Dangerous Boys

Imagine that freedom. God, can’t you feel it?

What harm could it do?

They dropped all charges against Blake. No DUI charge, no manslaughter trial, not even a ticket for reckless driving. The statement said there was no evidence of wrong-doing. It was time to draw a line under the tragedy and let the community heal.

A pipe burst along the east wall of the sheriff’s department, flooding the evidence lock-up. Two crates were destroyed, including the interview tapes from the night Blake was brought in.

Weber. The evidence room. The tapes. Blake’s testimony.

I could have said something, I know. Crystal was gone and they were sweeping it aside, like her death meant nothing, not compared to loyalty among officers. A couple of beers might not have made any difference in the end, but it was a lie.

A lie I could have exposed.

But I did nothing. I turned my head away and bit back my suspicions, and told myself that they were right, it was time to move on. The truth was, I didn’t have room in me to rail at Crystal’s injustice; I didn’t have the energy for her fight, not with my own underway. I had bigger things to worry about.

Mom had stopped taking her medication.

I didn’t notice at first, I was too intoxicated by Oliver, I didn’t know how long she’d been slipping back into her old depression. I only realized when I came home from work early on Friday night and found the stench of urine, thick in the air.

She’d wet herself.

A grown woman, sitting in her own filth. Crying quietly with the TV on, as if she couldn’t even find the effort to get up.

‘Mom!’ I pulled her to her feet. The smell was terrible and I tried not to gag. ‘Jesus, Mom, what happened?’

‘Did you see?’ she hiccuped, pointing at the TV. ‘Those poor babies.’

It was some news report about an orphanage in Asia. I quickly shut it off, then tried to coax her upstairs to the bathroom. ‘It’s OK,’ I told her, over and over. ‘Everything’s going to be OK.’

I helped her strip off her soiled nightgown and get into the shower. She stood there, shivering like a child under the jets.

‘I’m sorry,’ she whimpered. ‘I’m trying, I really am.’

‘I don’t understand, you were doing so well.’ My voice twists. I thought we had it figured out, I thought all this was under control. And now, now it was threatening to fall apart again. Panic rose up in me, sharp and swift. I couldn’t do this, not again, not from scratch for month after anxious month.

‘We’ll go back to Dr Mayhew,’ I told her, fighting to stay calm. ‘Your dosage must be wrong. We’ll try new meds, we’ll figure this out.’

I left her cleaning off and went into her bedroom, hunting for fresh clothes and towels. Her pill bottle was standing on the bedside table and I paused. The last time I checked, weeks ago, it was about half full. When I lifted it again, I realized: it still was.

Anger flared.

‘Mom!’ I strode back into the bathroom. I yanked the shower curtain aside, holding the bottle up. ‘What the hell is this? You’ve stopped taking them. I can’t believe you’ve stopped taking them!’

‘I don’t like it,’ Mom mumbled. She turned her head away, ‘They make me feel like someone else. It’s not right.’

‘Not right . . . ?’ I gasped for air, drowning in the rage that flooded through me, the harsh blow of frustration. ‘Not right is me running around after you, having to make sure that you dress yourself, and wash yourself, and don’t piss your pants on the f**king couch!’

I grabbed her arm and pulled her roughly out of the shower. She protested but I ignored her, shoving a clean robe at her and pushing her out into the bedroom. ‘I’m sorry,’ she whimpered again, tying the robe around herself with shaking hands.

‘Don’t just say that, do something about it!’ I took the pill bottle and shook two on to my palm. I held them out to her. ‘Take them.’

Mom shook her head. ‘I can’t.’

‘Take them!’

My voice echoed, a furious scream.

Mom cringed back, her eyes widening with fear, but I didn’t care. ‘Take them, or I’ll drive you to the ER right this minute,’ I ordered her, my blood pounding in my ears. ‘I’ll tell them you tried to kill yourself, that you’re a danger to yourself and others, and they need to commit you.’

She gaped at me in crumpled disbelief. ‘You wouldn’t.’

‘I will,’ I promised her and, God, I meant it. ‘And if you think these drugs are bad, just wait and see what they put you on in there. Have you seen the psych ward?’ I demanded, moving closer. ‘Have you? They’ll strap you down in an empty room and leave you there alone to rot.’

‘Don’t!’ She broke into sobs, her body shaking. ‘Please, Chloe . . . ’

‘There won’t be fluffy pillows!’ I yelled, hurling one from the bed. ‘There won’t be cooking shows, and knitting, and a nice dinner every night. I’ll leave you there, and I won’t ever come back!’

‘Please!’ She sank to the floor, weeping. ‘Please, don’t leave me, Chloe, you’re all I’ve got.’

Her words tried to wrap around me, suffocating, squeezing tight, but I fought them back, determined. I was done with hesitance and panic and creeping around in the dark. I had the upper hand now, I knew how to keep her in line. ‘So you’ll take the meds?’

She nodded.

‘Promise me, you have to take them. Otherwise . . . ’ I let the words hang in the air.

‘I will!’ Mom gasped eagerly. ‘I promise, I’ll be good.’

She reached for the pills, quickly gulping them down dry. ‘See?’ she managed a quaking smile. ‘It’s OK, sweetie, I’ll be better.’ She tried to hug me, but I stood back. I couldn’t look at her like this, not another second longer.

‘I’m going to class. I want you in bed by the time I’m back.’

I turned it over in my mind, all through Ashton’s lecture at Rossmore that night. What to do, what to do? Every step I thought we were progressing, Mom would back-slide at a moment’s notice – and now I had to accept for the first time, that she might never get any better. I’d been hanging on the hope that recovery was just around the corner: that with enough time and the right meds and careful, nudging support, she would crawl herself out of the darkness of her own mind and somehow shed this helpless, weary skin, becoming the person she used to be again.