Here to Stay (15 page)

“You guys all right?” he later asked Will over beers.

“We’ll be fine,” Will said. “You make a plan and God smiles, right? But everything happens for a reason.”

“No shit,” Erik said, knocking the neck of his bottle against Will’s. They drank deeply.

“In other news,” Will said. “I’m not allowed to look in Lucky’s direction until I get a vasectomy.”

“Yeah, I’d book that immediately,” Erik said.

His foreboding turned out to be accurate and as July wound down it became evident Lucky wasn’t doing well at all.

“She’s so depressed,” Will said on the phone. “Dude, it’s bad.”

“I hear Dais on the phone with her in the middle of the night,” Erik said. “It sounds bad. Has she seen her doctor about it?”

“She finally went and he wrote her a script for antidepressants, but she’s balking at it.”

“I know,” Erik said. “I did the same.”

“I’m going to leave Jack and Sara with the nanny this weekend. Take Lucky and the baby up to stay with my parents. I need to get her out of here and Lucky needs Dais.”

“Good idea. Come to us.”

“And listen,” Will said. “Will you help me talk to her? About the meds?”

The four friends gathered close.

Mostly Lucky talked.

“I feel like such a shit,” she said, tucked in the circle of Will’s arms and weeping. “I have this beautiful life and I’m such an ungrateful bitch.”

“Stop,” Will said against her hair as he rocked her. “Don’t beat yourself up like this, babe.”

Lucky cried harder. “I don’t understand. She’s so good. She’s such a good baby. She’s a piece of fucking cake. Jack and Sara are being amazing. Our nanny is an angel. We have a roof over our heads, we have work, we have fucking government-mandated parental leave. What the hell is wrong with me?”

“Don’t,” Daisy said, coming to sit on Lucky’s other side. “This isn’t something you’re doing. It’s something that’s happening to you.”

Lucky gulped and sniffed. A flicker of understanding seemed to cross her flushed, swollen face.

“Nobody thinks you’re doing this on purpose,” Erik said. “Look around the table, Luck. You got three breakdowns in front of you. We’ve all been there and it’s not something you choose to do for kicks.”

“We’re the jury of your peers,” Daisy said, smiling as she smoothed Lucky’s hair. “Not the judges.”

Lucky exhaled. Took a deep breath and exhaled again. “I love you guys. I’d be fucked without you…” She looked across to Erik and held out her hands. As he caught them tight and squeezed, he noticed for the first time Lucky wore her gold wedding band on her left index finger. To be one with Will, who had no choice but to wear his there.

“I just want you to feel better,” Will said.

“I do, too,” she cried, letting go of Erik and slumping against her husband. Will rested his forehead on her temple, his love for her etched in every line of his face.

“Take the meds,” Daisy said softly. “They won’t make it all go away, but they’ll help you feel yourself again.”

“It makes me feel so weak,” Lucky said.

“You’re in a weak place right now,” Erik said, smiling as his own therapist’s words came out of his mouth.

“Life is too short to go around feeling like you’re dying,” Daisy said.

Lucky dropped her head on Daisy’s shoulder. “It sucks.”

“A cesspool of sucking suckage,” Daisy said, twirling one blonde curl around her finger then tucking it behind Lucky’s ear.

“It won’t suck forever, honey,” Will said. “This is only right now. Fish is right—it’s not weakness, it’s just a weak place. So go on the meds a month. Try counseling a month. Four weeks. Just to get out of this place and into a better one.”

“I’ll go back on mine, too,” Daisy said, which got a chuckle from Lucky.

“Me too,” Erik said. “We’ll do it together.”

“The friends that medicate together, stay together,” Will said.

Lucky laughed for real then. Lifting up her chin she looked around the circle. The tears were falling again, but a little light was back in her grey eyes. “All right,” she said. “All right, I’ll try.”

AS MUCH AS THEY planned the logistics and anticipated the pitfalls, it was hard when September came and Daisy went back to Saint John. They looked for the bright side: two hours apart wasn’t twelve hours apart. Two solid days together was better than a scattered handful of hours over a week. It was far from perfect but it was better than before.

And it was hard.

“At least Lucky’s glad to have Daisy back,” Will said on the phone. “From the department of silver linings.”

“How is she doing?” Erik asked.

“All right,” Will said, a sigh in his voice hinting she was far from all right.

“Truth, please,” Erik said.

Another sigh. “It’s slow to come around and I don’t need to tell you therapy can make it get darker in your mind before the light comes on. But she’s definitely more engaged. Starting to crack jokes about depression rather than crying about it. Which is good. I mean, if you can laugh at a shitty situation, you have the upper hand.”

Erik hesitated. “Any insight as to what’s behind all this?”

Will gave a short chuckle. “One guess?”

“Begins with a J, rhymes with moody?”

“Fucking Judy,” Will said. “You know, dude, I don’t hate people. I don’t have the time and it isn’t in my nature. But when I say I hate my mother-in-law, I mean I
detest
my mother-in-law.”

“I take it not much support coming from her.”

“Zero.”

“She doesn’t call at all?”

“Oh, she calls plenty. To tell Lucky all the wrong things, invalidate her feelings, belittle her accomplishments and undermime any progress she’s made. I’m at the point now where I run interference on the calls and it’s a fucking chore just to be civil.”

“But it’s not the lack of support that drove Lucky over the edge. It goes deeper than that, right? It’s older.”

“It’s as old as Lucky.” Will paused. “Hang on a sec, I’m going outside. Too many ears around.”

Erik sat on the couch, putting his feet up on the coffee table. If he were at Barbegazi, Bastet would have immediately jumped in his lap. Out of habit, his hand reached, looking for the dome of that silvery head nudging at him. The empty air beneath his curved palm made the dull ache of missing Daisy rear up like a startled cobra.

“Sorry,” Will said. “Anyway, you know Lucky’s family pretty much mirrors our situation. Two kids and then Lucky was a surprise third.”

“When did her parents divorce?”

“She was six. And the unspoken skeleton banging on the closet door is Rich was already kicking around the idea of separating when Judy got pregnant with Lucky. Either accidentally or on purpose.”

“Did he have someone else?” Erik asked. “Or he’d just had enough?”

“Not sure. Somehow Judy shamed or manipulated him into staying. He came back home and stuck around for the kids’ sake.”

“So basically, Lucky was Judy’s pawn in a loveless marriage?”

“Yeah. And when Rich left anyway, she became Judy’s punching bag.”

“Because she failed to serve her purpose.”

“Exactly. Plant that seed in Lucky’s subconscious and fast-forward to when we find ourselves pregnant for an unexpected third time. What do you get?”

“Rattling bones.”

“Whether Lucky saw Jacy as herself and Lucky was going to turn into Judy. Or both...”

“You’re not Rich, though,” Erik said. “And your marriage is anything but loveless.”

“Doesn’t matter, I guess. It obviously triggered something.”

“Weird how it’s nothing you consciously do or decide,” Erik said. “When an instinctive, free-associated idea gets into your mind, it gets into your DNA. You just start living it.”

“Yeah,” Will said, his voice dull and tired. “She’s working through it. She likes her therapist and the meds seem to be evening her out. She’s getting up and getting dressed and getting through the days. But…”

“She’s not herself,” Erik said. “And you miss her.”

“I hate seeing her so lost. I hate that half her candles are blown out. She’s here, but her eyes are just…gone. God, it fucking kills me. Especially since I know how bad it can get and I’m helpless to fix it. I want to go in with a wrench and duct tape and make it all better. I suck at patience.”

“You’re the most patient person I know. Are you kidding?”

“It’s a cleverly-crafted illusion,” Will said. “I want the world yesterday. Always have.”

“Huh.”

“I can’t do anything about it,” Will said. “Directly, anyway. It’s all indirect support—managing the kids and the house, trying to carve out time just for us, wrapping my arms around her every chance I get. Blah blah.”

“Hey, they sound like little things but they’re huge.”

Will gave a grunt. Erik caught the keen edge of frustration within it, and only hesitated a few seconds before saying, “Probably not much sex going on, huh?”

“Shit,” Will said. “I feel like a douche for being bothered by it but Jesus
Christ.”

“This is entre nous,” Erik said. “Douche away.”

“Same sob story,” Will said. “She’s here. She’s present. She doesn’t initiate, but if I want to, she lets me in. But her head is just somewhere else. It feels so empty and it makes me sad. I miss her jumping my bones. God, I suck.”

“Come on, you do not,” Erik said, laughing. “Sex is your and Lucky’s favorite hobby.”

“Cheapest form of entertainment there is,” Will said, a little humor back in his voice.

“It’s a huge part of your relationship,” Erik said. “Sucks to have it disappear. Sucks for anyone.”

“Yeah, especially since we were back in a groove since Sara turned two. Before that we were just too damn tired to do more than sloppily grope. But once we got a routine going and the kids were sleeping through the night, we kind of had a Renaissance.”

“Now it’s the Dark Ages.”

Will made a disgusted noise.

“It’ll come back,” Erik said, realizing a man had a dozen ways to feel impotent.

“I know,” Will said. “I’m just impatient. And horny. But enough about me. You guys doing okay? Your teeth must ache from missing her.”

“We’re all right,” Erik said. “I make no illusions about patience. The circumstances suck balls and I want to be living with her for good. Yesterday. But so far we’re managing. And joking about it.”

“Joking around and jerking off.”

“Twice today.”

“Same. Ever look at so much porn you depressed yourself?”

“No.”

“Yeah, me neither. All right, I need to go. It’s the evening meltdown.”

“Have fun. Say hi to everyone.”

“Love you,” Will said. “Don’t fucking call me.” He hung up.

Erik tossed his phone aside and sighed, arms crossed tight over his chest. Teeth aching. The lonely cobra still stirring in his gut and the silence of the little apartment pressing on his ears.

“It’ll be all right,” he said softly.

But he awoke in the thin, wee hours. Crying out into the dark, ripped from dreams of blood pouring off the stage in Mallory Hall. A gunshot like a punch to his chest. His insides caving in, not from pain, but the despair of helplessness. Paralyzed and dying, unable to stop James from going back to shoot Daisy dead.

His voice echoed off the bedroom walls in a strangled yell. T-shirt stuck to his back with sweat, heart writhing within his chest. Holding his head, he pulled in breath after breath. Putting the world back in place, remembering when it was and where he was.

It’s all right,
he thought.
This is now. She didn’t die. You found her. She’s safe.

He stripped his damp shirt off and threw it on the floor. Moved over to the other side of the bed which was dry, but cold. He pulled the covers high, letting his shaking breaths warm him.

You’re safe.

He shouldn’t be surprised. The nightmares of the shooting always came to him in the fall. Something about the turn of season and the shortening of days triggered them. Still, he thought having Daisy back in his life might have kept them at bay this year. His stomach twisted in a strange disappointment. Almost a reproof. As if he had let himself down.

You can’t help it,
he thought.
It’s not something you do, it’s something that happens to you.