“Sorry, kid.” Travis looked at me and sighed. “It’s just that…if I had more direct ties to you legally, I could do more for you.”
“You do enough,” I told him again. We’d had this same conversation twenty-four times. “I’m eighteen. Everything’s in my name, and I’m okay.”
“No, you aren’t,” he mumbled. “You need to go back into therapy. You had fewer attacks on that medication.”
“I don’t have any extra money for more prescriptions, and the therapy isn’t covered,” I reminded him. “Making up for what Medicaid won’t pay for Megan’s care is expensive enough. I can get back into it after I graduate. Once I’m at college, the financial aid stuff will kick in, and I’ll be able to afford it.”
“I told you I’d pay for it.”
“And I told you I wasn’t taking any more of your money. You can’t spare it, and you’re already helping with Megan.”
“I still can’t believe they didn’t give me her guardianship. You shouldn’t have to deal with all of this.” He was whining, but it wasn’t meant to be mean or anything. Travis fought to have both of us put under his care, but I proved to the courts that I was high-functioning enough to do it on my own.
“I should be her guardian,” I said. “She’s my sister.”
“Your older sister,” he emphasized.
“Only physically.”
We stared at each other for a minute. We’d been at this impasse before.
“I’m doing all right, Travis,” I told him. “I mean, I’m not really much more fucked up than I was before. I’m doing as well as can be expected for someone who lost two parents within three months, and it happened less than a year ago. All my other issues are just icing.”
“Icing!” Travis snorted.
I ran my hand through my hair again, which reminded me of the haircut.
“You shouldn’t be alone here,” Travis said. He knew this argument was a lost cause, too.
“I’m not selling the house.”
“You wouldn’t have to.”
“Travis,” I growled.
“Fine, fine.”
“I want to stay here,” I said. I looked at him until he finally nodded. He knew this was a subject on which I would not budge. I wanted to be independent. I wanted my parents to know I could take care of myself and Megan without becoming a burden to Travis and Bethany. “The meds I take now work well enough. Megan’s SSI covers her stuff, and the other supplemental income I get is enough to pay the bills. I’ll take care of the issues at school, too.”
“If you went to that other school in Cincinnati, the resources would be better. Bigger school, bigger budget, and more kids like you. They had that whole separate class for kids with Asperger’s”
“I didn’t want to change schools when I started high school, and I certainly don’t want to change now. There are only three months left!”
“I know.”
“I’m all right, Travis. Really. Even the social worker said so when she checked on me last week.”
Travis sighed and nodded.
“If anything else happens in that class, I’m talking to Jones,” he told me as he dropped the keys to Beth’s Civic in my hand.
I drove him bac
k to his place on the other side of town. We didn’t talk much more. I wondered if the idea of talking to Mr. Jones might have put him off. I wondered if Mr. Jones taught when Travis went to school there. Travis was my dad’s younger brother by twelve years, and it wasn’t that long ago that he was a student at Talawanda High.
“Take care, kid,” Travis said as he got out of the car. “I still want to hear more about this girl.”
“Okay,” I said. “Thanks.”