“Manny, I could kiss you.” I drop the note and watch it float back and forth towards the bench.
“Probably best if you don’t. We can’t afford to lose him.” Faith, looking as exhausted as I feel, shuffles rather than walks to my side, dropping her bag and keys on the floor then flopping her head onto my shoulder. “Please tell me this is going to get easier.”
Thethisshe’s referring to is balancing work, and our new life as support providers for my big brother, Dylan. He’s on the spectrum too, but he’s non-verbal and has full-time, high support needs. Needs we are struggling to fill.
“I’d love to Faithy, but I don’t think I can.” What I can do though, is grab two wine glasses, fill them a touch generously, and offer her one even though she’s going to turn her nose at the vintage. Tears clinging to her lashes like dewdrops on a leaf, she accepts the offered glass, aerating the crimson liquid with a swirl as she picks up and reads the note I just dropped.
“How did Dad do this by himself, Jamie? There’s two of us, and we’re more than half his age.”
“Honestly, I have no idea. But it won’t always be like this, sweetheart.” I say this for myself as much as Faith. I wonder if she believes it as little as I do? “Once the insurance is sorted, we’ll be able to get more help.” There it goes. Another stabbing pain in my chest. Tightening of lungs to the point of uncomfortableness. Gripping the bench to keep me upright, I count to ten, once, then twice, hoping it settles. If I was alone, I would go lay down, pull a blanket over my head and stay there. But I’m not and I can’t say anything to Faith, either. She’ll just call me a hypochondriac. Which I am.
This time feels different, though.
This timecouldbe it.
Of course, she notices the tensing of my body, wiping her tears away and sliding that Doctor mask back on. “It’s not a heart attack, Jamie,” she says, with zero compassion, “You’re holding your breath, and since you’re a person and not a fish, you can’t breathe when you hold your breath. You know this.”
Fuck. My lips flop like a horse neighing as I exhale. “I didn’t even say anything.”
“No, but you were turning purple before my eyes, because again—not a fish.”
“Not a fish,” muttering to myself, I fold forward until my head crunches against the paper, noticing Cleo purring while cutting figure-eights between my legs. All this talk of fish has him excited. Vibrations from his gentle hum are more soothing than my deep breathing, Faith’s half-assed there-there pats to my back and any fucking mantra my therapist could ever provide.
Like so many on the spectrum, anxiety, depression and I are well-acquainted. Back in my teens, I would have periods of situational mutism, and yes, I call it situational not selective on purpose. I never selected or chose to shut down. My brain just decided the situation called for it. Anyway, I haven’t had an episode like that for a long time, but every day that passes since Dad died, I feel myself inching closer. Guess that’s what happens when your life erodes before your eyes.
Those damn hockey boys will probably be the ones to get me there.
Faith keeps nattering until she’s satisfied my hyperventilation is over, and after slipping an apron over her neatly pressed shirt and pencil skirt, we get to work on dinner. Wordlessly shifting around each other, she heads to the fridge and takes out the lasagna and some salad ingredients, while I switch on the oven then start chopping.
“You know what, Jamie? You need to get laid.”
Before I slice one off, my brain orders my fingers to drop the knife. “Who are you and what have you done with my prudish, demi-sexual sister?”
“Oh,” she scoffs, taking another swill. “Don’t be mistaken. My beliefs surrounding humanities over reliance on intercourse remain unchanged. I’m simply repeating what I hear from the masses. Anytime someone has a problem, sex is the universal first suggestion. Especially by men.”
“Men like your Brady?”
Faith’s at my side, so I don’t see the slice of tomato coming for me. I feel it though. Sliding down my neck, it nestles in the collar of my white polo. That’s going to stain. “One, he is notmyBrady, and two, no, he wouldn’t say anything of the sort. He’s a gentleman. Unlike that boyfriend of his.”
“Boyfriend? He has a boyfriend?” Reaching around, I pull the tomato from my shirt and fling it into the sink. “Are you sure we’re talking about the same Brady?”
“We are, and he does. They, as in Brady and Troye, have a girlfriend too. David Harris’ daughter Quinn. They live together in Back Bay. It was quite the scandal.”
I’m desperate, no, gagging, for more gossip, unfortunately Faith holds a similar contempt towards spilling tea as she does fornication. I have to tread carefully.
“A queer, poly-relationship blooming in one of the highest realms of toxic masculinity. That’s highly … irregular.”
“Normally I would agree, but change is inevitable, Jamie. Even in the world of hockey. Maybe queer acceptance has improved since you fell out of love with the game.”
Fell out of love with the game?Hockey was the first, and only thing I have ever loved. Being part of a team. Having actual friends. Working out together. Goalie hugs. I didn’t fall out of love with hockey. The world just forced us apart.
None of this torture is displayed though. All is swallowed down in order to maintain the unaffected facade. “Within this team, maybe. But that’s a huge, massive, maybe.”
Faith slides open the cutlery drawer, knives and forks rattling. “It’s been years. Are you ready to tell me the real reason you quit?”
Damn that sibling intuition.
Of the myriad of excuses pulled from my ass, none have ever convinced Faith. The truth, I quit so Dad could pay for Dyl’s therapy, and your college is one she will never hear. Not if I can help it. “Nope.”
