Chapter 10
WORK IS just like it was yesterday. And the day before. And the day before that. And I don’t care anymore. I try to lose myself in the vehicles. Distract myself by picturing their beautiful circulatory systems. The way each piece has a job to do. How every system is necessary to keep things running smoothly. But I’m just going through the motions. Waiting for something that might snap me out of this fog. Everything Brian, Sam, and Pop say pisses me off, and I’ve been walking around with my fists clenched in a constant state of readiness to fight during the two weeks since Rafe walked out my door. I feel like I’m sixteen again.
This morning I woke from smothering dreams, still half drunk, the sheets twisted and sticking to me with sweat, and I dragged myself up to run. The sidewalks were cracked, the remains of the snowfall a few days ago hiding dangerous uneven patches that can turn an ankle. I felt heavy, my legs useless like in dreams where I’m being chased—as if the pavement is quicksand, sucking my feet down no matter how hard I try to propel myself forward. I cut over to the track behind my old high school, shut down three years ago in budget cuts. The track’s just dirt now, really, but I didn’t trust myself to pay attention running around the neighborhood.
I zoned out as I ran, but the second I stopped, everything slammed back into me like the nasty return of punching bag when your head’s turned. My legs were shaky and weak, my stomach roiling, and my ears numb with cold.
All of that was nothing compared to the fishhook of pain lodged somewhere between my chest and my stomach, throbbing with each beat of my stupid, pathetic heart.
As I come through the door of the garage with a second cup of coffee—an attempt to wake up after almost melting a mess of wiring with the soldering iron—Sam nearly slams into me and the mug falls, shattering on the cement, splatters of coffee mixing with oil, paint, and grease.
“What the hell,” I mutter.
“Pop!” Sam yells, his voice panicked like I’ve never heard it. “Call 911. Call 911 now!”
I bolt toward the office as Luther grabs the phone. On the floor of the office strewn with paperwork lies Pop, one hand clutching at his chest, the other clawing at Sam’s arm. He’s covered in sweat. His face is gray and terrified.
The only time I’ve seen him look so lost is after Mom died. When he wandered through the house like a child, picking things up and putting them down as if, maybe, she wasn’t gone, but simply misplaced.
“They’re on their way,” Luther calls.
My heart races like I’m still running. “Pop?” I croak out, and I sink down next to him. He mouths my name but no sound comes out.
Before I can figure out what we should do next, paramedics are pushing us out of the way. Pop loses consciousness before they get him out of the office.
“What—what—Colin, what happened? Pop?” Brian runs up to the shop as the paramedics are putting Pop in the ambulance, late as usual. “What’s wrong with him?”
I remember that edge of panic to Brian’s voice. I remember it from when Mom died and Brian came home from school to find Pop crying in the kitchen.
But I can’t talk to Brian. It’s taking every bit of energy to drag air into my lungs. Luther pushes Sam into the ambulance with Pop, but they can’t take us all.
“I’ll drive you.” Luther grabs Brian’s arm with one hand and mine with the other and puts us in his truck. This too is familiar. Luther was there, especially those last few weeks when Pop was with Mom in the hospital most days.
The ride to the hospital is a blur of Brian crying and Luther talking and traffic lights changing and horns honking, and then we’re in the waiting area. Brian’s chewing on his lip, his knee bouncing and his head swiveling every time someone walks by. Sam is slumped in his chair, eyes straight ahead, cradling his cell phone. Luther is half watching us and half watching the nurses’ station. It’s too bright and too quiet and too loud to feel anything.
We’re probably getting motor oil and grease on the waiting room. Mom never let Pop sit on the couch without changing his clothes and taking a shower. She insisted that oil still managed to get on things even when he did. The price of loving a mechanic, she always said, smiling.
I close my eyes, trying to picture her. Trying to remember how she smelled. I know her perfume was some kind of rose—her favorite flower—but I can’t conjure it. There’s only sweat and oil and stale recycled air.
TEN MINUTES later it’s over.
Pop’s dead.
A heart attack, the doctor says.
I DON’T remember getting back to Pop’s. Luther must’ve driven us, but I don’t know how long ago. Sam is a robot as he makes arrangements with Vic, a guy from the neighborhood we’ve known forever whose cousin runs a funeral parlor. Luther makes a bunch of other calls. I don’t know.