When we were little, Jake and I used to dribble our basketballs down to the air-conditioned gym at the high school and shoot baskets. I was never very good, but he was great, so I signed him up for all the camps. We’d shoot hoops until it got cool enough to go back outside, where we’d hit ground balls to each other. We could escape and be content in our own little town and no one expected anything of us, except to be on time for hamburgers at six. That’s kind of what cloud head reminded me of. That and running. Nowhere particular to be, just moving through the world. One foot in front of the other. Simple. Not great, not bad, just okay.
“Are you excited to start nesting with your bride?” Hailey asked.
Regular head would have gotten nervous at the very mention of Cassie, knowing that she was better at faking it than I was. Regular head wouldn’t know what to say.
“Yeah, she’s great,” cloud head said. “She’s a musician.”
“Oh, my! I didn’t know that. She always seems so shy.”
“She’s very creative,” cloud head said.
Jake pushed me through the automatic doors toward the transport van, where a nurse would drive me to Cassie’s house.
Regular head started to panic. “I’ll see you in a couple weeks?” I asked. Jake was leaving again, and we hadn’t really gotten a chance to talk, for me to explain what my new plan for life was once I healed. Or rather, to explain that I needed to come up with a new plan, because I didn’t really have a plan yet. I guess I had been counting on the inspiration of nine months in the desert.
“Maybe pick me up for a Bears game once the season starts up again?” I continued. The Bears were our high school team; they played where Jake and I used to practice.
“We don’t have a place to put a wheelchair in the Honda,” Jake said, uncomfortable.
“Maybe we could rent a van?” Hailey asked.
Cloud head tried to reassure regular head that it would be fine. But I couldn’t not care about the prospect of being alone in Cassie’s apartment, in a neighborhood I didn’t know, unable to tell anyone I was there without having to justify our situation.
“Nah, I’ll be up and about soon,” cloud head said, hoping I was right.
“Take care of yourself,” Jake said. I shook his hand. Hailey bent down to hug me.
From the windows of the van, cloud head waved good-bye.
? ? ?
When I woke up, we were in East Austin, and the Oxy had worn off, leaving a headache and a beating in my joints. I started to dig into my bag to pop another pill, but before I could find the bottle, Cassie was sliding open the van doors.
“Hey,” she said, her hair up in a tiny ponytail. “Let’s get you settled.”
The bastard nurse came around the front of the van, scoping out the little white house as he activated the platform. There were two front doors, one with a red A over it, one with a B.
“You’re on the first floor, then?” he asked Cassie.
“No, um. Second, actually,” she said, her tone uncertain.
“Second, as in upstairs?” I said.
I could barely walk for five minutes without collapsing in pain, let alone take stairs. Cassie hadn’t mentioned this. I could feel my jaw clenching. It would take all the restraint I had to wait to explode at her.
“Yeah,” she said. “I told you that.”
Oh. I might not have been fully present during that conversation. Shit.
The nurse nodded toward the second floor. “You gonna need my help to get him up there?”
“Nope, we got it covered,” I said.
“Suit yourself,” he said, and pulled the lever to bring the platform back into the vehicle. Cassie looked at me, incredulous, and back at the nurse, but he closed the van door, turned the ignition, and drove away.
Cassie threw up her hands. “What do you mean, ‘we got it covered’？”
I didn’t want his hands on me, carrying me like a wet noodle. And maybe this was what I needed to start walking. No choice. A kick in the ass. “We’ll be fine. You saw me today. I can probably get up there by myself.”
She wheeled me down the sidewalk, my bag on her back. “Are you kidding?” Cassie paused, softening when she saw my face, and approached the door. She gestured toward her body, perhaps two-thirds the size of mine. “Look at me.” She turned toward the door and knocked on A. “I’m gonna grab some help just in case.”
“Wait, Cassie . . .” I clutched my wheels, still fuming.
A middle-age woman opened it, dirty-blond ringlets framing a kind, puffy face. She wore leopard-print leggings and a T-shirt that said WAKE ME UP WHEN IT’S OVER.