“Shit,” we said at the same time.
She stooped to pick it up.
“Please, let me,” I said, and the room seemed to expand to normal size again, but too quickly, almost knocking the wind out of my lungs. I heard bullets—no particular sensation had reminded me, and yet I could hear them, just like I could hear the sound of the flag whipping. They’re picking us off from the northwest hill. My voice was distorted again, shaking, this time by something other than anger. Something that came from the same place in my stomach.
As if sensing it, Cassie rose and stepped away.
I leaned over in the chair, folding my torso to its limit to grab the plate halves.
Why did these little things mess with my brain like this? Why couldn’t I just let life pass through me? And of course, because I never left her apartment, Cassie was around every single time this happened.
I wheeled to a spot next to the counter and set the pieces near an avocado. “Or do you want me to put them in the trash?”
“Right there’s fine, thanks.”
She breezed past me. “Do you need the bathroom? I’m going to take a shower.”
I stayed facing the wall, but I could feel her moving across the room. Good fucking work, Morrow. This was the problem with regular head. Regular head was worse. Regular head sent me nightmares during the day. Cloud head would take over most of the interactions from now on, I decided right then. And I know what you’re thinking, I said in my head to no one. You think it’s because I like the OxyContin. No. That’s not it.
“Luke?” Cassie called. “Can you hear me?”
“No, I don’t need the bathroom,” I responded. I needed to defeat my own thoughts. I could be a new version of old Luke. “I mean, no, thank you,” I corrected, reaching for another pill.
Cassie
I stayed in the shower longer than normal, turning up the hot water to pelt me raw. Luke was always there, hurting in the quiet, a dark cloud in the house. I felt bad for shoving him on Rita, but after two weeks in the same house, his moods were beginning to affect mine. I had started to write sadder songs, which didn’t quite fit. I had a chance at a record deal, for Christ’s sake. I should have been pushing out hits, or at least joyous, forward-moving songs, songs that bloomed with possibility. I had even started to get annoyed with Toby, as if he should act as a punching bag for my frustration with Luke.
Mom would have known what to say to lift my spirits, but she had no sympathy for me. When I called, her voice was strained, a cold kind of friendly, like a how are you to the guy who delivers her mail. She would make an excuse to get off the phone before I could tell her much about Luke. She knew just that he was home, and injured. Nothing about how hard it was, how bad things were with him. I’d gotten myself into this mess, I could almost hear her say, and I could get myself out.
The muscles in my back and arms were aching from holding Luke’s weight. He was supposed to be able to put some weight on the leg by now, but he could still get to the toilet only if I helped him from the doorway, where the wheelchair wouldn’t fit. This morning I had slipped on the wet floor, and my head missed the edge of the sink by centimeters. I had to be more careful.
I thought of the broken plate. He had to be more careful. Doubt was creeping into my thoughts every day, but I pushed it away. If it was this hard to care for each other when no one else was around, think of how difficult it would be to make it seem like we were a couple in the presence of a real nurse.
And I still needed his health insurance and the extra thousand dollars a month.
I thought about how strange it was that after two weeks, he hadn’t asked me to get him anything. He ate whatever was put in front of him. He made sure to never be on my laptop whenever I came home. No requests for certain foods, no new clothes, no boxes from Buda he wanted to retrieve.
Maybe that was the problem.
All he had was the space that I had set up. My books, my records, the dusty trinkets from vacations Mom and I had taken. My schedule, my nonathletic arms to lift him. I should get him a plant, or something, I thought. Something living to be around other than me and Rita.
I stepped out of the bathroom, glancing at where he had wheeled himself next to the window. He turned to me, but quickly looked away, a tennis ball in his clenched fist. I disrobed in the bedroom, and got ready for work. I’d said I would go in early today to do liquor inventory, get some extra hours.
On my way out of the room, my eye caught a strange sight on my pillow. Two orange dots I’d never seen before. I looked closer, picking them up. They were small, cylindrical, and made of foam. Earplugs.