“Is that how you got into being a paramedic?”
He gives a noncommittal shrug. “We had an EMT course at school, so I was running with crews even before graduation. Then after I worked for my paramediccertification.”
“And then Colorado,” I say.
He pauses, his jaw tight with tension. “It’s sort of weird, you knowing all this. Hard to feel like we’re getting to know each other in the regular way.”
“I don’t think it’s ever going to feel regular with us.”
Betty comes with our food, sets both plates down, and levels me with an even stare. “You’re okay?” she asks, as if Aiden isn’t even there.
“I’m good, thanks.” I give her a reassuring smile. I don’t miss the way she turns toward Aiden, giving him a look like she’s got every reason tobe suspicious.
“You’ve got nice friends,” he says, once she’s gone. There’s a slight tone of surprise to it, him trying to make sense of a puzzle piece that doesn’t quite fit for him.
“The nicest.” We eat in silence for a while, maybe our first real détente. The quiet between us is easier here than it is in the cabin, where I’m so out of sorts and unsure of myself. Still, I wish we were better at this. I wish it camemore naturally.
“I’m working on being better friends with Ahmed and Charlie,” he says suddenly, surprising me. “Haven’t been very social since I came back.”
“Was it for the camp? Is that whyyou came back?”
He chews his sandwich, takes a drink of his water before answering. “Sort of. My parents were thinking of selling the house, and—that was hard for me, I guess. The house we grew up in and all.” He pauses, leans back in his seat and takes another drink. He looks a little shell shocked, as if he forgot for a minute that he shouldn’t say anything personal to me. I heard it, thatwe. I know he means him and his brother. “But I’d had this project in mind for a while, with the camp. If it wasn’t Stanton Valley, I would’ve found someplace else around here.”
“You know, you’re going to have to tell me about it. About your plans for the campground.” It’s ridiculous that he hasn’t yet, a liability for what we’re doing that we can’t let go on for another week. Maybe he was waiting, figuring out if he could stand me long enough to get through even the first weekend, but even he’s got to know that it’s risky to keepme in the dark.
He takes a deep breath, head lowered, and passes a hand over his hair, back to front, before looking up at me. “You know how my brother died,” he says, his voice quieter now, so I have to lean forward in the booth to hear him. I do, of course, know how Aaron died: a fatal overdose of Opryxa, the very drug that promised him eventual sobriety. I know he’d had three seizures. That his heart stopped beating afterthe third one.
“Yes,” I answer, though hewasn’t asking.
“In Colorado, there’s a camp—well, there’s more of them now, one in New Mexico, one in California, one in Maine. It’s a Wilderness/Wellness program, for addicts. It’s live-in, with individual and group therapy. Equine therapy. Outdoor excursions, work programs. Relapse prevention. They have a fifteen percent higher success rate for opioid addiction than other live-in programs. I want to bring one here.”
Now I get a puzzle-piece feeling too, some information about Aiden that changes my perspective of who he is. Like me, Aiden’s got a burden of his own, but he’s doing somethingrealabout it, something that could make a difference. “That’s—wow,” I stammer. “That’s wonderful.”
“Obviously the settlement money is only for the land. And obviously I’m not an addiction specialist. But I’d be the owner of the land, leasing it to someone who does the start-up and runs things.”
I swallow, my soup all but forgotten. I don’t want to move. I’m afraid anything I do or say will stop him talking, and every single thing he’s said I want to hear more about it. It hurts, but I want that. I want to keep feeling every single thing.
“I tried to get Aaron to come to Colorado. I prepaid for a three-month stay for him. But it was always hard for him, me having moved away, and uh—you know. He was really sick. Colorado seemed far away to him.”
“Sure,” I say, as if I understand even a fraction of how it must’ve felt to be Aaron, twice in the thrall of drugs doctorsprescribed him.
“I know you noticed that—well, I know that Lorraine and Paul are maybe not as traditional as I let on. But turning their camp into a rehab facility—it’d be a real different version of the camp’s future. I don’t want them to see me as the lone wolf, screwed up and grieving. I want them to see me asstable. Happy.”
“Aiden, this is—” I begin, but he stops me.
“That’s all I want to say about it, for now.” He goes right back to eating his sandwich, finishing it off in a few bites while I basically alternate between staring at him and staring at my bowl. What he’s said—it’s everything he should’ve told me before. But there’s no “should’ve” when it comes to me and him. There’s too much between us. I know how big a revelation all this is; I know that what he hates the most about our situation is my professional proximity to his personal crisis. We’ll never be friends, that’s for sure, not with what he knows about me. But him telling me this,it’ssomething.
“I haven’t worked since I left the firm,” I rush out, and he looks up at me. “You asked me what I do all day. The truth is, right now, I don’t do anything. I go to the gym. I read a lot. I spend time with my friends. I was supposed to be planning a trip but I haven’t.” I clear my throat and look away, out over the crowded dining room. He’s watching me, I know he is, but I can’t look back for this part. “Mostly I think a lot about people likeyour brother.”
From the corner of my eye I see him shift in his seat. I watch Betty deliver a tray of beers to a table across the way, watch her trademark wink, familiar and comforting, everything to me Aiden is not. I look back at him then, right into his hazel eyes. “I’ll do whatever I can to help you. I’ll be a lot better this weekend. I promise you that.”
“No,” he says, and for a second I think he’s going to say,No, this is over; you’re as useless to me as you are to everyone else.But instead he says, “You were great. This weekend, I’ll be better.”
And with that, Aiden and I make afragile peace.
Chapter 6
Aiden
