Amy & Roger's Epic Detour (39 page)

“Your fish?” I asked.

“God, enough about the fish,” Charlie muttered. “Why don’t you just e-mail him?”

“Oh yeah, that’s a great idea,” Muz said. “Should I just send it to Corey who hangs out at the Dairy Queen dot com?”

“I’ll see if I can,” I said, taking the envelope from Muz and smoothing out some of the wrinkles. “I’ll try.”

“Thanks,” he said, smiling at me. “I knew you would. Chuck’s always talking about how you’re always there for him, and—”

“We have to go,” Charlie said, pulling the door farther open. “I’ll help you get back down.” We stepped out into the hallway and found it deserted, the only sound the gentle trickling of the water.

“Are we late?” asked Muz.

“Oh, yeah,” Charlie said, and we all hustled down to the room I’d entered from.

“Thanks again,” Muz shout-whispered to me before heading down the corridor. He raised a hand in a wave, which I returned before following Charlie into the room. It was empty—presumably the two girls had headed out to their next activity.

“That one?” asked Charlie, pointing to the open window. I nodded, and we headed over to it. “Well, I guess this is it, then,” he said, twisting his hands together.

“Are you okay?” I asked, knowing that we were out of time, but not feeling ready to leave yet. “I mean, you look better. But this place … are you okay here?”

Charlie looked down a the white carpet and rocked back and forth on his flip-flops. “I think I am,” he said. “I think so.”

“Amy,” I heard whispered loudly from outside. I stuck my head out the window and saw Roger looking up. He looked incredibly relieved when he saw me, and I wondered how long he’d been calling for me.

“I’m coming right down,” I called back, and he nodded. I pulled my head back into the room and looked at my brother. “How long are you here?” I asked. “I mean, when do you get to leave?” I hadn’t realized until I saw this old version of him, one I hadn’t seen in a very long time, how much I’d missed my brother. But it was hitting me now, when I was leaving him again.

“Another month,” he said. He gave me a small smile. “Not so long.”

“Amy,” Roger called from out the window, a little louder this time, just as the chime sounded again. Charlie and I looked to the intercom.

The soothing voice, sounding a little less calm this time, announced, “The prelunch session has now begun. Please conduct yourself as quickly as possible to your designated activity, if you have not already done so.”

“Okay,” I said. Charlie nodded, and we looked at each other. My brother and I were not huggers. I couldn’t actually remember the last time we’d hugged. But I wasn’t about to shake hands with him. I started to wave when Charlie reached out and hugged me hard. I hugged him back, and it felt exactly right—and something we should have done a while ago.

“Thanks for coming,” he mumbled into my shoulder. I nodded, and we separated. “You should talk to Mom,” he said. “I’ve been getting her e-mails, and she’s worried about you. I think she’s kind of lost without you.”

I stared at him. “What are you talking about?” I asked. “She’s not lost without me. She left me for a month and barely—”

“Amy,”
Roger called again.

“Talk to her,” Charlie said. “But good for you for doing all this. I’d have barely recognized you.”

“In a good way?” I asked.

“In a good way,” he said. He smiled, then looked at the window. “Need a hand?”

“I think I might,” I said. Holding on to the sill, my arms stretching over it, I swung a leg outside it, and saw Roger waiting down below, reaching for me. I took a breath and swung my other leg over. I looked down, and suddenly Roger and the ground seemed very far away. “Um,” I said. “I’m not sure …”

“You have to extend your arms,” Charlie said. “Give me your hand.” I looked up at him, and he nodded. “It’s okay.” I unhooked my arm from around the sill, and Charlie took my hand. He placed it on the edge of the sill, and then helped me do it with the other hand. I extended my arms, and was hanging there in space. I felt someone grab my foot, and I knew Roger was there.

“Just drop,” he called. “I’ve got you.”

I looked up at my brother, who was looking right at me. “You have to let go,” Charlie said. “It’s okay.”

“Take care, okay?” I asked. He nodded, and I smiled at him. Then I let go of the sill and dropped straight down, landing on something soft—Roger. “Sorry,” I gasped, rolling off of him and standing up, brushing myself off. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” he said, taking the hand that I extended to help him up. “But I think we have to get out of here, like, now.” He started speed-walking toward the car, still holding on to my hand, pulling me along behind him.

“Why’s that?” I asked as I struggled to keep up.

“I think there’s a possibility that we may have attracted some attention,” he said. “I was trying to look as inconspicuous as possible, but that’s hard to do when you’re talking to a window. People kept walking by and looking at me.”

We hustled toward the car, and sure enough, I noticed a lot more white-scrubs-clad people hanging around the entrance than had been there before. And I noticed that now they were all carrying walkie-talkies. “Let’s just make it to the car,” I mumbled under my breath, and Roger squeezed my hand once in answer.

“Excuse me,” a voice behind us said. We turned to see Courtney walking toward us. “I have to speak with you two.”

Roger and I looked at each other and then, without discussing anything, still holding hands, we both bolted for the car, running flat out. “Keys?” I asked him breathlessly as we crossed the parking lot.

“Yeah,” he gasped. I turned and noticed that Courtney was also jogging toward us. We reached the car, Roger beeped it open, and we threw ourselves inside. He started it and backed up with record speed, and we peeled out of the parking lot.

Roger didn’t slow down until we’d been driving for five minutes and it became clear that Promises Kept wasn’t sending someone after us to give chase. “Close one,” he said, and I watched as the speedometer dropped to his normal non-interstate speed.

I stared out the window at the other cars rushing by, trying to sort out what I was feeling. I had been trying with everything I had to avoid thinking about that morning, trying not to play the memory out to its conclusion. But seeing Charlie, and talking about it …

“You okay?” I could hear Roger ask from a place that sounded very far away.

I nodded, but turned more toward my window, and closed my eyes. But it wasn’t going away this time. It was like I no longer had the strength anymore to hold this back.

“Amy?” I opened my eyes and saw Roger looking over at me, worried. “Are you okay?”

I started to nod, but gave it up halfway through, and shook my head. “I just …,” I started to say, and heard my voice crack. “I’m not okay,” I said. He looked over at me and turned down the music. I could feel the memories of that morning swelling behind me. I knew Roger wouldn’t look at me the same way once he knew the truth. But I was tired of fighting to hold it back.

“What is it?” he asked quietly, looking at me, then back at the road.

“The Elvis thing,” I started. “Why I didn’t want to hear it.”

“Because of your father,” Roger said. “Right?”

I nodded. “We were listening to Elvis in the car,” I said. “I mean, we were always listening to Elvis in the car. But we were listening to him when it happened.” I swallowed hard and forced the word out. “The accident.”

“Oh,” he said softly. It was like this wasn’t even a word. It felt more like he was laying out a stone for me to step on, so that I could keep going.

I felt my breathing speed up, and I knew I was circling around what I could no longer not say. “The accident,” I said, trying to force my voice to stay audible. I took a shaky breath and said it. “It was my fault. It’s my fault that he died.”

“Amy,” Roger said, looking over at me sharply. “Of course it wasn’t your fault.”

Other people had said the same thing. But this was just what you said to people. And none of them knew. None of them had actually been there. “But it was,” I whispered. And I took another breath and told him why.

I’ll be right here with you, come what may.
—Elvis Presley

M
ARCH
8—
THREE MONTHS EARLIER

I stepped out into the sunlight and slipped on my new sunglasses. I couldn’t help wondering what my mother was going to do to Charlie. Being picked up by the police for sleeping on a park bench, still stoned, had to merit some kind of punishment. Maybe this would make my parents finally see what was happening with him. I walked down the driveway, toward the garage, and looked back to the house, where I could hear my mother’s voice, still sharply edged with worry and anger.

“And then once you’ve gotten him,” she said as she stepped outside, my father following, letting the screen door slam behind him, “I’m going to need you to stop at the store. So just give me a call when you get there and I’ll tell you what we need.”

My father gave her a look as he slipped on his ancient sunglasses, aviators with lenses so scratched I was always amazed that he could see through them. “Or you could tell me now,” he said, a smile in his voice. “That’s always an option.”

“Right,” my mother said, shaking her head. “We’ve been through that before.”

“I’ll be back soon,” he said, kissing her quickly, causing me to automatically avert my eyes.

“Call if there’s a problem,” she called to us.

“We will,” my father and I called back in unison, and we exchanged a smile when we realized this.

“Amy, where are your shoes?” my mother yelled to me, sounding exasperated.

“Oh.” I looked down at my bare feet. “Just a second,” I said to my father, dashing across the lawn. It was still wet, and freshly mowed—an unfortunate combination, and as I looked down, I could see that grass clippings were sticking to my feet. I ran up the steps to the house and around my mother, still standing in the doorway, to grab my flip-flops from the basket in the mudroom.

I slipped them on and headed outside again, where my mother was holding the car keys in her hand. “Ben, keys,” she said in what my father referred to as her Exasperated Voice.

“I’ve got them,” I said, grabbing them from her hand and giving her a quick wave. I ran across the lawn to the garage, and headed around to the driver’s side. I tossed the keys in my hand and gave my father my most convincing smile. “I’ll drive.”

He smiled and walked around to the passenger side as I opened the driver’s door and adjusted the seat. I buckled my seat belt, and pointed at my father. “Buckle up,” I said. My father hated wearing seat belts, and the only way Charlie and I had ever gotten him to wear one was by refusing to put ours on until he buckled up too.

“Come on, pumpkin,” my father said in his best persuasive voice. “We’re in a hurry. Why don’t we just go?”

“Fine,” I said, unbuckling my own seat belt and turning the key in the ignition the ignition. “Let’s go.”

My father grumbled and pulled on his seat belt. “Happy now?” he asked.

“Very,” I said, snapping my own back in. “Thank you. I’m telling you, you’ll thank me someday.” I looked into the rearview mirror and began to back slowly down the driveway.

“Music?” my father asked as I pulled the car around the cul-de-sac.

I’d had my license for three months now, but I still had to concentrate when I drove, and was just recently becoming okay with having music playing in the car. When I just had my permit, and found the three-point turn to be on par with quantum physics in terms of difficulty, I’d needed total silence at all times. “Sure,” I said as I braked at a stop sign. “You want to hear the King?”

“You need to ask?” my father asked, flipping through the CDs. “Ah,” he said, taking one out of its case and sliding it into the player.

“Which one is that?” I asked. When I was driving, I reserved the right to be picky about the Elvis that was played. None of the Hawaii stuff was permitted, for example.

“I think you’ll approve,” he said, skipping through the tracks. A moment later, “All That I Am” began to play.

“Nice,” I said, smiling at him. “I like this song.”

“I know you do,” my father said. “That’s because you are my daughter, and the child of my heart.” We drove for a minute, listening to the King croon. “And as a matter of fact,” my father added after a moment, “I think we should dance to this at your wedding. Sound like a plan?”

“Dad,” I said, rolling my eyes. “Gross. Plus, I think that’s a few years away. You know, just a couple.”

“Sorry,” he said, but he was still chuckling, and I had a feeling that he didn’t mean it. “Hand,” he said, and I carefully took one off the wheel. He turned my palm up, placed something inside, and then folded my fingers over again. When I opened my palm, there was a Life Saver sitting there. It looked like Butter Rum, and I glanced over to see my father tossing back one of his own.

“Thank you,” I said, popping it in my mouth.

I pulled up to the intersection at Campus Drive, and realized I didn’t know the way from here. “Right? Left?” I asked. It was odd to have to need directions in a car I was so used to navigating in.

“Left,” my father said. “Take University.” He sighed and looked out the window. “Let’s get this over with.”

As I put on my turn signal, I saw him crunch down on another Life Saver. “Have you known about this?” he asked, interrupting the King. “About your brother, I mean?”

I glanced over at him, then back at the road, wondering how much to tell him, and wondering if there was any point now in still trying to cover for Charlie. “I knew something was going on,” I said. I thought of the failed intervention I’d tried to stage, and wished now that I’d just told my parents about it then. I pulled up to the intersection and braked when the light turned yellow, making some people behind me, who must have been hoping for me to run it, honk unhappily.

“I knew something wasn’t right with him,” my father said, looking out the window. “I just didn’t think it had gone this far.”