More Happy Than Not

It’s hard to breathe, like whenever Fat-Dave pins me down.

This headache feels like someone’s playing a game of jacks inside my skull. Thoughts bounce around like a rubber ball.

My face feels swollen. Maybe that’s because my friends beat me up because they hate me.

“Aaron, blink if you can hear me,” I hear Dr. Castle call to me.

Evangeline.

I can’t face her or anyone right now, so I keep my eyes shut and hide in the darkness where the awful pain drowns her out.

I can’t sleep anymore, no matter how hard I try.

I can open one eye easily, but the other still feels too heavy and hurts, so I leave it alone. I see half of a midnight-blue room I don’t recognize, and it reminds me of a starless night. I turn my neck a little bit to see Evangeline asleep in a chair with a clipboard on her lap. It’s hard to believe she sleeps. Maybe this visitor’s chair is cozier than the one in her office; that one looks like it’s made of concrete to prevent her from getting too comfortable. Next to her is my mother, sitting forward with her face in her hands, praying.

“Mom—” I can barely breathe her name without my throat aching, but she hears me anyway. Evangeline, too; she snaps awake like her boss caught her sleeping at her desk.

“Baby, my son.” Mom kisses my forehead and it hurts like hell. She’s apologizing to me and thanking God I’m okay until Evangeline pulls her to the side, giving me some much-needed space.

“You’re stable, Aaron,” Evangeline tells me. “Try not to move too much.” She invites my mother to give me water through a straw. She presses an ice pack wrapped in a hand towel against my bad eye and forehead. “I imagine your head hurts, but we’re all so impressed with how you’re recovering.”

“So impressed, my son,” Mom adds.

I sip more water and it soothes and stings. “Why am I . . . not in . . . a hospital?”

“You were originally, but your mother contacted me when she heard you screaming things you’d forgotten,” Evangeline says, and it hurts my neck to look up at her. “The ambulance drove you here and we’ve spent the past four days returning your mind to its former state before it could collapse entirely under the weight of the unwound memories. We’ll perform some test work when you’re feeling up to it to make sure all is well.”

Four days. I’ve been knocked out for four days.

I feel like I know everything I once knew, but I can’t be sure. I remember believing Evangeline was my old babysitter, as sure as I know Santeria is stupid or how I’m an asshole and a coward. “Did you . . . change anything?”

“Certainly not, kiddo. Too many complications.”

My mind is once again busy with terrible things: my father’s body, his hateful words; Collin turning his back on me, Collin’s kisses; Eric giving me shit for dumb things; the judging looks of the other guys on the block; and, the most pressing, my mom and one of our last moments together before my procedure.

The memory of coming out to her the first time feels both familiar and unfamiliar, like an old bully you haven’t seen in years but still kind of recognize, even all grown up. I know she knows I know she knows, so I just shut up and focus on what needs to happen next.

“When can you change me back?” I ask, my throat aching less and less. “Make me straight again. For real this time.”

Evangeline doesn’t answer. Mom cracks the silence with fresh tears.

My voice hardens. “Your procedure didn’t work . . . and we paid a shitload of money for it to work so you need to make it work.”

“The procedure cannot be faulted for the heart remembering what the mind forgot,” Evangeline says.

“Bullshit,” I say.

“I warned you that this procedure was still very experimental, remember?”

“Yeah, I remember. That’s the problem.”

I turn to my mom, who shakes her head. “No, I’m not signing off on this. Not again. I have my son back and I’m not giving you up again.”

I wish I could’ve just been exorcised or spent the summer at a conversion camp or something.

“Can you both leave? I want to be alone.”

“I can maybe give you five minutes to yourself,” Evangeline offers. “But anything longer isn’t allowed with all things considered, I’m afraid.”