Chapter Nineteen
Week Three
TIME PASSED in uneven lurches.
At certain points the days sped by at a rate that surprised me. The sun rose, signaling breakfast, and by the time I was departing the second group session of the day, it had set below the horizon. With nothing to do but follow my daily schedule, I became keenly aware of how few hours of daylight there were in February.
I took my vitamins, tried to cooperate with my counselors, and developed a rapport with most of the other patients during group sessions. My grudging comments became known as the moments when “Michael dropped knowledge,” and Jones made sure to call me out at least twice a session. The days went by quicker once I stopped watching the clock, but at night, time staggered along once again.
I hadn’t talked to Nunzio since that day in the teachers’ lounge, and he hadn’t returned my call. Raymond claimed Nunzio asked after me almost every day, but it wasn’t the same as hearing his voice.
I couldn’t stop wondering whether the message I’d left him had been good enough. Or whether I had said the wrong thing while blurting out my feelings in a rush.
I spent hours replaying our last conversation in my head. In turn, I was furious with him and myself. How could he have taken me seriously? Did he really believe I could so casually advise him to walk out of my life? It seemed stupid for him to have taken my words to heart. I wanted to sneak into the office, call him, and force him to listen to me. Force him to respond, and hope that he would give me another chance. That he hadn’t already given up on me.
I didn’t, but when I woke up from yet another dream about his hands and mouth and gorgeous eyes focused on me (or sometimes, someone else), I was tempted.
No amount of group therapy, of discussions about family and self-expression and triggers could ease my frustration. And every day that went by, I wondered if he would get used to my absence. The idea was terrifying.
It ratcheted up several notches when my one visitation day arrived. I knew he wouldn’t show up, but I found myself obsessively primping in front of the mirror regardless. I wanted to look decent if I saw him—wanted him to see that I wasn’t as much of a mess as I had been last time we spoke.
Drew watched me fuss with my hair, smirking.
“Is your man coming?”
“I don’t have a man.”
He rolled onto his back, watching me upside down from the bed. “Is the guy you have sexy dreams about coming?”
“I doubt it. I haven’t talked to him since I came here.”
“Why not?”
“Because—” Because I was a dickhead. “I don’t know. Just because.”
“Man, you’re all agitated and wound up, aren’t you?” Drew rolled over again. I could feel his critical gaze wandering over my outfit. “I would love to see you in something other than sweatpants and T-shirts. Your body is sick.”
I snorted and looked over my shoulder. He was giving me a comic leer. “Shut up, Drew. Why don’t you get out of bed and do something constructive?”
“Like what?”
“Go find Carina and look at those GED papers I had Marg print out for you guys.”
“Oh my God, you’re obsessed.”
I turned away from the mirror. “You should be obsessed too. I don’t know what you think you’re going to do without even a GED. Let me put it to you like this—”
“And here we go….” Drew covered his ears.
I kept talking, raising my voice. “If Starbucks and Barnes and Noble are full of kids with college degrees because those poor suckers are having trouble finding anything else, where do you think someone without a high school diploma will end up?”
“I know! You’ve told me like thirty thousand times, Mr. Rodriguez.”
“So stop dicking around and go look at the paperwork.”
Drew stuck out his tongue. “I’ll do it later. I’ll need a distraction, anyway.”
He didn’t say the last part until I was halfway through the door, but I still paused to look back. I wanted to say something uplifting about his lack of visitors, but I failed at compassion, and Drew wrinkled his nose when he caught me staring. He made a run-along gesture as if sensing my pity and wanting none of it.
The staff had cleaned the cafeteria, pulled the tables apart, and decorated each one with a single, crappy flower. I sought out Raymond and did a double take. David was sitting next to him. My disappointment and bitterness momentarily flitted away.
In his black hoodie and with his long hair hidden beneath a fitted Yankees cap, Raymond was a total contrast to David’s golden hair, navy pea coat, and tight khakis. They were a seriously odd couple.
I grinned after taking a seat across from them.
“How did this happen?”
“He—” Raymond started to say.
“I found him on Facebook,” David interrupted. He looked proud of himself. “And made him tell me where you were and how I could come see you.”
“You didn’t make me do anything. I just told you.”
“I still found out.”
“It’s not like it was rocket science. It’s Facebook.”
David rolled his eyes. “You’re just as grumpy as Michael.”
Raymond shook his head. “This dude is annoying.”
“You’re rude and should take your hat off.”
I looked between them, unable to wipe the grin off my face. “Should I leave you two alone?”
David smirked. Raymond just sneered.
“You look good, Michael,” David said. “I’m not just saying that, either. The last time I saw you—”
“I was doing shots in my classroom?”
“Wow, son. You’re mad retarded.”
David whipped his head around and pinned my brother with a lethal glare. “Don’t say that word.”
“Sorry.” Raymond kept staring at me. “You’re mad special ed.”
David scoffed, and I burst out laughing.
The combination of the PC police and my offensive little brother was too hilarious to stifle a good chuckle. A couple of the other patients glanced over at us, and I wondered if I was interrupting some tearful reunions with my obnoxious guffaws. I swallowed the sound, but it felt good to laugh.
“Thanks for coming. I know it’s only been a few weeks, but it’s weird being cut off from everyone.”
“It’s weird being in the house alone,” Raymond admitted. “It fucks my head up after everything that happened. I try to avoid being there.”
“I took him out for lunch the other day,” David said. “After my amazing Facebook detective work.”
“Maybe I really should leave you two alone.”
Raymond kicked me under the table. “Stop throwing your gay subs.”
“Yeah, Raymond made sure to inform me that I’m not his type.” David unbuttoned his coat. “I told him every hetero boy says that at first.”
“Anyways…,” Raymond said in a droll tone. “I thought you might wanna know that I got a job.”
My eyebrows shot up. “Really? Where?”
Raymond glanced at David from under the brim of his hat. I could read his hesitation and reached over to clap him on the shoulder.
“Don’t hold out on me, Ray. I know you been looking for a job for a long time.”
It was a total lie, but he relaxed. He took off his hat and smoothed back hair that had escaped from the ragged knot he’d tied it in. “My friend’s pop got me a job as a casual dock worker over in Red Hook. It ain’t nothing special—” Raymond peered at David again. “But, you know, it pays like almost thirty Gs a year if I put in enough time.”
“Cripes.” David screwed up his face. “Maybe I should have become a longshoreman. I wouldn’t have a stupid master’s to be paying off. I’d trade my forty thousand in debt for a job that pays ten thousand less.”
“So who told you to go to a private school to become a teacher?” I asked. “State school would have had the same outcome.”
“Yeah, that was pretty stupid,” Raymond agreed.
“Oh, thank God I chose to look to you guys for sympathy.”
“That was stupid too.”
David scowled at Raymond, and I cracked up again.
“Where’s the bathroom?” Raymond stood up. “I gotta take a leak.”
I gestured over my shoulder. “Out those doors and to the left. I know you get lost easily, so ask someone if you need to.”
Raymond flipped me off and walked away. When he was gone, I made a face at David. “Can you stop flirting with my brother?”
“He’s cute.”
“You have a sort of boyfriend.”
“Nope. We broke up for good after the Grindr incident.”
I’d forgotten about that. “Raymond is straight.”
“How do you know?” David grinned. “He didn’t protest too hard when I asked him out to lunch, and he doesn’t freak out when I flirt with him.”
“Oh my God, can you not creep on my brother? What’s with you and grouchy boricuas?”
“I can’t help it. You have good genes.” David’s smile was broad and unapologetic.
A rosy flush had risen to his face, and I wondered if he was joking. I was more surprised at Raymond’s willingness to hang out with David than I was with David’s alleged attraction. Raymond was more open-minded than I had ever given him credit for. But if he’d stayed in the room while Nunzio and I had drunkenly tried to get it on, he had to be.
“Seriously, though.” David folded his hands between us on the table. “How are you doing? You really do look better.”
“It’s easy to look better if you’re rising up from the gutter, but thanks.”
“Is it just on the surface, then?” David’s face was wide open and imploring. He didn’t realize how much pressure his hope could put on someone.
I shrugged, looking around the cafeteria again. Unsurprisingly I didn’t see Drew anywhere in the room, but Carina and Kenan were present. It wasn’t a completely gloomy scene, but no one seemed that thrilled to be there, either. The blank indifference and discontent on their faces caused a swell of affection to rise inside my chest for David and my brother.
“Michael?”
I looked back at David. “I don’t know. It’s not like I suddenly want to go straight edge, but being here has given me a lot of time to think and get my priorities straight. Also, hearing about what some of these people have been through has given me a shitload of perspective. There’s kids in here not too much older than some of our students.”
David winced. “I noticed that.”
“Yeah. So—perspective. I really have no right to act like the world ended. Some of these kids have been through crap their whole lives.”
“Yeah, but don’t fall into the trap of thinking they have it worse, so you can’t be depressed. Everyone has their own stuff, and you’re entitled to feel what you feel.”
I nudged his knee with my own. “You sound like one of the people who run my meetings. Maybe you should get another fifty-thousand-dollar master’s and become a guidance counselor.”
“Shut up.”
I laughed just as Raymond returned to the table. He dropped into the seat next to David and put his hat back on.
“Did you tell him about Nunzio?”
My heart stopped.
“No.” David wrinkled his nose at Raymond. “I didn’t just come here to gossip.”
I looked between them. The spit had dried in my throat. “Gossip about what? What’s wrong with Nunzio?”
“Nothing’s wrong with him.” David toyed with the wilting flower in the spindly vase. “He put in his thirty days with the DOE last Friday. He mentioned it at happy hour.”
“What?” My gaze drilled into Raymond. “¿Por qué no me lo dijiste?”
“I didn’t say anything because I didn’t know!” Raymond held up his hands, sitting back in the chair. “He didn’t tell me, and I text that fucker, like, every day. David told me on the way over here. He was all worried about breaking the news to you.”
David reddened again. “That’s not what I said. I just wondered if you knew. To be fair, I think it was an impulsive move. He was telling Karen that he’d applied for a teaching position at some LGBT center in SoHo a while back, and a position opened up last week.”
“If Nunzio quit the DOE, it wasn’t just a random decision.”
All traces of my good mood evaporated. I rubbed my temples. Bitterness scorched through me, settling on my shoulders and dragging the sides of my mouth down in a deep scowl. Nunzio and I had done everything together since junior high. Him making a major life decision without talking to me about it was the sharpest knife of rejection. Maybe he was really over me.
“He must have been wanting to leave since the beginning of the year,” David said quietly. “After they replaced him with me.”
“You?” Raymond’s tone was thick with incredulity. “Man, I’d be pissed too.”
“It wasn’t just that.” I dropped my hands. “It was building up from other things.”
“Like what?” David asked. “He always looks fine when I see him.”
“Yeah, because he’s professional. He can hide his discontent. Unlike me.” But apparently Nunzio had hidden his desire to leave even from me. The only time it had come up was in September when Price had first switched his position, and even then, he’d deflated quickly. He had not once mentioned applying to another job. Never once expressed his desire to up and leave before the end of the year. “I can’t believe he didn’t tell me.”
“I can.”
I gave Raymond a sharp look.
“You been in your own little world since Dad died. You wasn’t trying to hear anything anyone had to say.”
David wrung his hands and stayed quiet.
As angry as I wanted to be, I had no legitimate defense. I thought about all the times I’d interacted with Nunzio at work since winter and the anxiety in his voice as he’d talked about the job. Had I ever showed a real interest in what was up with him, or had I just brushed it off as the typical work annoyance? I couldn’t remember.
“Damn.”
“Sorry, Michael. But you know it’s true.”
“Yes, I know that, Raymond. Thank you.” I bounced my knee up and down. “Anything else I should know? Did he get engaged in the past three weeks? I would have missed the invitation since my ass is stuck in here.”
“You’re taking this way too personally.”
“Yeah, I fucking know that too, Raymond. Thanks again.”
Raymond didn’t look very charitable, but David put his hand on my arm.
“Listen, don’t get upset. He just didn’t want to put his problems on you when you were already going through a lot.”
“He should have. He’s always around for me, and I was oblivious to the fact that things were so bad off at work that he wanted to quit.”
“I still think it was a last-minute thing,” David insisted.
I shook my head. I wanted a cigarette so bad I could taste it. “Is he fucking anyone?”
“Uh….”
“Just tell me.”
They both looked reluctant to respond, but I wasn’t about to explain why I was so desperate to know. Discussing my reoccurring nightmare of leaving the program only to find that Nunzio was in a committed relationship with someone who didn’t choke on their own vomit after drowning their sorrows in booze was pretty much my idea of complete humiliation.
“He hasn’t mentioned anyone, but you know Zio. He’s always messing around.” Raymond looked nonplussed. “What does that have to do with his job?”
“Nothing. Forget it.”
“O-kay….”
David shot my brother a dark look. “You’re cute but phenomenally dense.”
Raymond started to retort, and I forced myself to not tune out their semiflirtatious banter. I was no longer amused, but I wasn’t about to ruin the visit when they’d made the effort to come to see me.
I swallowed my unhappiness and changed the subject. I asked about Raymond’s new job and then the goings-on at McCleary.
David filled me in on the kids, my substitute, and the newest teacher drama. Some of my spirits lifted when David told me that Shawn had passed his Algebra Regents. The kid had actually asked Nunzio to tell me.
“I’m so ready to go back to work.”
“Good! Price keeps asking me if I know whether you’re definitely coming back,” David said. “Believe it or not, everyone misses you.”
“Yeah, well, I miss you too, asshole.” Raymond jerked his thumb at the window and in the direction of our neighborhood. “I’m starving to death at home. I tried to make rice the other day, and it was a disaster.”
David tilted his head. “Just follow the directions on the box.”
The look of disgust that Raymond aimed at David dragged an unexpected laugh out of me. David looked between us in confusion, and Raymond shook his head.
“White people.”
They succeeded in distracting me by being endearing and ridiculous, but after they were gone, my brain went right back to obsessing over Nunzio.
Once visiting hours ended, I made my way to the evening group session.
“How has everyone’s day been?” Jones asked, looking around the circle. “I know for some, this is the best day of the month, but for others, it may be the worst.”
I noticed Kenan nodding out of the corner of my eye, his expression drawn. He twisted his wedding ring idly.
“Just in case anyone is curious, no one visited me again!” Drew grinned, nodding at the patients who had been in the program with him for longer than a month.
“Not even your parents?” Carina asked.
“Girl, I don’t have no parents. I grew up in a group home in Staten Island, and no fosters wanted to keep my rotten ass.”
“Damn. I’m sorry.”
“Why?” Drew began to swing his leg, rolling his narrow shoulders. “I don’t give a shit.”
No one looked convinced, but more than half the group was as tense and upset as me.
Jones held up his usual stack of papers. “I want to talk about setting boundaries today. Like I said, seeing loved ones can be uplifting or it can be a trigger for relapse, and part of that is because of issues maintaining healthy boundaries.”
I wasn’t in the mood to talk about healthy relationships, but I began reading anyway.
Connected: You are able to engage in balanced relationships with others and maintain them over time. As conflicts arise, you are able to work them out.
What a joke. I was the antithesis of that statement.
I wondered if Jones had planted a little microphone under my table during visiting hours in order to dig this deep in the right direction. I was being narcissistic, but yet again, the guy had targeted something I was feeling in just the right way.
I read the section about boundaries being too close and too distant, and could see Nunzio in the too close column. He was too giving and had difficulty saying no. I was in the too distant column. I isolated and distrusted people, and pulled back without explaining why.
“My relationship with my wife is so unbalanced,” Kenan said, breaking the silence. “It was really obvious today.”
“Did it not go well with her?” Jones asked.
Kenan kept twisting his ring. “She’s going through a rough time while I’m in here, but it’s like she’s starting to fall out of love with me, you know?”
“That’s a pretty extreme assessment,” I said.
“Yeah, but it’s true. I don’t see anything in her eyes when she looks at me. There’s just nothing there anymore.” Kenan dropped his hands. “I expect her to act like everything is the same, but it makes no sense. Things have changed.”
I nodded, processing the words and churning them out into something that looked like my situation.
Expecting too much, but in my case, also giving too little. I still wasn’t sure if any of it was related to my drinking or just my bullshit behavior once I was sunk so thoroughly in misery. I’d shut everyone out, focused only on my own needs, and I had sat around feeling slighted when people adapted their behavior accordingly. Like Nunzio had done.
The direction of the conversation was making me antsy, and I wanted out. The craving for nicotine and a shot reared up with a blinding intensity. I visualized the minibar in my room at home, but knowing Raymond, he’d have dumped it all already.
“What do you think, Michael?”
I gave Jones a wild look. For a startling moment, I thought he could somehow see the craving in my face.
“I don’t know.”
My default answer was getting less impressive every day.
“Do you not think boundary issues affect your situation?”
“Uh. I don’t know.” I sounded like an idiot. Wincing, I looked down at the handout again. The words had transformed into meaningless symbols. “To be honest, I’m really not in a good mood right now and really want to get wasted.”
“Amen to that,” Drew muttered. A couple of people laughed, but not Jones.
“What’s happening, Michael?” he asked.
“Can I just—” I stood and put the paper on my chair. “Look, I’m sorry, I just need some air.”
Jones didn’t stop me when I hurried from the room, but I heard him ordering someone to give me some space. I appreciated it, but space wasn’t what I wanted. I wanted a drink and 4mg of Xanax. I wanted to put a stop to the incessant merry-go-round of regretful thoughts in my brain.
Speed-walking through the common area and past the office, I shoved open the back door and stepped out onto the courtyard. The wind hit me like a sledgehammer in the chest, but everything slowed down and reset, my anxiety dialing back now that I could suck in breaths without worrying about trying to appear calm.
After several moments, I hunkered down and forced myself to reflect.
Had I freaked out because I needed to drink? No. But I wanted to drink because I’d freaked out. And I’d freaked out because my future with Nunzio looked bleak. And while stuck in the confines of the center, I couldn’t do a damn thing about it.