44. bird’s-eye view

44

BIRD'S-EYE VIEW

I want to quit my job and move far, far away.

God, how I want to run.

But it's Christmas Eve. My dad and Jessica will be crushed if I no-show for dinner.

Kinsey and Nix are still sleeping when I find my phone attached to a charger in the kitchen. Ignoring the notifications, I order an Uber. Ten minutes later, I head outside, my phone remaining on the counter next to a note telling them I'll check in later.

At home, I find Ferdi curled on my comforter. I lie beside him and stroke his ears, his purrs vibrating through my fingers. Tears slip from my eyes as I realize how much I love the little beast.

"I'm getting you a collar for Christmas," I whisper into his fur. "Don't leave me, Ferdi."

He mewls and begins sandpapering my chin with his tongue. His breath is horrendous, but his spontaneous affection makes up for it. Cat therapy for the win .

I shower. Get dressed. Drink tea and manage to stomach a piece of toast. I finish wrapping Dad's and Jessica's presents. I even wrap the gift I picked up for Jameson yesterday. Right now I may want to cover him in honey and throw a beehive at him, but he's still my brother.

Packing everything in mismatched shopping bags, I kiss Ferdi goodbye and grab my coat and keys. Then I realize I don't have a phone. Hailing a cab in L.A. doesn't really happen unless you're outside a nightclub at closing time.

Thankfully, the third neighbor whose front door I accost is home. Twenty minutes later, I'm in the back of a cab that smells like day-old Chinese food. I really need to get a car.

Or move to New York City. Or maybe Paris or Amsterdam.

By the time I'm dropped off at Dad's, the sun is setting. The house sparkles with hundreds of professionally strung lights. Palm trees boast alternating red and white strands and a massive, blow-up Santa wavers on the front lawn.

I haven't seen a display like this since my mom was alive, and for a few minutes I stand in the driveway, taking it all in. How grateful I am to Jessica. How lucky I am to have a relationship with my father.

"Mom would have loved this, huh?" asks Jameson, walking up beside me.

I nod.

"Can we talk, Meerkat?"

The front door opens on Dad and Jessica. They're wearing matching Christmas sweaters and Santa hats and grinning from ear to ear .

Sighing, I look at Jameson. "Not now. Maybe later. Maybe. "

He nods. "Whenever you're ready. Want me to take those bags?"

I hesitate, then hand them over. They're heavy. "Thanks."

He peeks into one of the bags. "Is there anything here for me, or did you burn my presents?"

My smile is tiny, but it's real. "Burned them."

He grins. "I figured."

"Come on, you two!" shouts our dad. "We have the karaoke machine up and running!"

"Is he kidding?" whispers Jameson as we walk toward the front door. "Tell me he's kidding."

I shake my head, grinning in spite of myself. "I think he's making up for lost time, Jaybird. I see rivers of eggnog and black-and-white movies in our immediate future."

My guess is right on the money.

It's late. Dad and Jessica are in bed. Jameson and I cleaned the kitchen and are presently on the living room couch. Since we're staying the night, we've decided to relive a preteen catastrophe and get drunk on pilfered Peppermint Schnapps. So far I've managed to avoid being sucked into sad-drunk territory, but the risk rises with every sip.

Eventually we run out of small talk. Quiet lasts less than a minute before Jameson says, "Ready?"

Am I ?

"I don't know. I might be too drunk for this."

"I can tell you again tomorrow."

I straighten from my slump, rubbing my face roughly. "Fuck, fine. Tell me."

Jameson mirrors my position, sitting up and facing me. "I'm not going to speak for Leo or Kevin, just myself." When I nod, he continues mutedly, "When you had the accident earlier this year, I thought I was going to lose you. Not necessarily physically, but in every other way that counts. You'd been slipping away for years, and all I could do was watch it happen. I never knew how to help you. Are you with me?"

I nod, resisting the urge to grab his hand.

"Leo was one of the founding players in our hockey league. He started the Ice Holes a few years before I joined. About five years ago, we went for drinks after a game. It was right after you called from a shoddy phone-line in Mexico and told me about your parachute not opening in the Cave of Swallows. I was upset, to say the least. Before I knew it, I'd dumped everything on Leo. I didn't know then what his line of work was, just that he was a really good listener. He has a way of simplifying things, of bringing them into perspective."

"What did he tell you?" I whisper.

Jameson cracks a smile. "That you could benefit from therapy."

Even though I don't want to, I laugh. "Figures."

"Anyway, fast-forward another year and you showed up at a game. At this point Leo and I had a running joke that I owed him money for all our casual therapy sessions. Most of them were just while hanging out. We talked a lot about you, about how I could maintain healthy boundaries and not get caught up in worry or fear."

I pinch the bridge of my nose. "Jesus. I'm suddenly grateful I'm three sheets to the wind."

"Ditto." Jameson sighs. "This isn't easy. There are certain things I conveniently ignored, like the look on Leo's face when I pointed you out in the crowd."

"Do you mean…" I can't get the words out.

He nods. "Dude was smitten."

I shake my head helplessly. "I never even saw him. Didn't meet him after the game."

Jameson shrugs. "Yeah, he split right after. I don't know why. You and Kevin started dating and I forgot about it. Things started looking up for you. You seemed happy."

"Then ka-boom ," I say, raising my glass and downing the dregs.

He nods shortly. "I didn't know who else to turn to but Leo. We hadn't talked about you in a while. He'd left the team and started a new one by this point. When you came home from the hospital and… and took those pills"—he clears his throat—"I called Leo and he diverted the ambulance to UCLA, where he was an attending."

"And he diagnosed me," I conclude.

"Yeah, with confabu-something or other."

"Confabulation," I answer mutedly. "I fabricated memories to replace missing ones. In my case, the trauma of the accident caused me to cut out all memory of being pregnant and everything after."

Jameson reaches for my hand, grabbing it before I can retract my arm. I tense for a moment, then give in and let his fingers wrap firmly through mine.

"Dad and I waited, Mia. We let you have space. Didn't bring up the accident at all. Leo said it would take time."

"But then I had another accident, and you thought I'd tried to kill myself."

"I didn't know, honestly. But whatever happened, you weren't getting better like we'd hoped. So I called Leo again. He finally told me about an intensive, ultra-private treatment facility he'd been working at for a couple months out of the year."

"You had to convince him?"

Jameson smirks at the affront in my voice. "I had to convince him to admit you when he was there. He didn't want to treat you. He said?—"

"It was a conflict of interest."

"Something like that, yes. I'm sorry I didn't tell you, Mia. When Leo and I drove out to Oasis to pick you up, we agreed it wasn't the time. Not with Dad in the hospital and all the chaos. On my end, it was purely selfish. I'd just gotten my sister back and didn't want you to hate me."

I stare at the Christmas tree until the lights blur.

"Mia? I'm sorry."

"Did you know we were seeing each other?" I ask at length.

He sighs. "Yes."

"And you still kept the truth from me?"

"Yes. I was scared you?—"

"Thank you for telling me," I interject, then use the coffee table as leverage to stand. My hand slips from Jameson's grip. "I'm going to bed. You get the couch."

I only stumble twice on the way to the guest room. Crawling beneath the covers fully clothed, I curl around a pillow and wait for the tears to come. They do, slow and thick. Silent.

I wish I could turn off my heart again. Undo all the work of the last months. Erase Leo's mark on me. Reject this fragility. This love.

But I don't know how.