Chapter Twenty-Two
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Milo
My father had been drunk for the past few weeks, but that was nothing new. He didn’t even question where I’d been the weekend I’d run off with Starlet. Most of the time, it felt like he was a ghost, more than my mother had been. He’d sometimes walk past me to the kitchen to grab another beer, haunting me with his slight presence. I was surprised he was able to keep working his job.
He was officially losing himself in his depression and alcoholism, and I wasn’t sure what his story’s next step or phase would be. Some nights, I worried about walking into the house and finding him dead in a puddle of his own piss and beer. I hated those thoughts because I wasn’t sure if my heart could take another break like that. It felt selfish to think those kinds of things, but even though we weren’t currently close, I had more good memories with my father than bad.
He was the man who taught me how to ride a bike.
He was the person who showed me how to drive a stick.
He taught me to play the saxophone and introduced me to jazz.
He told me he was proud of me every night until Mom died.
Before the tragedy, my father was my hero. The man I looked up to at all times. He was my family’s protector, and I was almost certain that he could pull us out of the darkness if anything ever went wrong. And if I lost him…if he lost the battle of depression and lost his life…I was almost certain I’d lose the last small bits of me, too.
When I arrived home that night, he was awake on the couch, eating a burnt pizza and watching the news.
I dropped my backpack on the recliner in the living room and nodded his way. “Hey.”
He grumbled a little and gave me a nod back.
“I need my insurance card,” I told him. “I have to set up an eye appointment.”
“Yeah, okay.” He scratched at his messy hair before scratching his beer gut. “I’ll get it for you.”
“Do you know what eye doctors are covered? I’ll call and set up an appointment.”
He narrowed his eyes in thought and shook his head. “No. Your mother normally…” It happened again—his words getting tangled up in his grief. “I’ll find the card and figure that out,” he said.
“Thanks.”
I stood there for a minute, staring at a man who hardly resembled my father, and for the first time in a long time, I didn’t hate him…I felt bad for him. It was clear that life had raked him over hot coals, and he was barely breathing.
Maybe I’d expected too much from him.
Maybe I’d thought he was stronger than he’d actually been because, for my whole life, I’d always looked up to him.
Yet at the end of the day, our parents were human, too. Their hearts had probably been through a lot more trauma than our own.
I didn’t know what it would be like for me if I’d lost the love of my life.
I didn’t know how I’d be able to recover.
So that night, I gave him a break. I didn’t push for him to be the father I once knew. I didn’t tell him how shitty he’d been doing in his parenting role.
“He’ll be okay,” I muttered in my room after applying to fifteen different locations. “Just make sure he’s okay, Mom,” I begged.
I didn’t know if I believed in God, but I did believe in my mother. So if I prayed, they’d be sent straight to her. If anyone could’ve answered my tainted prayers, I knew she could.
***
One moment.
One situation.
One sentence.
That was all it took for a person’s world to turn on its head.
A few weeks later, I was able to set up an appointment to get my vision checked out. I wished it were getting better over the past few weeks, but it hadn’t improved in the slightest. At least I had no more blackout moments in Mr. Slade’s class. I didn’t want to hear more shit from him about how I was faking my sight being screwed up.
“So you’ve had a few eye issues?” the optician asked me as I sat in front of a table with a machine that was going to blow a puff of air into my eyeballs.
“Yeah. I was looking into glasses.”
“Wonderful. You came to the right place. We’re just going to run a few tests for you, and then we can have you out on your way.”
I’d never been to a doctor’s appointment of any kind on my own. Mom always dragged me to them, and Dad wasn’t in the best shape to attend an appointment with me. I was still somewhat shocked he was able to find the insurance card for me to use.
The tests were painless. I was certain I’d want contacts over glasses, but they still had me look around at different frames. As I was doing so, I couldn’t help but wonder which frames Starlet would like on me. When did I become the asshole who cared what a person thought about his appearance? Shit was getting weird lately when it came to my feelings for Starlet.
Even though we hadn’t been able to touch one another, kiss, or do all the things I’d daydreamed about doing with her, I still felt as if our connection was growing more and more. Never in my life did I want to be with another person. We didn’t have to do anything at all. Being in the same space as her seemed to be enough to calm the loudest parts of my mind.
“Milo?” the optician called after going over all the tests. “You can come back with me to finish up.”
I followed her into one of the exam rooms. She smiled at me, but it felt like a sad smile. The kind of smiles people offered when they were giving condolences.
“How blind am I?” I joked as I took a seat across from her desk.
Her smile fell to a frown.
My gut dropped.
She cleared her throat and turned her computer to face me. “Do you see this photograph? This is what it should look like versus this image.” She switched the photo. “Which is yours.”
The difference between the images was shocking. I didn’t know what it meant, but from her reaction, I knew it wasn’t good.
“So how strong a pair of glasses do I need?” I asked her.
Her frown deepened as she clasped her hands together. “Milo, I believe this is a condition called retinitis pigmentosa. It’s a rare eye disease that—”
“Eye disease?” I cut in. “What do you mean, eye disease?”
She paused before picking up a pencil and scribbling down some information. “More tests are needed to rule out retinitis pigmentosa, but we are not able to perform them here. Here is a name of a remarkable ophthalmologist. They will be able to run the proper testing such as electroretinography tests, fundus autofluorescence tests, and a variety of others.”
She kept talking, but my brain shut down.
Her mouth was moving, and words were coming out, but I couldn’t process what was being said to me. The words eye disease were the only things playing on a loop in my mind. I couldn’t process what it meant or how to handle that situation on my own.
I should’ve been asking follow-up questions, but Mom always did that. I should’ve called Dad, but he wouldn’t have answered.
“Am I going blind?” I blurted out as I choked on the words.
Her sad smile returned, but she didn’t answer my question. “You’ll meet with the ophthalmologist and will be able to get more answers. You’ll need someone to drive you to the appointment when you go in since your eyes will be dilated after the tests.”
She said some more bullshit, but I was officially checked out.
It was only midday, and I could’ve driven back to school to finish the afternoon, but my dad called me out for the rest of the day for the appointment. I did text Starlet and told her I’d meet her for our session in the library that afternoon.
I showed up at the study room three hours before she’d arrived. I sat there on my phone, researching retinitis pigmentosa on the internet. The more I searched, the scarier it became. The early symptoms were all things I’d experienced throughout the past few years. Night vision issues. Peripheral vision issues. Temporary blackouts.
The later-stage symptoms were what terrified me the most, though. Loss of vision. Blindness.
I felt sick to my stomach. I wanted to scream, yell, and cuss at the God I didn’t believe in. Instead, I sat in the quiet study room of the quiet library and stared at the words on my phone. With each second that passed, I became increasingly numb to the reality set out in front of me.
Blind…
I was going blind.
One moment.
One situation.
One sentence.
That was all it took for a person’s world to turn on its head.