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“I don’t think that has anything to do with it, though, because you hadn’t been happy like that for a long time before, even when you had a job,” he says, reaching into the trunk for his bag. “It was Brendan.”
“If I seemed happy, it had nothing to do with him.”
“If you say so,” he replies. “Or maybe being scared of shit runs in the family.” Without a backward glance, he walks away.
I spend the trip back to the hospital fuming. What an asshole. He took my entire life savings and is riding the rehab train for the eighth time. Why would I listen to his opinion about anything?
Besides, what he said didn’t even make sense—happiness and bravery are completely different things. And he might know plenty about happiness, at least of the heroin/cocaine-induced variety, but he doesn’t know shit about courage.
I’m not a coward. I’ve gone into the seediest bars known to man to find my father. I kept running track when I wanted to give up. I’ve held my family together in my most broken moments. I stood up to my boss and ended a relationship when it wasn’t working, although I guess I can’t take much credit for that now that we’re back together.
“I’m not scared of anything,” I say aloud, as if I can prove it to myself. Except I don’t sound brave, or fearless. I sound like a child arguing against the most obvious truth.
* * *
Rob comes to the hospital early in the afternoon to drive my father to rehab. He insisted on doing this, although I wish he hadn’t. Somewhere inside, I know he finds this situation distasteful. We are like a dirty guest room he’s forced to stay in for a weekend. He smiles and struggles to control his disgust the entire time.
My mother climbs in the backseat of Rob’s Range Rover with my father, filling the air with false good cheer. It reminds me of bug spray—the scent not quite sweet enough to disguise what is noxious.
“I spoke to Father Duncan,” she says. “He said he’d be happy to marry you in the church, despite the situation. We could probably get a date within the month, as long as you aren’t going to insist on bridesmaids and…” Her voice grinds to a halt.
Rob’s hand, holding mine, feels leaden.
“Yeah,” he says. “Just family. No one else.”
My mother starts prattling on about the morning weddings she’s attended, places we can go to for a nice brunch afterward. She asks if we’ll have a honeymoon, and I finally snap.
“Mom, can we please stop discussing this? Let’s just get through one thing at a time.”
She’s probably mad, but I don’t really care. I turn on the radio, and Rob immediately hits the preset for NPR. I think of Brendan again, although I never actually seem to stop thinking of Brendan. Everything he said was correct. I don’t want to listen to this, but I’m not going to ask Rob to change the station. I’m not going to ask Rob for anything I want, ever. I want so many things I wouldn’t even know where to start, and I don’t think I’d ever be able to stop.
One of their annoying little bluegrass interludes comes on, and I want to laugh and cry at the same time. Even the stupidest, smallest things make me think of Brendan, and every one of them hurts.
My head begins to throb. The bluegrass continues. My mother, behind me, is talking too loudly, her false enthusiasm grating on my ear as she comments on every fucking thing we pass. Every building, every road sign, every billboard.
“I didn’t know they had a Cracker Barrel here, honey, did you?” she practically sings to my father. “We’ll have to stop there when you come home!”
She’s pretending all is well, even with half of her family in rehab.
Rob catches my eye and smiles awkwardly. “Are you hungry?” he asks.
“Not really. You?”
“If you can wait, we could just get a late dinner back home. Why don’t you see if we can get a table at De La Mer around eight?”
De La Mer is quiet and expensive and sterile, the kind of place I hate. I bite my lip. Brendan, get out of my head.
“I’m pretty wiped,” I venture. “Do you think we could go somewhere low-key? That place with the patio on Edgemont always looks relaxed. And they have bands sometimes.”
He frowns. “Outside? What kind of food?”
“Just casual, I think. Burgers or whatever.”
“I was kind of craving some ahi tuna. And if there’s a band, we won’t be able to talk.”
It’s not worth fighting over. Very few things in life are. I go online to reserve our table, ignoring the odd dread I feel about the night I’ve just planned. What is there to dread about a nice dinner at a good restaurant? Nothing.
We check my father in, and the sick feeling in the pit of my stomach remains. The truth is that it’s been here, to some extent, ever since I agreed to get back together with Rob. I’m beginning to worry it’s permanent.
