Every Time I Think of You (20 page)

“No, I don’t mean just now. Those letters, your mountain adventures. I know you were trying to cheer me up, but it just made me realize … That’s your future, your dream. I can’t be a part of that, like this.”

“That’s not my whole life, Ev. Besides, there are plenty of campsites we could drive to. I mean, maybe we can’t hike, exactly, but I can haul you on my back. I’ll get sled dogs!”

He sighed, as if even faking a smile were too exhausting. “You need to go live your life.”

My mind reeled. If it hadn’t been for me, he’d still be lying on a bed in that makeshift bedroom in Forrestville; Miss Havisham, but a guy. “Oh. You mean go
away
away.”

“What do you think?” he shouted, incredulous at my ignorance as he pounded his thighs with his fists before forcing himself to calm down. “I want to ask you, Reid.” His eyes twisted to narrow slits, almost accusative. I’d never seen him so angry. “Some people are saying I won’t heal. Ever. Others hope so. What do you think?”

“I–”

“Because if you’re one of those who hopes I’ll change back, who will never look at me the same way again if I won’t, then I don’t think we can be together.”

“I can’t believe this.” The tears sprang out. “You…” I gestured toward him with a movement I would regret for months. “… are breaking up with me.”

“What was that?”

“What?”

“That!” Everett repeated my gesture with an angry jab. “Like I’m supposed to be grateful? Like you’re the one who does the dumping, because you’re not in a chair?”

“What I meant,” I slowed down, found a place to sit, to be at his level, so that he wouldn’t feel overwhelmed, loomed over. “What I meant was how upsetting it is that you take this all so casually, the fact that I’m just totally … love you.”

Everett said something in Latin.

I didn’t ask him to translate.

“From the first day I met you,” I said, attempting to stay calm, “I thought, here is this guy who’s wild enough to be right there, where I would be wild. I thought, wow, I got so lucky, right off the bat; first time and he’s … But that same day, the way you turned so casual. There wasn’t a minute that I thought of you and wondered, when will this end? When will he realize what a dork I am? I guess that’s … now.”

Everett sat, his arms folded tight, waiting. He could have left. I knew to let that happen, that wheeling away is the right of a person.

“You should go back to Kevin.”

“Kevin?” I almost shouted. I stood, turning away to see a woman with a clipboard held against her chest standing at the open door, giving me a stern glare.

I lowered my voice to a simmer. “You practically threw him at me, as what? Some kind of substitute? He’s just a … He’s a nice guy, sure, but Jeez, Ev.”

“You need to–”

I drew closer to him. “You know what I need? If you have any other boyfriends who take trains and bang up cars and break into houses and get drunk and practically fuck in front of your parents, one at a time, if you recall, just to be with you, I’d really like to meet him. He sounds like a great guy.”

Everett slumped in his chair even lower. Regretting my scolding tone, I tried to inject a little humor. “I mean, come on. You mailed me your jock strap. If that’s not love, what is?”

At least that got a smile out of him.

“I’m trying to understand what you’re going through. Just … just help me.”

“Do you wanna try it?” Everett wheeled backward to a chair, as if to remove himself from his own. “Go out for a spin. See how far you get before your shoulders cramp and your fingers get caught in the spokes and your piss bag spills and some old lady three times your age asks if you ‘need some help, sweetie?’”

Crouching down before him, I put my hands on his knees, despite realizing he couldn’t feel me there. I said, softly, “You helped me.”

“What?”

“Ev, since I met you …” I couldn’t explain how he’d inspired me, driven me to grow, and by loving him love myself. “I know everything’s changed, but I want to be here for you. It’s what I want.”

Intent on staring at some point on the floor, he muttered, “This is not about you.”

“Oh, okay.”

“No, Reid. It’s not okay. It’s about what I’m going through. It’s about losing everything physical I just took for granted, and it’s falling off my chair when I’m just trying to put my socks on. It’s not fun, and it’s not sexy and it’s just … not.”

And then Everett said what I hoped was a lie. Not one of the many small charming fibs that got him what he wanted, or into trouble, which he also liked; it was what I hoped was his one great lie.

“I don’t love you like you want me to.”

Trying to figure out which parts of him could still feel, and which parts had voluntarily shut down, I offered a hesitant, cautious hug.

“Well, I love you like I want to.”

“Just go home. We’ll talk later.”

We didn’t, for three months.

Chapter 31

Autumn, 1979

My freshman semester at Temple University was spent trying to focus on my studies, to make new friends, and to not think about Everett. In that last effort, I failed miserably.

Not that there weren’t ample distractions in a two-bedroom, four-guy dorm with a common area that almost every weekend erupted into drinking and semi-naked hijinks that never resulted in, to use a sports term, follow-through.

I had been fortunate enough to have Eric, one of my three dorm mates, turn out to be easy-going and a lot like me. A husky ex-jock who actually liked studying, between his biology major and my own, we found an equal fascination somewhere between cells and seeds.

Initially separated, we had decided to change our initial room assignments after a few days. Our collective poster decoration clearly showed that our similarities and differences made the decision a good one.

Eric’s décor was mostly
Star Wars
and other science fiction movie posters, while my wall became adorned with a map from Allegheny State Park and a poster of the Amazon rain forest I’d bought at the student bookstore. Charlie and Dennis, in the adjoining suite, favored posters of Cheryl Tiegs and Farrah Fawcett, among a few more revealing female centerfolds.

For me, the dormitory’s showers proved to be an infrequent boner-friendly environment. A few guys on my dorm floor had occasionally displayed themselves behind not-completely closed shower curtains.

Eric’s invitations to join him in workouts at the school gym provided more fascinating distractions. The main locker room’s environment turned out to be cautiously flirtatious, while Eric, who was straight, seemed oblivious or dismissive. I limited my timid cruising to lone visits.

I did become distracted by the frequent possibility of furtive sex with strangers, but never took it to completion. I never stopped thinking of Everett. I just put him aside, until I would see or hear a reminder.

One night my roommates decided to drag me off to one of the local bars on a Saturday night, claiming I was studying too hard. Somewhere after the second shared pitcher of beer, one of those anthem-like songs by Styx blasted through the speakers. The guys started singing along, hoisting their mugs.

“I’m okay! I finally found the person I’ve been searching for!”

The tears just sprang out of my eyes, right in front of the guys. Even though I didn’t tell them why I was so upset, they seemed sympathetic, but I just left.

Wobbling my way back to the dorm, I thought of that Styx poster in Everett’s bedroom and at the rehab center, and how I never even thought to ask him if he’d seen them perform, or if he’d gone to concerts with Kevin as I had done a few times. What if we both had, and I’d met him then, and later on somehow managed to get him to ditch that one lacrosse game for another of our secretive meetings?

There were other less convoluted reminders. Several students in wheelchairs lived on campus. The sight of each one of them brought a pang of longing to me. I withheld the frequent desire to walk up to them, burst out with pride some kind of pronouncement that would endear me to them.
Hey, the guy I love is in a wheelchair! Let’s be friends!

Instead, I simply made eye contact and greeted those that returned my look with a simple ‘Hi.’ Most times, after their initial surprise, they returned a greeting after the second or third time.

While sitting at the cafeteria, eating a sandwich while highlighting text in my Botany 101 book, I noticed one of those students, a young Black guy in a wheelchair, had rolled up beside me.

“This seat taken?”

“Oh. No.”

He seemed to appreciate my gesture of pulling the chair next to me away to another table to make room for him. He rolled closer, placed a paper bag on the table next to me. His pants were baggy around his legs. I made a quick estimate as to the level of his injury’s location.

“Devon.” He pronounced it ‘di-VON.’ We shook hands. I felt a pang of guilt for sizing him up for what I thought was wrong with him before actually seeing him.

“Well, you been a little more friendly than most of the students. To us. Almost like on purpose. You in campus politics or something?”

Devon had been in a car crash in North Philadelphia late one night. He went into a lot of details about it, and his struggle to recover. He didn’t have the advantage of a wealthy family, or much of a family, and the guy driving the car had a few violations, plus lapsed car insurance, yet survived the accident with merely a few sprains. Devon was basically left with state and local services, which in themselves had been a hassle to get.

“Then my case worker found out about the scholarships here, and it’s been a lot smoother,” Devon finished his story. “Sorry, I’m talkin’ too much.”

“No, no, it’s cool.” I closed my book.

We ate our food, talked of other things that had nothing to do with wheelchairs or accidents. Devon offered to show me around the off-campus bars he liked, which meant those that didn’t have stairs. We traded numbers and left the cafeteria together. Before heading off in opposite directions, Devon said, “Good luck with your friend.”

Before meeting Devon, I was about to the point where I could last an entire day without thinking about Everett. At night, in my mind, I was all his.

Running had come back to me. Starting off with a few loops around the outdoor track at school, I politely declined invitations to join an intramural group of guys. Running off-campus around city blocks was just too difficult, so I branched off to a few trails that looped the campus. The autumnal clusters of trees reminded me of my summer in the state park, and I relaxed.

The good pain in my legs and lungs returned. My pacing felt steady, my mind at ease to later dive into my studies. For several weeks, I had deceived myself into thinking I could move on with my life.

Pulling my textbooks for the day from my backpack, I stacked them on my desk for another night of studying, before a hoped-for nap and before my other two noisier dorm-mates returned.

My roommate Eric and I shared a small corkboard on the wall between our desks. I saw a piece of scrap paper tacked to the board with a familiar phone number and name: ‘Holly.’

Weighing the burden of returning her call, I fought the surge of conflicted feelings that rose. Was it more bad news about Everett? Good news? Had he miraculously healed? Had he tried to kill himself? I’d read in my research phase months before that the suicide rate among some disabled people was far higher than among the able-bodied.