Dad started drinking this afternoon, and he hadn’t really stopped. He received a call in his office earlier, and I guess it wasn’t the call he was expecting, because right after he hung up, he started drinking. I’d never seen him drunk before. He was currently pacing the backyard, muttering to himself with a beer in his hand, kicking around lawn chairs and anything else he could get close enough to. He was wasted off his ass.

I’d told him earlier that he probably shouldn’t have been drinking so much seeing as how he was getting chemotherapy the next day, but he told me to fuck off and mind my own business. I guessed I wasn’t getting those driving lessons he’d offered me anytime soon.

“Just come home,” Mom cried into the phone. “You aren’t being reasonable.”

“How’s Denise doing? Has she been by to see you?” I asked, changing the subject. I already knew the answer to my question. Denise called me earlier this week, telling me that she worried about Mom not taking her medicine. I could tell that she hadn’t been too, seeing how I’d been getting more and more late night calls from her. Denise wanted Mom to check into some mental health complex for a few weeks, but Mom wouldn’t. She believed she was fine. Sometimes I wondered if Mom would ever really get the help she needed. Denise said all we could do was pray—but I’d been praying for help since I was five, and nothing so far had changed.

“She’s still with that sleazeball Brian. Can you believe that? I don’t like him,” Mom said, snapping me from my thoughts.

Of course she didn’t. The only guy I’d ever known her to like was me.

“I don’t want to be here alone anymore, Levi,” she whispered, making me feel bad.

“Mom, have you been taking your medicine?”

“Those don’t work for me anymore. And now that you’re gone, I’m all alone. Did you know that? I’m all alone.”

My stomach tightened, and I pinched the bridge of my nose. Of course she wasn’t taking her medicine. “Don’t say things like that.”

“Why not?”

“Because they fucking piss me off, you know that.” Maybe. Maybe she knew that.

“Levi Myers, do not speak to me like that. You’re sounding more and more unlike yourself.”

You mean sane?

We talked about pointless things until I forced myself to tell her I had to hang up.

“Levi?”

“Yes, Mom?”

“I love you till the end.”

I echoed her words, but then I felt bad because sometimes I wished the end would come sooner than later. Maybe I was unwell, too.

It wasn’t long until Dad stumbled back into the house and headed straight for the bathroom. He wretched so loud that I could hear him through the door, so I moved to his study and grabbed some of his nausea pills and a glass of water. When I reached the bathroom, the door was flung open and Dad’s head was leaned into the toilet, violently vomiting.

When he sat back against the closest wall, he wiped his mouth with tissue.

“Here, Dad,” I said, holding out the nausea pills and water. “This would help.”

“Get the fuck outta here,” he muttered, waving me away.

“The doctor said they will help with the upset stomach. Here.” I held it toward him.

“I don’t want that,” he sneered.

“It’s for the nausea, Da—”

“I said I don’t fucking want it!” he screamed, taking the glass from my hand and throwing it against the bathroom wall, making it shatter to the ground. “Get the fuck out of here.”

I stepped out of the bathroom and paused. My fingers formed fists, and I slammed them against my sides. “I’m trying!” I hollered, turning back to face dad. “I’m trying to help. To make this easier on you. To build some kind of relationship with you!” I knew I was taking my anger off on him. My anger with Mom. My anger with cancer. My anger with life. I tossed the pills at him. “Take the pills or don’t, but when you go in for chemo tomorrow, you’ll wish you’d taken them.”

“I ain’t doing that shit.”

“Doing what?”

“Chemo, I’m done.”

“Done? What do you mean done? There are four more appointments on the calendar.”

“I’m not going.”

“Dad,” I said, my anger shifting to concern. “Don’t be stupid, you need the chemotherapy to get better.”

He reached his foot out toward the bathroom door and closed himself inside.

I headed to my bedroom and reached for my shoebox filled with the past that Dad and I had used to share together. All of the Christmas cards, all of the Post-it notes, all of the small things I’d held on to that he somehow chose to forget.

I should’ve stopped looking at the stuff. I should’ve closed the box, headed to the woods, and played the violin, but I didn’t. I kept flipping through the notes and cards, hoping that in that moment I was just having a bad nightmare, and that when I woke up, Dad would love me again—or at least like me.

Time.

We were running out of time.

Merry Christmas, Lee. I love ya, son.

-Dad

Happy 7th birthday, my boy. We’ll celebrate this summer.

-Dad

Missin’ you on the old creek.

-Dad

Maybe next year we’ll spend Christmas together.

Love you, Levi.

-Dad

We’ll feed a few deer in the woods again when you come for a visit.

-Dad

Love you, son.

-Dad

I sat up all night, pinching myself, trying to wake up from this nightmare. I was tired of everything. I didn’t think it was normal to be a seventeen-year-old and feel this tired. I was tired of faking that I was happy at school. I was tired of worrying about if Mom was going to hurt herself because I left her. I was tired of wondering if I would wake up one day and Dad wouldn’t be here anymore.

I was tired of my nightmare of a life, and I just wanted to wake up from it all.

* * *

The next morning at 5:58 A.M., Aria showed up in the woods. I was pissed off and tired from the night before with Mom and Dad. My body ached and slumped. I hadn’t slept at all.

Aria stayed at a distance, frozen still.

Her brows lowered.

“You okay?” she mouthed.

I tried to give her a smile, but I couldn’t. Anyone else would’ve received the biggest grin and a lie, but with her it didn’t seem necessary. With her it felt okay to be broken. I shook my head. “No,” I mouthed back, leaning against a tree.