I was so sure when I heard the door to the boiler room swing open that it was Kevin Smith. The door opened with that heavy swishing sound and I started talking to him about the song. It was going pretty well. Screw Ashley. She was wrong. I wasn't crazy. She was wrong.
It wasn't Kevin. It was Joey and Spinner. Damn that Spinner, he said he wouldn't tell anyone I was here. Why had I trusted him? When would I learn that I couldn't trust anybody?
Well, there were no choices. I had to leave with Joey, with his concerned face and his lectures about taking my meds. Fuck those meds. No one thought I was better so why did I have to bother taking them? Plus they made me feel like shit. I felt tired and groggy all the time. I hated it.
"Craig, you can't just stop taking your medication," Joey said in the car. I pulled the seat belt across my lab and buckled it.
"I know," I said, my head down. Joey had agreed to let me go to Europe and he'd been all proud of me and now I'd screwed it all up. He really couldn't trust me, and what was worse was that everyone was right. Joey and Ashley were right. I was crazy.
Joey wasn't really mad at me. He was worried. He didn't really think anything was my fault anymore. It was because of the bipolar. It was because I had a mental illness. Nothing was my fault. I couldn't help it. He blamed everything on me being crazy. I couldn't explain to him that I wasn't just crazy, I wasn't "Bipolar". I was me, still. I chose to do things and when I was upset or something was wrong it wasn't just because of the bipolar. I couldn't explain it, though.
We got home and Joey was mad, but at Caitlin. He started yelling at her the second we walked through the door. Caitlin looked at me with mild surprise. She wasn't all that, I don't know, trusting of me I guess. Not since I beat up Joey. Boy, did that make her look at me differently. There was this subtle coldness between me and Caitlin now. It was why she was all too eager to help me get to London for the summer. I knew it.
They were yelling and Caitlin was giving it right back to him. I looked at them through the railings on the stairs, my mouth open. Caitlin said my heart was breaking and it was, Ashley was killing me. Joey said my mind was a lot more fragile right now, and that made me feel great. Fragile. That's what Joey thought about me. He thought I was sick. And he was right, that's what sucked. I could feel the thoughts racing in my head, the confusing images regarding Ashley and the wedding I'd wanted and the music and the dreams that surrounded that like this cloud and Joey and Caitlin fighting over me like my parents used to and my dad, how he used to hit me all the time and how scared I was then, and how scared I was now. The yelling, the quick movements was bringing it back. So many things could bring it back.
"Come on," Angie said, taking my hand and leading me upstairs. I went with her, not able to stand the fighting anymore. It was my fault. Caitlin hated me. And she had every right to.
I heard the door slam and I knew one of them had left, probably Caitlin. Joey wouldn't leave Ang or even me. It was Caitlin. Maybe I should leave, too. Maybe everyone would be better off without me.