I’m watching the landscape pass by when it begins to change. Instead of a clear horizon and fields full of flowers, there are ratty trailers and trash littered everywhere.
The scene change is so jarring and familiar that my heart stops in my chest. It’s not the trailer park I grew up in, but when you’ve been in one run-down trailer park, you’ve been in all the rest.
My chest grows tight, making it hard to breathe, but I manage to turn toward Theo and squeak out a question. “What are we doing here?”
He stops the truck in front of one of the trailers and turns to lookat me. “I want you to meet someone.”
I can’t tell him that being in a place like this fills me with anxiety. He’s already seen too many cracks in my mask, so instead, I hide my trembling hands and say, “Okay.”
I take the thirty seconds it takes him to run around the truck and open my door to compose myself, and by the time he opens my door, the only sign of my anxiety is the necklace in my hand.
He helps me out, and I let him—counting theMississippisit takes for him to drop his hands.
Twenty. It takes twenty Mississippis.
Which is way too long if you ask me.
Once my feet are on the ground, we walk up a cracked sidewalk with weeds growing through to a front door that doesn’t even look like it locks. Theo lifts his hand and knocks, then steps back and waits.
My charm zips along my necklace.Back and forth. Back and forth.Theo reaches up, stopping my hand from moving. “There’s no need to be nervous.”
I scoff. “I’m not nervous.”
Theo looks pointedly at where I still hold onto my necklace, his hand covering mine, and then back at me.
I lift my chin and pretend I don’t notice.
The front door creaks, and I turn my attention toward it. A woman stands on the other side of the screen door. She’s older, with graying hair and wrinkles that speak of a hard life. Her mouth is set in a stern line, and her eyes are just as hard.
“Theo,” the woman greets. “I didn’t expect a visit for a couple of weeks.”
Theo looks at the woman as if she hung the moon. “I wanted you to meet someone.”
The woman’s gaze jumps to me for the first time, as if just noticing I am standing here. She doesn’t smile, just stands there, assessing me.
“Highfalutin, isn’t she,” the woman says, looking back at Theo, and I bristle—something about being in a place like this, bringing out parts of the old me.
“You don’t know me,” I say, my voice hard.
The woman’s piercing gray eyes snap back to me, and she does another assessment. “You know what, I suspect I don’t.”
She shoves the door open, and Theo catches it with one hand as the woman disappears deeper into her house. When I can no longer see her, I look at Theo.
“Explain,” I demand, but the word loses some of its edge when I realize Theo’s cheeks are on fire. He’s embarrassed, and I’m missing something.
“You know how I said I got sober two years ago?” he asks.
“Yes,” I say apprehensively.
He nods in the direction the woman disappeared. “She saved me.”
“How?”
“She was at the rehab center I went to. I don’t know why, but she gave me her number on my first day there and said to call whenever I wanted a drink. And so I did.”
“Do you still call her?” I ask, then clarify. “When that happens, I mean?”
Theo shakes his head, but his eyes are sad. It’s the first time I’ve realized how lonely it is to be an addict. Even when I was going through it with my mom, I couldn’t see it. I was too close. With Theo, though, it’s so obvious, I wonder how I missed it before.
