“Fine.” He stomped toward it. “I quit.”
“Good riddance.” The door slammed.
I lay my head against the starchy pillow. The longer I proclaimed the gospel of fearlessness, the more I knew the world needed my teachings. Rather than uproot their fears, the masses let them grow and grow until their paths were choked, dreams forgotten.
Take Evelyn Luminescence. This woman had been my mentor. The boldness of her art had transformed my own. In her prime she said and did what few others dared, put her art before love, before everything. Where was she now? Teaching finger painting to toddlers at a patrician nursery on the Upper East Side. She told me that at her age she needed steadiness, both in income and in emotional state. Less turbulence, more predictability. I knew what was behind the about-face: a fear of failure. She was afraid of the slow fade into artistic oblivion. Rather than wait for defeat, she had removed herself from the arena. The world was poorer for it.
I sat in the hospital bed alone, aware of a slowly encroaching pain that wanted to eat me alive. Mind over matter, though; I would create my own reality. So long as I believed I was immune to this pain, it would be true. Gabe was the delusional one.
I turned on the television for a distraction. A black-and-white Western was playing, which made me think of my father, which made me wonder whether he had heard about any of my performances. If he had, Sir would find my stunts, complete with stopwatch and recitations on endurance, gussied up but familiar. A sadist he unequivocally was, but at forty I was willing to concede he’d taught me most of what I knew about fearlessness. Because of him I’d become invulnerable to fear. I knew how to swallow pain, to repurpose it as a source of power. Admitting as much was out of the question. We hadn’t spoken in sixteen years.
As I waited for the nurse to check on me, my thoughts kept drifting guiltily back to Gabe. He had always been good to me. He didn’t deserve to be mistreated. Still, he perennially forgot one simple fact: there was no shortage of Gabes, Lisas, and Evelyns on the planet, people who clutched their fears like dead loved ones without a clue how to let them go. He had to learn he was the replaceable one between us.
Nobody cared about the pawns. They were too busy watching the queen.
26
Kit
OCTOBER 2019
TEACHER AND I sat on the velvet couch in her office on a Monday in late October, door closed, discussing the progress I’d made on the Mom front.
“It’s not my fault she died.” I fingered the cool silk around my neck. “You made me understand that.”
“I’m so proud of you. You’ve begun to let go of the emotional attachments to which you once clung so tightly.”
I bent my head. “Thank you, Teacher.”
I had been an official Wisewood staff member for almost a month. In that time I’d worked fourteen-hour days, sweeping out the shed, mulching the vegetable plots, and reorganizing Teacher’s kitchen and pantry. I learned that she ate different foods than the rest of us—brie and prosciutto and an organic fig jam from a farm stand twenty minutes outside Rockland. Gordon had to take a bus to get there; no wonder he was gone all the time.
As a team, the staff had created a syllabus for the new Increasing Your Pain Tolerance class. Everyone’s eyes lit up when I suggested incorporating superglue into the curriculum. They called me brilliant, our secret weapon. I floated through the rest of that day.
At night I still wandered the campus. I found myself returning to the Staff Only doors, putting an ear to the wood but hearing nothing more than the sounds of the forest. Every time I reached for the brushed-steel handles, I held my breath. Every time they were locked, and I didn’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed. I was one of them now—when would I be allowed beyond these walls?
Teacher leaned toward me. I caught a whiff of her crisp perfume. “The next step is ridding yourself of material attachments.”
I peered at her. “I already did. It’s all in storage. I left everything behind when I came here.”
“Not everything.” She peered at my neck.
I gaped. “My scarf?”
“It’ll be good for you.” She watched my grip tighten on the fabric. “That scarf is a noose.”
“It’s not.” I let go of it. “I’m keeping her memory alive.”
She tapped the star tattoo on my temple. “You can store memories of Peggy right here. You’re holding on to the past.”
She might’ve been right, but I still didn’t want to give it up. “What if I keep it in my dresser? So it’s not with me all day.”