Page 36 of The Legend Next Door
Ben Stirling
It’saparticularlyembarrassingletter. A lot of them are, but this one takes the cake. I read it through a few times and consider crumpling it and tossing it in the trash. I think not though. I think I deserve to keep this one. I think I deserve a nice, heaping dose of embarrassment when I read it back in a few weeks.
I stash it in the drawer with the rest of them and sit on the sofa. I face the blank screen, wondering distantly whether the TV is too big for the room. I didn’t think such a thing was possible. I always thought the bigger the screen, the better. Now, I’m not sure about that either.
I lace my fingers together and sit as still as I can, trying and failing to ignore the fact that I know the Blackeyes are about to go onto the ice. They’re padded up. Warmed up. Psyched up. T-Dog and Sev are bickering about something that doesn’t matter. Something that won’t get resolved today, tomorrow, or the day after. Something that, somehow, will make them play better tonight.
I muted the team group chat when I moved to Seattle, and I’ve been trying really, really hard not to open it. It’s something that’s pathetic in itself. I should have left the chat, not muted it. I should’ve left it months ago. I should’ve left it the day I told Coach I wasn’t coming back. That’s what everyone else does. When you leave a team, you leave the chat. It’s common courtesy, a social contract, manners, or something like that.
I haven’t checked it for a couple of weeks.
Maybe that’s progress.
I’m not going to check it now. Checking will undo any and all progress I’ve made, that’s for sure. It’s just that if I do check, there’s a pretty good chance I’ll be able to work out what T-Dog and Sev are arguing about right now. I usually can.
The mad rush of getting Luca and Jeremiah ready has died down, and I’m suddenly aware of it. There’s been an abrupt shift from chaos to quiet. Commotion echoed through the house for a while after they left, ringing through the rooms on the ground floor and making them feel alive.
It’s gone quiet now.
The house is empty.
I’m alone.
Completely alone.
I don’t move for the whole of the first period. I sit stock still on the sofa with the TV off, hands still in my lap, shoulders tensed against the ache in my chest. It’s different tonight. Harder. Sharper. Brittle. It has a high pitch that makes my ears ring from the effort to keep it inside me. It grows and grows until I have to dig my teeth into my bottom lip to stop it from escaping.
My phone buzzes once. Twice. Three times. I don’t move until it occurs to me that it could be Jeremiah. He and Luca might need something. I fumble in my speed to wake the screen.
It isn’t Jeremiah. It’s Amy.
Hope you boys are enjoying the game.
Just checking that you made it. Let me know you’re okay.
Ben. Are you okay?
I can tell she’s about to blow up my phone, so I message back quickly.
I couldn’t make it, but everything’s okay. Jeremiah took Luca.
I’m coming over. Don’t move.
You have dinner plans, Ames. I’m fine. Don’t worry.
Fuck my dinner plans. I’ll be there in 15 minutes.
The doorbell rings in fourteen minutes flat, and Amy frog-marches me to the kitchen, hands me a glass of water, makes me drink it, and then takes me to the living room and sits next to me. We watch the blank black TV screen together.
Neither of us speaks until the silence becomes unbearable and I’m all too aware that it’s on me to find a way to explain what’s happening to me today.
“Do you ever have one of those days where you feel like you’re holding in a scream? Where it’s so fucking big and loud, it’s choking and suffocating you, but you can’t let it out because you don’t want to traumatize your kid, alarm the neighbors, or get yourself committed?” I ask.
“God, yes. All the time,” she says as if what I’ve said is something that happens to everyone. “Remember when Rory used to have those epic meltdowns when he was three or four, and his therapist told him that when he was feeling worked up, he could go to his room and ‘tell it to Mr. Pillow?’” I try for a smile and fail, but I manage a single nod instead. “Well, let’s just say I’ve been telling a shitload of things to Mr. Pillow over the past year and a half.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, really, Ben.Really, really. On bad days I can hardly wait to drop the boys at school. I don’t even drive-thru for my coffee on those days. I just race home, rush upstairs, and scream my ass off into my pillow.”
