured out how to save some money, and Annette fell down a flight of stairs.
GOOD NEWS, BAD NEWS
If you think about it, past a certain point, drum lessons are a complete waste of money. You go there, and some guy listens to you playing a couple of book exercises and jamming to a few CDs. Then he assigns you new book exercises and CDs, and your mom pays him $20 for the hour. Next, you repeat as necessary for a bunch of years. So I realized one day that—hey!—I had all the drum books and CDs I could ever need, and I could assign myself the next two pages of each book every week. All I had to do was bag my drum lessons, and I’d be saving the family eighty bucks a month.
Just like Mrs. Galley said: Why don’t you try working on the things you CAN change?
But how do you tell this to your drum teacher after five years together? This wasn’t just any old drum teacher, either. Mr. Stoll had attended every single one of my school concerts since I’d started lessons. He had invited me to probably ten of his gigs to watch him play and had once let me sit in on drums at a big band concert for a thousand people. At the time, I had just been terrified, but later, I figured out how amazingly cool that had been of him.
So I couldn’t j
ust stop showing up. I needed a grand gesture to soften the blow, and I came up with a beautiful one. The day of the last lesson came, and I asked my mom to drop me off a few minutes early and to let me pay Mr. Stoll, then meet her outside at the end—I hadn’t told the ‘rents anything about this plan and didn’t want to take any chances of Mom and Mr. Stoll talking that day. I had shoved something into my stick bag before leaving the house and was all ready for action.
So I went in, we exchanged pleasantries, and I even got through a few exercises before Mr. Stoll noticed I was all sweaty and shaky.
What’s wrong, kid?
Well, uhhh, I have some bad news.
What, did you get kicked out of All-City or something?
Worse.
Is it about your brother?
Not exactly. I…we…my family has a lot of expenses with the hospital thing, and my parents are all worried about money, and I decided…I can’t have drum lessons anymore. I’m sorry, but we can’t afford it, and I can’t pay, and I’m sorry.
You said that already, kid.
I did? I’m sorry.
There ya go again.
I, well, I brought you something. Let me just get it.
I reached into my bag and pulled out Mr. Stoll’s gift. I kept it behind my back for a moment, then said, Look, you’ve really been like a…ummm…like a mentor to me, and you’ve taught me more than I could ever have imagined, and I wanted to give you something to remember me by. So, anyway, here it is.
And I held the Special Sticks out to him. You remember, the ones that Carter Beauford of the Dave Matthews Band, my drumming idol, signed for me? The ones Jeffrey used to stir his Dangerous Pie?
Kid, those are your prized possession. Taking those would be like kicking you when you’re down. Listen, how about we just…look, from now on, your lessons are free. Don’t worry about it. It’s my pleasure to help my best student out.
Really? You REALLY mean it?