Unravelling

“J-baby, are you—”

“Dad. I’m fine.”

Jared jumps in front of us and unlocks the front door, and my dad is about to say something when the sound of glass breaking makes all three of us freeze.

or the past nine years, my dad has been the head of the counterintelligence unit at the San Diego office of the FBI. It’s ironic, really. This man who dedicates his life to the pursuit of truth, who works a nineteen-and-a-half-hour work day, who watches repeats of The X-Files and quotes it to his children, lives in a house where Truth always remains Unsaid.

And for almost as long as I can remember, I’ve learned to do the same.

My mother is bipolar. And at present, she’s not exactly functioning.

When I was seven, during one of her manic episodes, she stopped taking her meds, pulled both Jared and me out of school, and drove us up the coast—at least twenty miles over the speed limit, with the windows down—all day and into the night, until we stopped at the Northern California border and got a hotel room. We stayed up late, jumped on the beds, had a popcorn fight, and laughed until our stomachs cramped.

By the next morning she’d come down and wouldn’t get out of bed. We were holed up in our room at the Anchor Beach Inn in Crescent City, California, with the curtains drawn and the lights turned off, while she slept it off for two days before my dad found us and brought us home.

After that, my mom and dad fought—about her medicine, about Jared and me, about how much she slept and how much he worked, about her medication and his inability to express his feelings, about her spontaneity and his rigid schedule, about everything. They fought all the time—days, weeks, months, years. Until at some point—and I can’t remember when— the fighting stopped, she started drinking herself into a self-medicating coma, and our house just fell . . . silent.

And Jared and I were on our own.

’ll go check on her,” I say, ignoring the wave of anxiety rolling through my stomach.

My dad shakes his head. “I can do it. You just—”

“I’m okay—promise,” I say, giving him my best I’m fine! smile. “She’ll want to see me anyway, and you have to bring in the boxes.” I don’t wait for a response. Both Jared and my dad are secretly happy to let me do the honors, even if they won’t tell themselves that.

I slip into her bedroom and pull the door shut behind me, carefully enough so it doesn’t make a sound as it latches. Her bedroom is cloaked in darkness. The combination of the thick shade and the heavy velour drapes pulled tightly over the picture window blocks out every speck of light, and I have to pause and let my eyes adjust. If I didn’t know it was summer and the sun hadn’t yet set outside, I’d think it was the middle of the night. More disturbing is the stale smell of the air—like old, wet newspaper and mold. The recorded sound of rain plays softly on repeat, and I hear her grunt as soft light floods the bathroom.

I ignore the clothes and bedsheets strewn all over the room and breathe through my mouth as I move to the bathroom.

“Mom?” I ask. I hesitate before I open the door, like I always do. Because I’m afraid of what I might see on the other side. “Are you okay?”

“Oh, fine, just fine,” she answers as the faucet turns on. I let go of a breath I didn’t know I was holding and push open the door.

Her wild hair is standing on end, black against the paleness of her skin. Under her T-shirt and shorts, I can see the bones sticking out at her joints in all the wrong places, and when her eyes meet mine in the mirror, I’m struck with the image of her I remembered when I was dying—and how it should be some sort of crime for God to let a woman like that turn into someone like this.

“Janelle?” she asks, fumbling with a foil packet of Advil. All the medication in our house now comes in single-serving packets. “Are you feeling better? Your father said you were sick.”

I nod. “I’m fine.” It’s possible he told her what happened with the truck and she forgot, or it’s possible he didn’t tell her at all. I’m not sure which is worse, but it doesn’t matter because the result is the same.

A quick glance at the broken glass in the sink—not on the floor and no blood—tells me she’s fine. The thin layer of dust covering the whole bathroom tells me I need to stop avoiding this room and get in here to clean this weekend.

“My head just hurts so much.” She throws a hand over her eyes to shield them from the light.

“Here, let me help you.” I’ve barely torn open the packet when she snatches the pills from my hand and swallows them dry. “Have you eaten anything today? Struz is bringing over Chinese food.”

“Great, the whole house will smell awful,” she says with a snort. “It’s like your father does this to me on purpose. He knows how terrible my headaches are and he knows how much strong smells bother me. And loud noises. I just need peace and quiet. I need to rest.”

I flick off the bathroom light and help her back to bed.

“I just need to rest,” she repeats as she gets under the covers. She looks small and fragile, like a sick child instead of my mother. “Can you get me a cold compress?”

Part of me wants to say, Get your own compress, but instead I nod.

Just because I died and had a moment of reflection doesn’t mean anything’s going to change around here.

It’ll take a lot more to wake this hollow heart.

hoa, whoa, whoa!” Struz says, his six-foot-seven-inch wingspan flailing around the dining room table, almost knocking into both me and Jared.

I make eye contact with Alex, who’s been eating his second dinner with us every night since he was old enough to think up a good excuse to walk over to our house by himself—his mom cooks only organic, vegan, and gluten-free meals. He grins at me as he goes to take a sip of his Coke, but thinks better of it. Probably because he knows what’s coming. Struz has made us laugh until soda comes out of our noses many times.

Struz continues, “Jim! You gotta be kidding me. You mean you haven’t done a background check or a fingerprint analysis or anything on this Nick character?”

Jared laughs so hard he spits some of his Chinese food back onto his plate. Alex throws his napkin at Struz’s face. Dad and I shush them.

Struz dramatically wipes a hand through his hair and turns back to his captive audience. “That’s just not okay. I mean, seriously!” he continues, his voice quieter now, as he gestures to the flowers Nick brought earlier. “Jared! This guy brought J-baby roses! Pink ones! And we don’t even know who he is. What is wrong with your father?”

“Nick could be a terrorist,” Alex says. He finds that way too funny.

“He could be an alien!” Jared laughs.

I roll my eyes.

“No, seriously,” Dad says. “Let’s hear something about this guy. How did he win you over?”

Batting his eyes like a cartoon character, Alex says, “He’s dreamy,” with a dramatic sigh.

“That better not be an imitation of me,” I say.

Alex just laughs.

I look at Struz, who does his “give it to me” hand gesture, and then Dad, who also appears to be waiting for some kind of response. “Nick’s smart; he works hard.”

“At sports,” Alex coughs.

“Don’t be such an intellectual snob.”

“Seriously, Alex,” Struz says. “Professional athletes get a lot of play.”

I ignore that comment, since Dad and I haven’t really ever had the “who are you dating” conversation, and I’d prefer not to have it right now. And I’d really prefer not to talk about any of the guys in my life and how much “play” they are or aren’t getting. Struz included. “Nick wants to play football at USC next year,” I add, because something needs to be said.

“I suppose if he goes to USC, he’s good enough for me,” Struz says—not surprising, since that’s where he went to college. “But if he goes to UCLA, you have to break up.”

Jared laughs and announces that his lifelong dream is to go to UCLA, and I break open a fortune cookie. Stuffing the cookie into my mouth, I unroll the fortune and can’t help snorting a laugh.

Everyone pauses. “What’s it say?” Jared asks, reaching across the table.

Instead of answering, I flick the fortune to Alex before getting up. I grab my plate and a couple of empty cartons and head into the kitchen. Just before I turn the water on, I hear Alex’s voice reading my fortune. “Soon life will become more interesting.”