I drop my bag on the sofa and head into the kitchen. “It was a rough day,” I admit to her.
She’s standing over a griddle and there’s batter on the counter, along with eggshells and a bowl. “Do you want to talk about it?”
I plop down on one of the stools around the island, prop my elbow on the counter, and rest my chin in my hand, breathing in the scent of pancakes. “I don’t know…maybe…but I already kind of talked about it to a camera.”
She flips one of the pancakes over with a spatula, steam rising in the air. “Yeah, but it might be better to talk about it with a human maybe.” She smiles at me.
I note how quiet the house is. “Where’s your uncle?”
“He went out on some business dinner or something. He called and said he’d be home late. Why?”
“Just wondering.” Honestly, I didn’t want to talk about Quinton and was going to use that as an excuse, that her uncle was here and I didn’t want him to hear. But I guess I can’t use that excuse so I lower my head into my hands, confessing my day to her. “Quinton and I got into a fight and some stuff happened that’s confusing me.”
“Like what?”
“Like…like he did drugs in front of me.”
“Jesus, you didn’t do any—”
“Do I look high to you?” I cut her off as I raise my head back up.
She assesses me with wariness. “No, but I’m not an expert.”
I sigh. “Well, I promise I’m not. You can even take me to get a drug test if you want to.” I don’t really think she will, but I say it hoping it’ll make her feel better.
She relaxes a little, turning back to the pancakes. “Well, I don’t think you should go over there anymore. There’s too much temptation at that house.”
“He didn’t do the drugs while we were at his house,” I clarify, but stupidly, because really it doesn’t matter where he did them. The fact is he still did them. “And it wasn’t like how you would think. He didn’t do it because it was all fun and games and he wanted me to join him. He did it to piss me off so he could prove that we weren’t like each other and that I don’t understand him. He wasn’t offering drugs to me—he wouldn’t even let me take any if I asked.”
She frowns, the pan sizzling. “Are you sure about that?”
I nod, but I’m not 100 percent sure. The Quinton that I saw today, the one at the end of the conversation, wasn’t the same as the guy I first met, who always told me I should stay away from drugs. “Besides, it’s not like I want to do them,” I say, omitting that I have thought about it a few times because she’d probably flip out and make it a bigger deal than it is, because I haven’t done anything yet. “I was just being honest with you about what happened. If I wasn’t telling you this, then we’d have a problem.”
She slips the spatula under a pancake and flips it over. “I honestly don’t know what to say to you because I don’t understand any of this.”
“And that’s fine,” I say, sitting up straighter. “You don’t have to say anything. Listening helps a lot.”
She turns off the heat and reaches for a plate in the cupboard. “I think you should go down to this clinic that helps people who have people in their lives that are struggling with drugs.”
“Where is it?”
She sets the plate down on the counter and begins piling the pancakes on it with the spatula. “Down on the east side of town.”
“Okay, maybe I’ll drive down there tomorrow,” I tell her, figuring it can’t hurt. “Do I need an appointment or something?”
“I’ll give you the information after we eat.” She sets the spatula down on the counter. “Completely off the subject, but do you want me to cook some bacon and eggs with these pancakes?”
I force a grin and just trying to be happy makes it feel almost real. “Bacon sounds good…God, it’s like I have my own little housewife, cooking dinner for me.”
“That means you need to be a good little wife and go bring in the bacon.” She snaps her fingers and points at the fridge. “It’s in there in the bottom drawer.”
I get up from the stool and cook the bacon while she washes up the pan and bowl she used to make the pancakes. Then we sit down and eat at the table and it’s so normal. By the time we’re done I feel a little better and it worries me because feeling better allows me to realize just how down I was. I wonder how far is too far. How far do I allow myself to sink to get to Quinton?
Chapter 8
Nova
May 20, day five of summer break
I wake up the next morning and watch Landon’s video while Lea takes a shower, because I don’t want her to know I’m doing it, worried she’ll worry more about me. I hate that I watch it, but I can’t help it. Something about studying it makes me feel like I’m going be able to help Quinton not come to that point. Like if I watch it enough, I’ll see something I didn’t see before. But I still haven’t figured out what that is yet.
After I watch it, I get dressed and go down to the clinic, like I told Lea I would. I really don’t know how helpful it’s going to be to listen to other people talk about what they’re going through trying to help addicts, but at this point I’ll try anything because I feel so helpless.
I pick up a coffee and bagel on my way there, then park my car in the closest parking garage. The building is in an area that looks almost as sketchy as Quinton’s house. But I do my best to ignore that and go inside. There’s a meeting going on for people who have family members and friends who are drug addicts and I take a seat in the back, sipping my coffee and listening, feeling a little out of place because I barely know Quinton and everyone else seems to be related to the person they’re here for.
I listen for a while to people expressing how they’re feeling, how sad, how hurt, upset, heartbroken they are. A lot of them are parents and keep talking about how it feels like they’ve lost a child, like drugs have killed them. One man in particular with brown hair and brownish eyes that sort of remind me of Quinton’s starts talking. Even though I know it’s not Quinton’s dad up there, I could easily picture him being that person. It makes me wonder if Quinton’s dad feels like this—like he’s lost a child. He has to.
But according to Quinton, at least from what he said yesterday, his father blames him for the deaths that happened in the car accident. But I don’t—can’t believe this. It has to be something he created inside his head. I wonder if Quinton ever actually talked to his father about any of this—if his father even knows where he is.