“Drugs?”
“In my drinking days, I’d take whatever you were offering. But liquor remains my first love. The rest, I can walk away from. I’m lucky that way.”
“My sister, Becca, loved it all. Drink it, snort it, smoke it, inject it. Nothing she didn’t try. I blamed my father. If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em. But then he died, and she was still a train wreck. Lost her license. Lost her job. Picked up a new loser boyfriend. The two of them . . . like the meth-head version of Bonnie and Clyde, racing their way to the bottom. My mom and I tried. Interventions, rehab, AA, substance abuse counselors. For a while, every penny I earned went to my sister’s latest treatment. But Derek the Douche always reappeared. And she always went away with him.”
“You can’t help someone who doesn’t want to be helped.”
“You?”
“Sober ten years, five months, and”—I’ve lost track of dates—“eighteen days. Took me a couple of tries, though. And I did have help, someone who believed in me until I was strong enough to believe in myself. I take it your sister . . . ?”
“Drank herself to death?” Neil smiles thinly. Despite my best efforts, his eyes are at half-mast. I snap my fingers, forcing him to focus.
“Remember. No sleeping.”
“No dying,” he finishes.
“That’s the spirit.”
“She OD’d. My sister. Two years after I graduated from college. Police found her body in some abandoned warehouse. Derek the Douche was long gone. Probably grabbed the rest of their drugs and booked it while her body was still warm. I always thought the call would come in the middle of the night, but no. Eleven a.m. on a Tuesday. I was sitting at my desk at work. Saw my mother’s number and picked up without suspecting a thing.”
I squeeze his hand.
“Called Tim next. I didn’t know what to do. My mom was sobbing hysterically. And I was just . . . numb. After everything we’d done. It’s like half of me knew this was always going to happen. But the other half . . . She was my baby sister, the one who’d sneak me Popsicles after my father passed out. The girl who saved her Jell-O from school lunch because she knew how much I liked it. She used to swing so high, my mother would scream at her to get down. I loved her. Even when she was at her worst.”
Wordlessly, I wipe the first tear, followed by the second, third, and fourth, from his cheeks.
“Thank you,” he whispers.
“Did Tim help you? When you called him?”
“Tim took care of everything. Called the other guys, spoke to his parents, organized the funeral. My mom was useless. I knew I should be helping, but I just . . . couldn’t.”
“Sounds like Tim was a great friend,” I say at last.
“Saint Timothy.”
“？‘Because the heavens opened up and choirs started to sing every time he walked into a room,’？” I quote. “At least, that’s what Scott told me.”
“Scott’s an asshole.” But Neil’s smiling faintly.
He sighs, eyelids drooping again. I shake his shoulder till he peers at me groggily.
“Your head hurt?”
“Like a son of a bitch.”
Adrenaline’s worn off. Here we go. “Nauseous? If you’re going to vomit, please do it in the other direction.”
“Don’t suppose you have a stapler?”
“Sorry, this is a superglue-only ER. Come on. I know it’s hard, but you gotta keep talking. Tell me about Tim.”
“Can’t.”
“He was your best friend. First one you called when you got terrible news. Guy you introduced to his future bride. I wanna hear all the details.”
“Latisha was my date. He was supposed to entertain her friend.”
I pause, remember Scott’s earlier coyness, and feel like an idiot for not connecting the dots sooner. “You’re the one who dated Latisha first.”
“Only a couple of times. Took me forever to work up the courage to ask her out. Then I was so damn nervous, couldn’t get out of my own way. Spent the first date tongue-tied. The second sweating like a freak show. She was so nice about it, too.
“I was desperate to succeed. So I consulted Tim. His idea, turn the next outing into a double date. Less pressure. I’d relax, make a better impression. So I did. And it was way less pressure. Especially once Latisha stopped paying any attention to me. One look, and just like everyone else, she was all about Saint Tim.”
“Awkward.”