My Beautiful Failure (3 page)

The last shot was a line from the sign:
VOLUNTEERS WANTED
.

Gordy was right. This organization was perfect for me. I had so much saving to give. I only needed someone who wanted to be saved.

I went into the living room, where Dad was studying his art books in happy silence, with not even an opera CD to distract him. I felt completely invisible compared with his revived interest in painting.

The living room was all white, accented by Mom’s humorous throw pillows with sayings like
WELL-BEHAVED WOMEN RARELY MAKE HISTORY
and
WHAT WOULD LADY GODIVA DO?
In fact, in its own way, our living room resembled a book.

“I found my project,” I said. It sounded like I was throwing that at him, accusing him of something. “Dad, I found my project,” I said again. I clapped my hand over my chest.
I
had a project.
Even I
.

“What are you going to do?” He closed the book, with one finger inside to hold his page.

“I’m going to volunteer on a hotline.”

“Like a phone line?” Dad asked. “Where?”

“The Listeners. You’ve seen their sign on the bridge.” I might have said more, but I couldn’t say “depression” or “suicide” in front of Dad. Maybe because those words made Dad look weak, and maybe because hearing those words might give Dad ideas and he might off himself. It would be good, anyway, to work in a place where those words could be said out loud.

“Where would you do this? Here at the house?”

“In their office downtown.”

“They take sixteen-year-olds as volunteers?”

“Most of their volunteers are high school and college students.” I liked the college-student angle. If I worked with Hawthorne State students, I would be more mature than other high school guys, a sort of tweener.

Dad closed his book and folded his hands over it. He smiled, and because I hadn’t seen him smile a lot lately, I felt like he was laughing at me.

“Billy,” he said, “when I said you should have a project, I thought maybe you and Gordy might form a band.”

“Meaning?” I hooked my hands on the loops of my jeans to make me stand prouder, although I didn’t feel it.

“That job sounds like a huge responsibility.”

“That’s why I want it,” I said. “Because it’s more important than starting a band. Besides, a French horn and a harmonica are not much of a band.”

Mom came in with her reading glasses and
New England Journal of History
. “What’s important?”

“Billy wants to get involved with the Listeners,” Dad told her. “The hotline people.”

“They’re—” I began to explain.

“I know who they are,” Mom said, sitting down. “That doesn’t seem like a great idea. I’m not saying you wouldn’t be good at it—I know you would—but it seems a little morbid. I don’t know that I’d want to be listening to people’s problems hour after hour. Plus, they’re kind of a rival of ours.”

“In what sense?” Dad asked. They enjoyed this kind of conversation—the kind that started with me, then drifted away from me.

“They and the museum tend to go after the same money.”

Parents have a way of getting calmer and calmer that makes you more and more upset. I spoke so emphatically now that I leaned forward with each word. “I want to
help people
! I want to do something that isn’t a
waste of time
!” As soon as the words were out of my mouth I wondered if Dad thought this was a dig at his painting. If he thought so, he didn’t react.

“Will you have adult supervision?” Mom asked. “I wouldn’t have a clue what to say if someone called up and said they were, uh . . .”

I would beat them at their own game. I made my voice sound bored, as if I were working at Listeners already. “They have a trainer there all the time. They have a program that you follow. You don’t just make up what you say. Look, their website says they’re desperate for people. I should at least go meet them and see what they say.”

“Give it a try,” Dad said finally. “But don’t let it get to you, okay? Don’t be a hero. If it gets too stressful, tell Mom and me. And don’t hesitate to walk out of there and do something that someone your age would consider fun.”

C
ommand Central for the Listeners was in a secret location in downtown Hawthorne, on the third floor of Cabot Hall, home of the Cabot Insurance Company, which lent two rooms to the organization rent free. Despite the big billboard on the bridge, no sign on Cabot Hall betrayed what went on here. When I arrived for my training I found a dingy office with sticky floors, cockroaches that darted around in my peripheral vision, and the stale aroma of forgotten falafel. The college guy who opened the door for me said the grit made the place more authentic. Maybe he believed all the suicidal callers must live with sticky floors too. But I assumed Cabot Insurance used the secrecy as an excuse not to send their cleaning people upstairs.

On the walls I saw more versions of the Listeners poster, each one with a black-and-white photo of a face turned three-quarters away from the camera. These people were supposed to represent our core constituency: depressed, distraught, discouraged, and in some cases ready to throw
in the towel. But the faces looked like professional models, and they didn’t seem all that depressed to me. One looked like he was waiting for the mail. Another looked like she could use a forty-four-ounce cola. If Listeners wanted a true representation of mental anguish, they should bring in some paintings. Dad once told me the most anguished paintings were Edvard Munch’s
The Scream
and Van Gogh’s
Wheatfield with Crows
.

The person in charge of training was named Pep; her full name was Amalia “Pepper” Salton. I was impressed that her nickname had a nickname. Pep’s father was a congressman and a Listeners trustee. He raised piles of money for the organization. Pep was a junior in college, and she looked like a tennis player, along the lines of Dad’s work friend June Melman, except that June’s posture was exemplary and Pep had a to-hell-with-it slouch. She wore a white blouse with the collar turned up and a navy headband. Seeing Pep reminded me of all I liked about June, whom I had a crush on last year—her white-blond hair, her cream-colored warmup suit, her scent of expensive lotions, but most of all, that she jogged the whole route beside our runaway bus of last winter. In another time and place, I would have done anything for June.

In the front room of Listeners, two guys with beards discussed a hockey game, and a girl with heavy black-framed glasses read a thick chemistry book. Pep explained that although many of the Listeners were college students who needed to fulfill a community-service requirement in order to graduate, I wouldn’t be working the phone bank with them. College kids like these were
fairly independent, she said. They were allowed to work the phones alone if necessary, and sometimes they stayed on and took calls right through the night. But since I was in high school, I would be in the teen room, working limited hours with two ListMates who would show me the ropes.

She led me to one end of a long table with three telephones and three metal chairs. At the other end was Margaret, a girl in a plaid school uniform who might have been sixteen like me. In the middle was Richie, who looked fourteen. Who was he qualified to counsel? My sister, Linda?

Right away, I was irritated by the age segregation. So the two bearded guys and the chem major were in college. What did age really mean in the grand scheme of things? After all, I had been through what I’d been through. My application included a short essay about all the ways I helped Dad last winter. The other three had—what, taken the SATs, been rejected by a few schools, and learned to operate the juicer at Orange Julius? I smiled collegially at my teen peers, but I kept getting stuck on that fourteen-year-old.

Pep told me I needed to learn the ground rules. She handed me my training booklet,
The Four Pillars of Listening
.

1. WHAT HAPPENS AT LISTENERS STAYS AT LISTENERS.
All phone calls that come in are confidential. We discuss them only with other Listeners, not with anyone outside.
No exceptions, ever, period. We exchange first names with the people who call, and because we don’t use caller ID or track calls, we’ll never know their full names, phone numbers, or where they live, and they will never know ours. We’re not their friend, and we don’t develop any kind of ongoing relationship with them. Your involvement with the person begins with the call and ends with the call. In fact, if someone you know calls, you should not acknowledge that you recognize them. That would be a violation of the Incoming’s privacy.

I asked what an Incoming was, and Richie, a blond curl bobbing knowledgeably on his forehead, told me an Incoming is the person who calls.

Pep pushed up her sleeve to reveal a thick gold watch. She explained that Listeners had special terms for certain things and that I would have to learn the lingo.

I felt stupid, because I should have been able to figure out what an Incoming was. I decided not to ask many questions, in case they thought I wasn’t bright enough to do the job.

2. IT’S NOT ABOUT YOU.
Always keep the conversation focused on the Incoming. Do not reveal any personal information about yourself. Don’t tell the Incomings anything about your experiences, problems,
or preferences. Do not give advice. You don’t necessarily know any more about solving their problems than they do. Just listen to them and reflect what they’re saying.

Margaret waved her hand between us as if we were role-playing a phone conversation. She told me that the best way to respond to the Incoming was to be like a mirror: Repeat what they’ve already said, even using the same words. She said that this might feel awkward, but it would let the Incoming know that I was really listening.

3. ENTER THEIR WORLD.
Never question the reality of your Incomings. If they say they’re royalty, believe them. If they say they’re the leader of special forces in Afghanistan, believe them. If they say they woke up this morning and discovered they were living in the middle of a spiderweb, believe them.

Margaret told me that one Incoming actually did believe he was living in a spiderweb.

Richie chimed in that it helped to think of each person as a different planet. For instance, if Jason called with the spiderweb thing, I should tell myself that I was living on the Jason Planet and that was okay.

4. ALWAYS ASK (ALWAYS!).
Listeners is in the business of suicide prevention. You must ask each Incoming whether he or she
is feeling suicidal. If the Incoming says yes, follow the procedure for urging the Incoming to call the police or a hospital. But if the Incoming doesn’t give you permission to call emergency services, there is nothing you can do.

I flinched as if I’d been paintballed in the face. This I could not believe. Nothing we could do? A suicidal person is on the line and we’re supposed to just hang up? I asked if this was because we had no addresses or phone numbers. Margaret said that was right: We had no records, no last names, no nothing. Just a voice on the phone.

M
argaret asked if I was all right. She said I looked like I had stopped breathing.

I told her I’d felt fine until rule number 4. I rested my hand on one of the phones as if to test myself. The job was monumental, the ultimate responsibility. The way the rules were written, someday someone might call and mine would be the last voice that person would ever hear. In a few days I would start saving lives. But only if they wanted to be saved.

I talked with my teen mentors for a few more minutes. Then I rode home with the booklet in one hand, curled around the handlebars. As I reached the driveway I stashed the booklet in my pack. I liked having a booklet no one in my family was allowed to read. It was my book of secrets.

B
ack home, Mom was working on the high-end laptop she inherited when she became Brooksbie director.

“How was it?” she asked as I walked into the all-white living room.

“Excellent,” I said.

“Did you save anyone?”

“Not yet,” I told her. I carried my bike, Triumph, across the carpet and into my room. Rolling the bike across the white rug was definitely verboten.

“I know you, Billy,” Mom called. She had closed her laptop on the big square coffee table and curled her bare feet up into the chair. “You don’t look happy. What’s wrong?”

“The place seems great. It’s just that even though I have real-life experience they grouped me with the other high school students rather than the older volunteers.”

“This is an important life lesson, Billy,” she said. “Do you know what you’re going to have to do?”

“Threaten to quit?” I asked, stuffing the manual into my back pocket.

“
Au contraire
, my friend. This is no time to be a hothead.” She took off her reading glasses. I’ve been planning to hole up in my room, but this show of interest made me stop.

“But I already know I’m good at helping people. I don’t deserve this treatment.”

“You’re going to have to check that attitude at the door.”

“How can I?”

Mom laughed. She reached up and poked me. For a self-described bohemian, she had an oddly cheerleaderish side.

“Because of your age, you’re going to have to work twice as hard as the others to prove yourself. It’s the same way for women and people of color. Now that I have Pudge’s files I have some inkling as to how much work he had to do to stay where he was.”

“Half?” I asked, pulling up an ottoman to sit closer to Mom. This arrangement of couches and chairs Mom called the “conversation area,” and here Mom and I were, having our own conversation.

“That’s right. Half as much as I did as assistant director, even when I worked a reduced schedule last winter.

“Pudge had a lot of great ideas,” Mom continued, “but he left things half finished. It’s like some deity came along, plucked him from his desk at the Brooksbie, and lifted him, with clouds and angel choirs, to a perfect job at the Museum of New England Heritage. And
did he worry about leaving a mess? No, he just declared victory and moved on. But some people are like that, never dotting the i’s or crossing the t’s. Our family has the opposite problem: We try too hard sometimes.”