NOT TO CARE
I’m staring at my computer, leg bouncing in the monotonous heat of temptation. I’ve opened and closed the screen a million times. I already feel guilty for having to fight against this, and I’m struggling to figure out why I shouldn’t just finish off the guilt. At least I’d be distracted for a little while.
The front door opens. Addy’s home.
I run down the stairs to see her. To get out of my head and away from the computer.
“Hey,” I say as she tumbles onto the couch. “How was work today?”
She grunts but doesn’t answer right away. “I had to fire four people. One of them felt inclined to tell me that his son would be eating out of the garbage because of me. It’s not my fault he hasn’t shown up to work on time once since we hired him three months ago.”
I slide onto the couch and tuck my knees into my chest. “The guy or his kid?”
“His kid. Totally undependable. How’s your day? Did you and Dez make up?”
“I guess.”
“I don’t know why you two aren’t together yet. You already act like an old married couple.”
I take a deep breath. “Porn.”
She looks up at me. “Come again, Papi?”
“I’m addicted to porn. She’s addicted to everything. We want to try and kick our addictions before we can date.”
Addy raises an eyebrow. “What will that accomplish?”
I shrug. “Things and stuff.”
“You don’t even know what it’d accomplish?” she yells. “Ugh, my brother is such a twerp.”
“I do know, thank you very much.”
“Well, what is it?”
“We don’t just want to be each other’s newest addiction, you know?”
“Oh, I guess I’ve never really thought about it that way.” She lies back down on the couch. “I gotta hand it to you, Papi, I think you’re just complicating a really good thing, but it’s your parade, not mine.”
“Why do you call me Papi?”
She doesn’t answer. She never answers.
“Fine, what would you do if you were me?” I ask.
“Me? Oh, I’d probably kiss a lot and figure out the hard stuff as I went. Tell me, have you ever seen ducks in a row?”
“No.”
She lifts up her head. “Have you seen chickens in a single-file line?”
“No …”
“Then why the hell are you trying to force the poultry into linear shapes?”
I laugh. “I just came to you for dating advice for the first time in our relationship. Are you really about to let me walk away with ‘don’t force the poultry into linear shapes’?”
She nods. “Totally.”
“I mean, so far it’s the best advice I’ve gotten.”
—
At six, an hour before I leave for the Monday night Knights of Vice meeting, my phone rings. I know it’s Dez before I answer. Would telling her why I was suspended make me feel better? It would certainly distract me, but maybe telling the girl I’m trying to be a better person for the worst of what I’ve done isn’t the best call because here’s the thing:
I did it.
The more I replay the moments in my head, the more it makes me hate myself. My thoughts are an abacus and hate is the beads. Somehow, recently, the sum of me always equals how much I hate myself.
I squash that idea of telling her.
“Hello?”
“Have you ever researched Mr. Cratcher?”
“I don’t spend a lot of time Googling elderly men who ravage the minds of youth with philosophical questions about the human existence.”
“Do it. Right now.”
I flip open my computer, nervous that the simple act of getting online will be enough to break my mind-castle’s puny peashooter defenses. I type in “Colin Cratcher” and the results pop onto the screen.
Famed record producer Colin Cratcher under investigation for first-degree murder
Abbey Road producer Colin Cratcher primary suspect in studio murder
New US branch of Abbey Road Studios closed indefinitely due to murder investigations
Abbey Road US assistant producer Elias Harper murdered, producer Colin Cratcher primary suspect
I remember the picture I took from Mr. Cratcher’s house this morning and pull it out of my pocket. I stare at it. The black guy standing next to Mr. Cratcher must be Elias.
“Adam?”
“Yeah, here. Sorry. This—this is crazy.”
“I’ve been researching him for the last two hours.”
“Do you know what happened?”
“Yeah, so here’s what I’ve got. Abbey Road UK opened Abbey Road US in 1969. The UK execs hired Elias and Mr. Cratcher. Elias got his sister, Gabby, a job at the front desk. Because of the racial climate in the United States, people were pissed Abbey Road hired two black people, so there were a bunch of threats to shut it down. At the time, Mr. Cratcher was addicted to every drug ever and didn’t hide it very well, but I can’t find any evidence his drug use ever made him violent. Gabby and Mr. Cratcher fell in love around the time Elias and Mr. Cratcher started producing the album you guys have been working on after studio business hours. One morning, the studio head came into work to find Elias …” She pauses.
Even though I expect something bad to follow, I’m not prepared for what she actually says.
“… lynched … by a microphone cable. Because everyone knew Colin and Elias were working together after hours, and that Colin was addicted to drugs, he was the prime suspect.
“The day of the hearing, there were protest groups for both Mr. Cratcher’s conviction and release on the courthouse steps. But get this, Gabby was with the group protesting for his release.” She pauses, waiting for me to give a reaction. I don’t, so she keeps going.
“Mr. Cratcher gave a raw and honest testimony. He said he loved Elias as a brother, and the night he died, they’d both been doing LSD and drinking. Mr. Cratcher said he passed out, and when he woke up, he was in handcuffs. After a nine-hour deliberation by the jury, Mr. Cratcher was declared not guilty.
“A few weeks later, after a ridiculous amount of threats, Mr. Cratcher and Gabby Harper married and disappeared. Currently, the murder of Elias Harper is considered a cold case. A bunch of people believe Mr. Cratcher was framed by a super-active Nashville KKK group because, after his disappearance, a known Nashville KKK leader was overheard saying Mr. Cratcher deserved to die because he was, I quote, ‘romantically involved with a …’” She pauses to figure out how to say what’s next, but her silence fills the blank.
“Got it. Just keep going.”
“Abbey Road US was trashed and defaced by people angry with the verdict. The UK execs considered rebuilding, but the name was so tainted by the scandal they didn’t want to do any more damage to their brand so they never reopened. The building was bought in 1990, torn down, and rebuilt as another recording studio called Bridge Studios.”
When she finishes all I can say is, “Damn.”
How else do you respond to a story like that? That makes my story of addiction—heck, even Dez’s story of addiction—seem like an episode of Adventure Time.
I stare at the picture in my hands. “I don’t—I don’t even know what to say.”
“How is Mr. Cratcher still alive?” Dez asks. “How has he not died of heartache?”
“Can we—can we just not talk about addiction, or porn, or death, or racism for a minute?”
I feel such a heaviness that I, Adam Hawthorne, a man with a penis, want to scream and sob like an infant.
“I feel like I’m being assaulted with adultness, and I’m not ready for it. We’re only sixteen.”
“Can I just say one more thing?”
I sigh. “Yeah, go ahead.”
“The other night at Pritchett’s, you said Mr. Cratcher freaked out about not having the original album, right?”
“Yeah, it was more of a meltdown and less of a freak-out.”
“I’m guessing the album was either confiscated by the police or left at the studio. What if we tried to get it back for him? What if we drove to Nashville and tried to find it? If we did, we could finish the album for him. That’s something worth conquering.”
“How would we even do that? The case was closed years ago. All of the stuff they confiscated is probably destroyed or something.”
“Does it matter? What if we tried? What if we gathered the Knights of Vice and tried?”
“Our parents would never let that happen. Besides, how would we even pay for it?”
“Adam, do you not remember the Coulter Mansion of American Waste? Money isn’t a problem. I can just tell my dad some friends and I want to check out a college in Nashville and he might even charter a private jet for the occasion.”
“What on earth does your dad do?”
“Stock swindler.”
“By that, do you mean stock trader?”
“I mean stock swindler. It doesn’t matter what he does. We should do this. It would take our minds off everything. It could be like one big stand of justice. The trip where the Knights of Vice defeat their vices. The retrieval of a lost album in the memory of racial equality. Everything about it reeks of battle.”
I pick around the idea for a while. It seems super improbable that parents of addicts would let their kids go on a soul-searching trip to Nashville. We live in Washington. Nashville is more than a million steps away. Also, my research shows that when addicts soul-search, they typically decide their souls are easier to manage with the relief of a vice.
“I can’t just leave. I have all this suspension crap to do, and being at Mr. Cratcher’s every day is just a part of it. If I skip, I can be expelled from school. I want to go back to school, too. I miss being good at something without trying.”
“Maybe we can talk to Mr. Cratcher. Get him to let you go as part of the punishment.”
I laugh. “Yeah right. I’ll let you do that.”
I look at the clock. It’s almost six-thirty and I haven’t eaten or taken a shower. Even though where I’m going is completely populated by dudes, I’d like not to smell myself and think, “Ass of grim reaper.”
“Come on, Adam. What if we beat our addictions because of this trip? We could date, actually date for real.” She’s silent. It’s the silence that always comes before she says something that makes me want her more.
“I—I really want to love you, like, a greater-than-kind-of love you.”
Good. Ness.
I want that, too, Dez.
Soy bad.
I really realljy wanoijt … youbei
“You know I can’t say no to that, but I don’t—”
“Just think about it, okay? Just think about how to make it happen. At least do that before you say no.”
“Okay, I will.”
“You promise?”
“Nah, I don’t really feel like promising things right now.”
“Adam, I’m your wife. Stop being so annoying.”
—
Taking a shower proved to be the same amount of challenge as staring at my computer. I kept pushing porn away with thoughts about the trip. I replayed what Dez said about wanting to love me in a greater-than-addiction way over and over in my mind and that helped, too. I say all this like I was a victor in some giant mental fight, but my shower was only two minutes long.
I walk into the kitchen and reach for the Cocoa Puffs. I grab a bowl from the cupboard below. I tip the box toward my bowl, looking over my shoulder to see if my dad’s in his office. The familiar patter of Cocoa Puffs falling into a ceramic bowl has changed into a swift woosh. I look down and see a bowl full of the gridded rectangles of Life.
“Symbolic, Dad,” I say.
A chuckle drifts out of his office. “What better way to start the day with a bowl full of Life? God knows we need it.”
I sit down at the table. “I like your use of poetic analogy.”
“I’ve always considered myself a poet.”
After a lifetime of only ever eating Cocoa Puffs, I can’t tell if my first spoonful of Life is disgusting or revolutionary.
“What would you think about me taking a trip to Nashville?” I ask like I’m asking if he wants to go to Pritchett’s later.
He doesn’t respond, but I hear the rustle of him getting up from his chair. He walks over the kitchen table and sits down. “Why Nashville?”
Though she doesn’t sit up and she can’t see me from her spot on the couch, Addy adds, “Yeah, why Nashville?”
“It’s such a long story,” I say, shoving a spoonful of Life in my mouth. “Do I have to explain it to you?”
“Yes,” Dad says, “you have to explain it to me.”
“Yes,” Addy says, “you have to explain it to me.”
I tell them about Mr. Cratcher’s meltdown about the unfinished song and finishing the history of the album. I explain what Dez found out about him online, her proposal about the trip and how maybe it would help the Knights of Vice beat addiction, being together. Belonging. After I finish, they both just look at me.
“Dad?” I ask after, like, two minutes of silence.
“I’ve been a miserable father since the divorce,” he says, looking over at Addy and then me. “I was probably one before the divorce. I realize I’ve never talked about Mom outside of my grand ideas to get her back. I’ve also never asked either of you about anything that might get my hands dirty, and I’m sorry. All that to say, I know I haven’t been around for you, Adam. I also know I don’t deserve an answer to what I’m about to ask, but I have to ask the questions, and my consideration of this trip hinges on the way you answer.”
Why can’t things ever be easy? Why is everything always some giant battle?
“Okay,” I say, feeling insanely uncomfortable. I stand up to wash off my spoon and bowl.
“Are you addicted to pornography? And have you told anyone what really happened at school?”
I look at Addy, who’s now sitting upright and staring at me over the back of the couch. Her eyes are wide. Did she tell him? God, I’m so sick of talking about this stuff: my feelings, porn, girls, hurt, pain, death, blah, blah, blah.
I’m. So. Damn. Sick.
I grab the keys off the counter, walk out the door, and get into Genevieve. As I pull out of the driveway, images of Dad sitting at the table waiting for an answer haunt me, and I want nothing more than not to care.