June

As the frost parted to make way for a new season, the tree branches reached out their tendrils and began to caress the other foliage around them, interlocking their fingers for a joyous dance. I began to feel lighter than air. My parents hadn’t been in contact for weeks. Everyone in EMS had been avoiding each other, which meant radio silence from that end; a silver lining to everyone hating each other was that there was no new drama to deal with. And it was my brother’s birthday. He was turning fourteen. He had called me from school the other day to tell me that he had news: that he was going to tell the family when they came to pick me up from college.

“I want you to be there,” he said. “For support.”

We both knew what he was talking about, I much more than him.

“I miss hearing your cello, you know, when I fall asleep.”

“This awful racket?” I said, running my fingers over the strings of my cello while it rested against my bed.

He didn’t laugh. I’ll admit, it wasn’t a very good joke.

“It will be okay,” I said. “Everything will be okay.”

And that’s probably why it happened. Because you should never say that it’s okay. Anytime someone in a movie says “I’ll see you later” or “I’ll be okay”, something terrible happens. You would think I would have learned my lesson.

* * *

My grades turned around. Well, they turned up. Around implies drastic progress. I didn’t fail my classes. It was enough to get off of probation and back into the University’s lukewarm graces. I vowed to work harder next semester, to keep my involvement with EMS to a minimum. Finn took the credit for my uptick in academic standing. I let him, knowing that I wouldn’t always have him there to guide me along. I would have to be able to support myself, something I had too often over the past year felt too weak to do. I sealed closed the old me, shoving my hurricane away breath by breath. I think Finn saw the change because he stopped being as guarded with me, ceased sharpening his questions to a point.

“Do you ever want to talk to someone about it?” John said one day. “I hear it’s unhealthy to keep that shit inside.”

I sunk back into my memories of my therapist, the one with all the answers, the one who wouldn’t say anything.

“I wouldn’t know where to begin.” I said. It was the truth.

* * *

My parents let Sammy stay with me when they came. “A set of helping hands for finishing the packing process,” my mother said. I hadn’t packed a single thing. I wanted Sammy to see my room as it was before it got stored in cardboard boxes. “Your father doesn’t feel great so we’re going to rest at the hotel. He works so hard.” How quickly packing me up to leave school had become about him.

Sammy immediately gravitated to the cello and I realized that he was taller than it. I had always teased him that even my instrument was bigger than he was, but there he was, growing like a weed. He plucked a few strings. I don’t think he was sure where to start.

“Do you want me to teach you a song?” I said. “Or a scale,” I offered when he looked up.

“I think I can play something. I’ve been filling in for people in orchestra when they get sick.”

I nodded, another thing my father would have tried to suppress in his son. It was a miracle Sammy had remained such a gentle soul.

He began to pick out Ode to Joy. He stumbled at first, warming up to it.

I floated on the notes, letting my brother musical talent wash over me. What a happy song, I thought. And he was playing really well. I wondered if he really had only been playing here and there. He finished and I applauded, trying to make the sound fill the room. There should have been hundreds there to hear him.

He bowed, self-conscious.

“You’re good.” I said, masking my surprise. “If you like it, you should keep it up.”

“We’ll see,” he said.

* * *

Ruby came to the room only to get her stuff. Her parents were moving it all to storage because she wasn’t going to need much of it. They had duplicates of everything.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“Hey,” Ruby said. “Good luck next year. I know we won’t be living together but I hope I still get to see you.”

“You still want to see me?” I realized that I might want to see her as well.

“Yeah. It’ll be better next year. Living with strangers…It is great at the beginning and then everyone relaxes. Then the whole deal goes to shit.”

I smiled. It felt good. “What are you doing this summer?”

“Traveling, probably updating my resume and guzzling freedom until school starts again. You?

“Classes, I think. I have to get back to where I should be if I want to be a doctor.”

“Ugh. Summer classes. The thought makes me ill.” Her eyes grew bored. “I’ll see you around.”

I watched her retreat and thought about how her response should have been what I was feeling. After all, I was the one who had to take the classes. I wanted to take the classes though. It felt right for the first time in a long time. It was my choice.

* * *

Sammy and I walked to my parents' hotel room at the Shadyside Inn to save my father the trip. My mother had asked over the phone. Maybe we could pick up Chinese on the way? We weren’t going out tonight. We ordered our favorites, a series of fried meats covered in sauces, noodles, rice, a vegetable dish for our mother. I gave my brother a spontaneous hug, remembering back a few years to when we had last ordered takeout together, the thrill of being entrusted completely with a task that we considered so crucial. We traipsed down Forbes and Fifth to collect the food, me trying to guess what it was that he wanted to tell our parents, him asking me about landmarks, about college about life after our family.

He stopped outside their hotel room. “You’ll be there, right? For support?”

I set the Chinese food down and hugged him. “You can count on it.”

My parents let us in to the room and I set up the table, laying out forks and napkins, plates and knives. I opened up cartons, releasing their pressured steam into the air. My brother fluttered at my side. I stole glances at him in between tasks. His eyes were fixed on my father who was making his way to the table. My mother pulled out a chair for him and he sat down with a thump.

“My back is killing me,” he said. “What did you get?” He gestured to the assortment that Sammy and I had collected on our way over.

“The usual favorites, plus some shrimp spring rolls.” My father put a finger in his mouth like he was going to throw up.

“You don’t have to eat them,” I said. “We didn’t buy them for you.”

“It’s my money, isn’t it?” He said, grabbing one from the bag.

My mother sat across from him, leaving Sammy and I to take the seats in between at a table where our knees were all touching.

“I have an announcement,” Sammy said.

“How did the packing go?” my mother said at same time.

I ignored my mother. My vision tunneled on Sammy. My father finished pouring fried rice onto his plate, set it down slowly and took a bite.

“What?” A few grains of rice fell from my father’s mouth.

“You know Mr. Pren, the orchestra teacher?” Sammy said.

“What about him?”

“Well, I’ve been helping out with some of the music stuff lately. A lot of kids have been missing practice or getting sick. I’ve been filling in to help out.”

My father stopped eating.

“And he said that I’m really good. A natural, he said actually. He talked to some teachers at Interlochen, sent them some videos of me playing.” We were all staring at this point. “Anyway, they want me to come for next year. They think I could be really good.”

There was complete silence. I grabbed his hand under the table and squeezed. I could barely contain my excitement. He could go to Interlochen where he could board. He could learn how to play music and move people’s emotions. He could be Beethoven.

My father grabbed his arm, tearing him out of his seat. “How long have you known?” My hand hovered in air and then dropped.

“I didn’t think you would be happy.”

“You go behind our back! You’re too young to be making these decisions for yourself.” He dragged him towards the bedroom, with Sammy’s arm twisted behind his back. My mother stared at the ground, her usual position. I stood up, tangling myself in my chair and almost falling. I hurtled forwards, towards my father and Sammy.

“Don’t touch him.”

At the sound of my voice, he stopped. Or was it. Sammy wriggled out of his grip. My father rested his back against the wall, glancing around like the hallway was closing in on him. He breathed hard, struggling to inhale. He slid down to the ground and lost consciousness. I shook him, sternal rubbed. No response. I checked his breathing and his pulse. Nothing, absence. My mother peered around the corner, confused and emboldened by the silence.

She started breathing like my father before he had passed out. “We have to call someone.”

“An ambulance,” I said on autopilot. “We have to call an ambulance.”

“You’re an EMT. It’s your job to help him.”

An EMT’s responsibility on scene is to provide care as a first responder, to assess vital signs, to understand the patient’s history. We’re there to provide relief, to mitigate severe symptoms. I had figured out the vitals signs. I knew what was going on. I knew his history. I knew I was there to do what any reasonably competent provider would. I was there to help. But help who.