Chapter 18 Neil

"I'M STEVE," ZOE'Snew boyfriend says when we meet him at a sushi restaurant uptown in mid-February. "And I am not a fuckboy."

"Why does he sound like he's introducing himself to a support group?" Adhira wants to know, hooking her thumb toward him.

"Because I want you guys to know that I'm making good relationship decisions now," Zoe says, and it seems to be true, because Steve is kind and attentive and slightly anxious, often double-checking his jokes with a look at Zoe, as though worried she may not find him funny.

We've become something of a group, Skyler and Adhira and Zoe and maybe now Steve, too. And yet ever since coming back from Boston last week, I haven't felt like myself. My body grows weary with an unfamiliar kind of exhaustion I don't entirely understand. I get in bed early most nights, unless I have plans with friends, and when I do, I force the smiles, worried that once people glance away and my features droop, they'll immediately know something's wrong. That I've been faking my excitement.

Boston was a fairy tale, this interlude of not quite real life. I'd felt so good with Rowan—until real life sneaked back in, sank its claws in me.

I should have told her. I should have told her about the letter, and about how I felt during family weekend, and the way I lied about my mom because I was too much of a coward to take off that mask it seems I wear for just as many people over here as I did at home.

And yet I can't let my burdens become hers, too. Especially with the distance between us, it would only create more anxiety for her when she's already stressed about her writing.

It's better this way—for both of us.

When the bill arrives, that heavy feeling drags me even deeper.

Two hundred dollars.

Two hundred dollars for five people, and no one is batting an eye.

I have to work to keep the shock off my face because I have never been to a restaurant with a bill this large. I only ordered miso soup, the cheapest thing on the menu. I'd been surprised when the others ordered not just one but multiple rolls. "They're small," Adhira had explained.

"We can just split it five ways?" Zoe suggests, already reaching for her credit card.

"No, I got those dragon rolls—those were expensive." Skyler grabs the check. "I'll get it and everyone can Venmo me?"

We all take out our phones, and I send Skyler a silent thank-you.

I've always been so aware of money that I've wondered whether people who are more comfortable think about it as frequently. But NYU is the first place where that awareness turns into something physiological, capable of nesting in all my body's hollow places.

Perhaps that is the thing about money—the world never runs out of ways to remind you how little of it you have.

My life is lived in fragments, pieces of my heart in New York and Seattle and Boston. I am constantly wishing Rowan could hang out with us, and not just to prevent me from feeling like a fifth wheel, although nothing has officially happened with Skyler and Adhira yet. He tells me he's working up to it, trying to find the right words. And I can't fault him for that—it took me long enough to find mine.

Adhira and I wind up studying together a few times since we're in the same class this semester, though she spends a good portion of it asking questions about Skyler that make me certain she has feelings for him, too.

"You don't know if he's seeing anyone, do you? Like, is he bringing girls back to the room or anything?" Then she pauses, scrunches up her face. "Wait, I don't want to know."

"He's not seeing anyone," I say from across the table. Between work-study and study-study, Bobst Library has become something of a second home to me.

"Not that I care," she answers quickly, and then returns her attention to her laptop screen, where her notes are typed in organized, bullet-pointed sections. Karen Horney has made another appearance in this week's reading. "I fucking love this woman. Look, there's this bit where Freud called her ‘able but malicious'—I need that on a T-shirt."

I push my jaw muscles into an impossible smile. I want to get as excited as she is about Karen Horney, about this course. But the words swim in front of my glasses, my vision blurred and unfocused. As much as I try to enjoy the time I spend in class and exploring the city with Skyler and Adhira and Zoe and Steve, I can't understand why it all feels like so much. As soon as I got back to New York, some dark cloud seemed to settle over me.

Adhira types away on her laptop while my thoughts spiral me backward. Those days my dad stayed in bed, none of us allowed to disturb him. Why is my brain so intent on bringing me to that place?

Maybe because it all comes back to him, no matter where I am. Always. Surely, that's the way he'd want it.

This is absurd. Rationally, I know that—two people being tired does not a pattern make. My dad battled fatigue, but he also drank too much and swore at his children. And yet I can't explain why this exhaustion comes with it such a sense of the familiar, the meaning beyond my grasp.

"Do you understand this bit about expectancy-value theory?" I ask Adhira, flipping a page in my textbook, trying to stay in the present. "I'm not sure I'm getting it."

And she launches into an explanation I only halfway follow.

The next week, before our first big test of the new semester, it happens again: I sleep through my alarm.

Or at least, that's what I tell myself happens.

What really happens is that my alarm goes off, and it goes off, and it goes off, and Skyler took an early class this semester so he's not there to groan at me, and then I switch it off because the idea of getting out of bed suddenly feels too difficult. I feel pinned to the mattress, my limbs aching and chest tight, as though there isn't enough room in there for my lungs. I'm not sick, I don't think, but I don't know how else to explain the symptoms.

I make it to class just as the last exam is being turned in, a horrible shame hitting me square in the chest. Adhira throws me a concerned look from the second row, and I purposefully glance away.

I have never missed a test, missed an assignment.

"I'm so sorry," I say to Dr. Serrano after the classroom has cleared out. Pleading my case. "I—I overslept. I don't know how. I swear I've never had anything like this happen before. I know there probably isn't a chance to retake it, but I really love this class, and if there's any way I could make up for it…"

I will him to believe this is firmly out of character. Fortunately, he must be able to tell that I'm panicking and takes pity on me.

"I don't know if I can give you a retake," he says, "since that might not be fair to the other students, and I don't have another version of the test." Right. I hadn't even considered the potential for cheating. "But I could use some help with data entry for my own research, if you're interested. Just a few hours a week. I could give you extra credit that would be enough to account for this zero as long as you get high marks on the rest of the exams."

Zero. A word that has never been associated with my own academics, except for: there is a zero percent chance Neil McNair will fuck this up. Until now.

Dr. Serrano lifts his eyebrows at me over his glasses. "If you can be on time," he adds. "This isn't a three-strike system. I'm giving you one chance, and I expect you to recognize it as the privilege it is."

"That's all I need. Thank you. Thank you so much."

Those few hours a week become a much-needed bright spot as the city veers toward spring. Gradually, Dr. Serrano starts to trust me, maybe because he can tell my interest in psychology is genuine. We meet in his office, a small room with messy bookshelves that demand reorganization, and while I bury myself in spreadsheets and he goes through emails or grades papers, we talk about what was discussed in class that week.

Just like my heart being rooted in two different places, I feel as though my mind is split too. I told Rowan I was uncertain about my major, but not the degree to which it's suddenly become a massive destabilizing force. I was so focused on linguistics before I got here, to the point where anyone who knew me would consider it a core piece of my identity, but now there's a new option: double-majoring in psychology, although right now the notion of even majoring in one thing sounds exhausting. Twice the credits, hours, assignments, exams. None of it has ever intimidated me before, but then again, I've never been so far from home.

Seeing Rowan in Boston… she seemed so natural there. She fit. I don't know why it's so difficult for me to do the same. I have always loved words, and maybe I've spent too many hours with dictionaries and language-learning guides, gone down too many OED rabbit holes. Psychology is new to me in a way linguistics hasn't been for quite some time.

Obviously I am far from a linguistics expert. But I'm even further from a psychology one, and something about that is immensely appealing. If I fully dedicated myself to this, if I really understood—then maybe I could rediscover that spark I've been searching for since I arrived in New York.

Everything feels like it might be okay until Dr. Serrano asks me to organize some news and journal clippings one afternoon.

The Role of Genetics in Predicting Severe Mental Illness, reads the title of one article, and I just stare while my heart plummets to my toes.

Because this is what Dr. Serrano's research is about—I've known that since my first day in his class.

"That was from a study we conducted last year," he says when he sees me frozen, the article clutched in my hand.

I blink myself back to my senses. "So it's very likely," I say, "that a parent's mental illness might be passed on to a child?"

The small office grows even smaller, my throat dry. I'm sure somewhere in my mind, I knew this was possible, but I've never imagined it in connection with my own family.

My father gave me his dark eyes and the shape of his nose. What else could he have given me?

Dr. Serrano takes a seat in his chair, spins to face me. "I'm not sure I'd say very, but there is more of a chance than if the parent didn't have a mental illness, yes. Some disorders are likelier than others to have a genetic link: bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, major depression, ADHD. We were specifically studying bipolar and schizophrenia. But of course, mental illness is caused by a variety of factors, not all of them genetic. Environmental factors, life history, substance abuse, various social issues."

"Right. Nature versus nurture," I say stupidly, but he nods.

"It's not a foregone conclusion that a child will develop a parent's illness," he says. "Depending on the disorder, sometimes it could be a one percent chance compared to a ten percent chance. Those aren't exact numbers, but just to give you a ballpark." Then he gives me a warm smile. "I could get you notes from the whole study if you'd like to read them."

"Yes." My response is immediate. "Please."

"There's an undergrad psych club that meets here on Thursdays you might be interested in too," he adds, and for that, I can only give a maybe.

Even if his notes can't give me precise answers, they might lead me to a place I've been silently scared of ever since that horrible night eight years ago, and so many nights since.

They could mean whatever my dad has—if there is indeed something undiagnosed there—I am more likely to develop it, simply because of the DNA we share.

That Natalie is, too.

Back in our room, Skyler's at his desk, squinting at his laptop and tossing a foam football up and down.

"Hey," he says, greeting me with a nod. "Were you studying for psych? Did Adhira say anything about me?"

And maybe it's Dr. Serrano's research burning a hole in my inbox. Maybe it's my lack of confidence in the major I used to be certain about. Maybe it's the fact that my eyelids are drooping and it's only six o'clock but my bed is the only place I want to be right now.

But for whatever reason, Skyler's question pinches the wrong nerve, like skin rubbed hard against sandpaper. Against a fucking cactus.

"It's not my job to memorize every single thing Adhira says," I snap, shutting the door a little too loud behind me.

The words are all steel, rough on my tongue, and at first I don't even recognize them coming out of my mouth. I don't talk like this. Even when my sister and I squabbled, rare dumb arguments about nothing in particular, I never had such—such malice in my voice.

Skyler catches the football. Holds it. "Whoa whoa whoa. It was just a question."

A few deep breaths, and then I can respond like myself.

"No—I'm sorry." I bite down hard on the inside of my cheek, the regret sinking in. Skyler has only ever been kind and generous toward me. It's the least I can do to help him out with Adhira. "I was working on some research with a professor. I didn't see her today."

"Don't worry about it. Sorry I asked." But Skyler's voice has turned chilly. Then he nods toward my desk. "Checked the mail earlier. That letter came for you today."

I pick up the nondescript white envelope. Turn it over.

The return address blurs everything else around me, bending the room until I'm no longer certain where I am.

Washington State Penitentiary.

No.It's just not possible.

Somehow, I move toward the desk, my backpack sliding to the floor with a soft thud as I close a fist around the envelope. My heart is in my throat and my stomach is at my feet and my lungs are in another fucking country. Maybe it's something else—a request for a donation. An update about a renovation. Junk mail.

Ridiculous, every option.

"Neil?" Skyler's saying, at least I think he is. "You okay?"

"Yeah. Fine. Must have been the wrong address. I should… go sort that out with the RA."

I stumble out of the room, the letter trembling in my hand.

He found my address. How the hell did he find my address?

When I get a good look at the letter, I realize it's not addressed to my specific room—just Neil McNair, and NYU's address. My room number is handwritten, as though it was sorted by someone at the residence hall. So he doesn't know exactly where I live, but the universe was more than happy to intervene and help him out.

Breathe. Just keep breathing, I urge myself, because suddenly I'm unsure whether it's something I've ever been able to do naturally.

I don't read it until I'm outside, until I can gulp in lungfuls of midwinter air while unassuming New Yorkers stream by me.

Dear Neil,

I've been working on my penmanship. Can you see a difference? It made me think of you, how you loved those expensive pens and all that calligraphy stuff. I remember seeing you bent over the kitchen table, spending all that time making each letter look perfect. Seemed like a waste of time back then—when would you use something like that in real life? But maybe I'm starting to see the value.

Haven't heard from you, so school must have you pretty busy. But that was always the case, wasn't it? Guess I really thought you might surprise me at Christmas.

What I'm trying to say is… it's been lonely in here.

Miss you, buddy.

Dad

If his goal was emotional manipulation, then congratulations to him, because I'm feeling manipulated as fuck.

I hate that it hurts for a moment, the idea of him being lonely. I hate that split second of sympathy immediately followed by the crushing feeling that I don't know what to do about this.

I have always had the answers. Always had a plan. But there is no set of rules for this, no formula I can follow that generates a perfect answer. He hasn't listened to my mom. If I wrote back, telling him to stop? I'd be on edge every time I opened that mailbox. The simple presence of an envelope would make me break out in a cold sweat.

All this time, I've wanted to deal with it without dealing with it. Ignore it, and it would go away.

Well, it isn't going away.

Because even if those letters stopped, he'd still be in my head, taking up far too much space and pressing on old bruises. No son of mine is taking a dance class, he spat at my mom one night so many years ago. I'd been in bed, but sound carried easily through the thin walls. You've spent his whole life babying him—what's he going to be like when he's older? He'll barely be able to take care of himself.

I'm not babying him, she responded. This is what he wants.

And who put that idea in his head in the first place?

Then a loud noise. A muffled, foreign sound.

Hair straightener was too hot,my mom said the next morning, when I pointed to the red mark on her wrist, her voice shaking. Clumsy me.

The weight of it nearly knocks me over—I have to dodge a cyclist at the last minute. A memory warped by time and by force.

I'd somehow convinced myself—self-preservation?—that he'd never become physical with us. Suddenly I'm no longer sure what truly happened, what my mind conjured to protect me.

The way I snapped at Skyler when he asked about Adhira. How many times did my dad snap at us like that?

How many times did he leave a mark?

Now it feels overwhelming that the whole city is the campus, this intangible thing for an intangible feeling. Too many sidewalks, too many people. But it's slightly better than the claustrophobia of that room, with a roommate who might know my darkest secret.

I should love it here. I should be grateful for every minute. I'm in college in one of the greatest cities in the world, and I would dare to not have fun? What a fucking asshole.

Yet all I feel is a bone-deep weariness mixed with unease, as though I've been put in a blender along with every uncomfortable thought I've tried to keep from coming to the surface. Pureed and panicked.

I go all the way across the country, and he's still here in my head. He's next to me in the dining hall at breakfast and in my classes and on the subway platform. His voice, as clear as it was when I was sixteen, when I was eleven. Mocking me.

Miss you, buddy.

Buddy.

As though the two of us have a relationship where that word makes any kind of sense. There were times I doubted whether he loved me at all—I was certainly never his buddy. Because it didn't seem right, that he could love me while telling me in a hundred different ways that I was too soft. Too weak.

I fold up the letter and shove it deep in my pocket.

It crosses my mind that I could explain all of this to Skyler. But opening up about our relationships and friendships—that was easy. I'd be starting from scratch with this, and I wouldn't even know where to begin or how he'd feel about me afterward. I'm not ready for that kind of judgment.

In my pocket, my phone vibrates. A text from Zoe, asking where I am, if I got held up somewhere, because tonight we were going to Shabbat again with a few others.

Then Rowan calls.

It aches to send her to voice mail, but I can't talk to her when I'm like this.

Of course, after our conversation about communication, this has me feeling even worse. The letter is a reminder of an ugly past, one I've been trying to move on from for so long. Telling her would risk changing how she feels about me, and that's not a risk I'm willing to take.

The gray sky rumbles with the threat of rain, and more than anything, I wish I could be home right now.

No, not home—on the couch in the Roths' living room on the second night of Hanukkah. That instantly becomes my new happy place. The memory I'll return to whenever I need to escape.

Two weeks. In two weeks, she'll be here in New York for her parents' book tour.

I have to get myself under control before then. I'll let myself spiral now, and by the time she gets here, I'll be the person she fell in love with again.

Because I don't have anywhere to be, I just wander. Apparently New York is the kind of place where you can openly have a breakdown on a city sidewalk and no one pays you much attention. All around me, the city is abuzz with nighttime activity, people dressed up and going out or dressed down and bringing takeout back to their apartments. Everyone has somewhere to be, a fact that once comforted me and now just makes me feel lost.

I'm not sure how it's possible to be this lonely in a city of eight million people. Somehow that only makes the loneliness heavier, as though I am the only one stumbling around on unsteady feet with the weight of the past on my back, trying to outrun the darkness.