Thicker Than Water (4 page)

Jason smiled and leaned against my cart, and it groaned in protest.

“Your brother is Cyrus, right?”

I just nodded this time, wanting to cringe—it was the inevitable “Dude, your brother was so talented. What the hell happened?”

But these weren't fans. They'd probably never been to a game where Cyrus kicked ass and took names.

And then it dawned on me. They didn't know Cyrus the Jock. They knew Cyrus the Junkie.

“Listen.” Jason came forward a few more feet, this time blocking the shelf. Lucas hung back, leaning against a poster that boasted,
Reading Is Fun-damental
with a picture of two girls jumping on a trampoline. He was watching me in a way that made my face feel hot.

“From what I hear, Cyrus has a steady supply of Oxys,” Jason was saying, “and I want a piece of that action. You tell your brother, if he's ever looking to make a little cash, he knows where he can find me.”

Oh? And where is that? Dumpster or ditch?

“I don't . . .” I began uncertainly. Jason didn't wait for me to finish.

“Just tell him, all right?”

He turned and headed out the double doors and Lucas followed him. I gripped the side of the cart and tried to catch my runaway breath. When I did, it felt solid, a weight pressing right on my heart. Times like that, when my brother's reputation sideswiped me, never ceased to make me wish I could just disappear, that the earth would rise up and swallow me whole.

Then I wouldn't have to face my brother at home or claim him at school. I'd be far belowground where no one could touch me and Cyrus would be up here, doing his best to join me.

“SO, HOW IS THERAPY GOING?”

I was wondering how long it would take Jennifer to mention my sessions with Touchy-Feely Trina. I've met with my new therapist three times already, but I've yet to adjust to her tofu-tasticness.

“It's going fine,” I tell Jennifer.

“Did you like talking to her?”

“It was fine.”

She rolls her eyes. “You don't have to tell me right now, but Trina was hired to extend your treatment. Her assessments will serve as evidence of your progress.”

“Assuming I'm making progress, of course.”

“Which you are.” Jennifer's holding her ever-present legal pad, pen poised above a blank page. “We need to talk today. More specifically,
you
need to talk today.”

“Sure. What do you want to know? I can tell you about
my trip to Six Flags when I was ten. Or how about when my class visited the National Zoo?”

“You know, you can only avoid the inevitable for so long.”

“I disagree. If I distract you with harrowing childhood tales, I can potentially avoid the inevitable forever.”

Jennifer shakes her head. “Except I'm not going to let that happen, no matter how exciting the story.”

I cross my arms. “You haven't heard my Girl Scout camp adventures.”

She smiles tightly. “I
need
to ask you some questions today, CeCe. I
need
you to answer them honestly. We have less than a month to start building your defense.”

I lean back in my chair. Jennifer takes this as a good sign.

“I need to know more about Cyrus. About his lifestyle—how long he was using, when he started, the impact it had on your family . . .”

I scratch my nose. Look out the window again. Stare down at my hands.

“CeCe?”

“Okay, okay.” I uncross, then recross my legs.

“How old was Cyrus when he started doing drugs?” Jennifer begins.

“Um, eighteen, I guess.”

“Nothing before that? No marijuana or anything like that?”

I shrug. “I don't know. I don't think so.”

“And what was his drug of choice once he started using?”

“Painkillers—Oxys.”

“And those were prescribed to him?”

“Yeah.”

“And did he take them as prescribed?”

“Like, was he taking more than he should or was he taking them other than directed?”

“Either. Both.”

“He was always running out early, so I guess he took more than he was supposed to.”

“And he took it orally?”

“He snorted them. Or smoked them. It depended on the day.”

Jennifer is scribbling furiously. I bet her handwriting is terrible.

“Was he ever an IV drug user?”

I shrug again. Jennifer squints at her writing.

“You said before that he was a dropout. When did that happen?”

“It was his senior year. May of his senior year.”

Jennifer stops writing and looks up at me, confused. “Cyrus dropped out one month before graduating high school?”

“He didn't technically drop out, I guess. He just stopped going and never took his final exams.”

She pauses to push her glasses back up the bridge of her nose.

“So, how did your dad react to that?”

“He was fine with it.”

“Fine?” She's incredulous. I rake my hair over my face
and start to examine the split ends.

“Okay, maybe not
fine
,” I say, “but what was he going to do? I mean, Cy was practically an adult and it's not like he could drag him to school.”

“Sounds like you're defending him.”

“Who?”

“Your dad.”

I roll my eyes. “I'm just saying that he could only do so much. We all could only do so much.”

Jennifer cocks her head a bit, then looks back down at her notepad.

“But Cyrus never went back in the fall to finish, correct?”

“You got it.”

“And by then, his drug use had escalated?”

“Uh-huh.”

Jennifer takes a minute to read back over what she's written. Her lips move as though she's muttering an incantation. When she gets to the end, she looks up.

“Your mother died when Cyrus was, what? Fifteen?”

“Something like that.”

“Did he struggle with that—with the loss of your mother?”

I look at Jennifer like she's stupid, which is an expression I usually save for group.

“Of course. But we all knew it was coming. We had fair warning.”

“That doesn't mean it doesn't hurt when it happens.”

I swallow hard. “Yeah.”

Sometimes I think that kind of advance notice made it
hurt more—that dull ache of a future loss that increases methodically, rapidly, with every breath you take. I remember the night when Mom went into the hospital—the last night she was ever admitted without later being discharged. Cy and I sat with her for hours. He'd even skipped a game to stay with us, even though Mom slept most of the time we were there. We'd watched
Steel Magnolias
on full volume, hoping that she would wake up and tell us to turn it down.

She didn't.

It wasn't until she needed meds that we saw her eyelids flutter. With a groan, she writhed in her bed—a fish too long out of water and drying up from the outside in. She was just waking up at the part of the movie where Shelby, the dying daughter, admits that her mother is giving her a kidney. I considered what body part I could give my mother to save her life. At that point, the cancer was like a fast-food chain—setting up multiple franchises in the surrounding areas of her body.

The next time I'd looked over at Mom, she was gazing at my brother. She had aged from her illness, the wrinkles settled deep into her forehead and around her eyes. She smiled with lips that made more of a grimace. Her intention was “brave” but the result was “decomposing.”

“You're missing your game,” she'd whispered to Cyrus. He shook his head.

“I'm not missing anything, Mom. I'm right where I want to be.”

Now I blink rapidly against the tears, focusing instead on Jennifer as she looks at her paper again.

“So what about this doctor? Dr. Bethany.”

“Dr. Frank. What about him?”

“You said in your original police interview that this doctor prescribed your brother OxyContin for”—she looks at her notebook—“a year and a half?”

“That sounds about right.”

“And you said that you would take Cyrus to his appointments?”

“Sometimes. Most of the time, Dad did it. Cyrus lost his license.”

“For?”

“Speeding tickets.”

“And you'd just take him to the doctor, drop him off, and wait for him?”

I pick at a hangnail. “Yeah. That's about right.”

Jennifer shakes her head. She looks troubled.

“I don't understand, CeCe,” she says quietly, propping both elbows on the table and leaning toward me. “This doctor was corrupt, he was a drug dealer in disguise. So why didn't you report it to the authorities?”

I look out the window. The sky is the color of paste. I feel sick.

“C'mon, Cecelia.”

My whole first name. I must be in trouble.

“Please, don't clam up on me now,” she urges. “It's obvious this doctor is the real villain here—he was prescribing
heavy narcotics to patients who didn't require them. I need to know everything there is to know about him.
He
is your ticket to freedom.”

I want to tell her that the tickets are sold out, that the train's already left.

Instead, I say, “I don't know if you'll have any luck finding him—I've heard he's moved.”

Abruptly, Jennifer gathers up her things.

“Well, then I'm going to go track down this doctor.” She reaches out to squeeze my arm. “Once I get his statement, we'll have a lot more to work with.”

Her smile is triumphant; I almost can't bear to spoil her sense of achievement.

“Look, you don't understand. When I say he moved, I mean moved out of the
country—
like to the Dominican or something.” I shrug. “I guess that's what you can expect from someone with a dead patient and a couple million dollars.”

Jennifer narrows her eyes, then shakes her head.

“Well, that just means I'll have to search a little harder, that's all. It's my job, CeCe. I'm here to help you.”

I sigh at that. “Okay—I just figured you should know.”

In the end, she'll realize what I already know—that no matter what Dr. Frank prescribed my brother, there's only one person responsible for Cyrus's death. That, and the only place I'm moving to is a jail cell.

“Today I want to talk about your support system.”

Dr. Barnes is running group today. I guess he got tired of
hearing us complain about Cam. Either that or he realized that Cam is a snotty bitch who likes to hear herself talk.

Aaron snorts. “What support system?” Barnes gives him a patronizing smile.

“Family. Friends. This group. Your individual therapists. Anyone you think helps you out or has ‘got your back' or wants you to succeed.”

“Count me out, Doc.” Aaron rubs his nose. “I got nothing and no one but me.”

“So you think we just want you to curl up in a ball and die?” Lola, a tall, willowy blonde asks. Everything about Lola is miraculously long—her hair, her legs, the vowels in her words.

Aaron looks her up and down, then shrugs. “I'm just sayin'—I mean, I can get better or I can get worse. In the end, you don't give a shit what happens to me as long as it don't change what happens to
you
.”

“What about you, Tucker?” Barnes asks, attempting to redirect. “Who's in your support network?”

Tucker is across the circle from me. He's wearing a dark green sweater. Today his eyes kind of look like tree bark—rough and layered, in multiple shades of brown.

“My parents are all right,” he is saying. “They hung in there with me. Honestly, they probably should have turned their backs on me a long time ago. It means a lot that they're still supportive.”

“Yeah, if you stole that kind of money from me, I'd kick your ass—family or no family,” Aaron pipes up.

Barnes gives him a look. “Any sisters or brothers?” he asks Tucker. He nods.

“Sister.”

“Older or younger?”

“Older. She lives out of state.”

“Are you close with her?”

Tucker's dark hair falls in waves across his forehead and around his ears, listing forward and back. He seems like he's thinking. Finally he shrugs.

“I was. There was a time when she was my best friend.”

“Anything else you'd like to say?” Barnes asks. Tucker gives his head an almost imperceptible shake.

“Okay, who's next . . . Aarti? How about you? Who is supporting you?”

“My sister,” Aarti says quietly. I have to strain to hear her even though she's only a few feet away.

“Your sister?” Dr. Barnes repeats. Aarti nods.

“She came here a year after me. She married a lawyer in Saint Louis, a friend of my husband's. I don't get to see her much, especially now. But knowing she's here, on the same continent as me, is a great relief. It gives me a purpose, a reason to heal.”

Knowing Aarti's version of alone isn't as alone as
my
alone makes me feel a little bit better for her and a little bit worse for me. Dr. Barnes eyes me. It's as if he sees my self-pity etch itself across my face.

“And what about you, Cecelia? Can you tell us about your support network?”

It was easier for me to avoid answering Cam. Dr. Barnes's eyes are piercing. I cough, a hand over my mouth, praying blood will magically spew from my throat. It doesn't. You just can't rely on spontaneous hemorrhages these days.

“I, um, I guess my dad was my support system.”

“You say ‘was.' Why is that?”

I blink. “Well, I'm here now. So, I mean, I'm not his responsibility anymore.”

Dr. Barnes leans back in his chair. It has wheels and it rolls a few inches outside the circle.

“So you think that means he doesn't support you?”

What I think:
My dad will never forgive me for Cyrus's death
.

What I say: “I think it means that he doesn't have to worry about taking care of me. I know he supported me enrolling in this program, but that wasn't my choice.”

“And whose choice was it?”

Dr. Barnes is looking at me expectantly. I can tell, even though I'm still examining the ragged edges of my nails. At least I'm not squinting.

“CeCe,” he says quietly, “I know that being here is challenging for you. I know that you are having a difficult time opening up to the processes that come along with treatment. You need to open up to us—it will help you.
We
can help you.”

When people tell you that therapy is a stress-free environment, they're lying. There are the same pressures, the same worries you have in the “real world.” You want people to like you. You don't want people to judge you. It's just as hard
to be honest here as it is anywhere else.

Dr. Barnes is watching me. Aarti and Kevin and Lola are watching me. Everyone in the circle is watching me. Everyone but Tucker. He's staring out the window, his face turned away from the group. I give in and close my eyes a bit, watching the dark waves of his hair blur into a fuzzy ball.

“I'm here because I have to be.”

“Why do you have to be here?”

“Because it looks good.”

“Looks good to whom?”

His words saw at my patience. I squint into slits so small, I can't see anything but shadows.