Fat kid rules the world Read online

  FAT KID CRYING IN DINER.

  It’s stupid that I’m crying. I’m not doing it loud or anything. I don’t even think Curt notices because his eyes are closed. But the tears keep running down my cheeks. I feel them on my lips and my fat tongue reaches out to lick them off.

  73.

  WE’RE STANDING OUTSIDE watching traffic and my mind is spinning. It’s cold out, but the cold makes me alive. The sounds of the city are loud, intense. Horns, voices, music somewhere in the distance. Life has shrunk to the size of this time and this place. Me. Curt. A second chance.

  The implications are staggering. I stare at each person walking by and imagine the moment they open their mouths, forks poised in midair. I picture them licking ice-cream cones, tongues extended.

  Some of this makes me happy. Insanely happy. A short Spanish woman walks by and I picture her eating a taco and practically get tears in my eyes. I see an old man with massive age spots and imagine him eating something forbidden, like a vanilla cream–filled Dunkin’ Donut. I imagine the way the cream would spurt all over his face and how he probably wouldn’t be able to chew it, so there’d be food spilling down his chin, but he wouldn’t care because he’d be happy and when you’re old no one expects you to have a facade. I imagine myself as that old man.

  I look up and my eyes land on one of those giant billboards. A half-naked woman leans seductively over a shiny new car. She’s incredibly sexy, a babe with cleavage wearing a red string, and I imagine her leaning forward, toward me, beckoning. But just when I’m getting into that vision, a vanilla cream-filled donut comes flying out of nowhere, like a spaceship. It flies to her and I imagine her taking a bite. I’m trying hard to keep her sexy, but it doesn’t work. Now she looks stupid bent over the car with her breasts sticking out of her bikini top. No one can eat a Dunkin’ Donut like that.

  “Oh, man,” I whisper. “Oh, man, oh, man, oh, man.”

  I turn to Curt, to ask him if he thinks this is some kind of new perversion—Fat Kid porn. But when I turn around he’s not there. I make a half circle, then see him at my feet. While I’ve been contemplating the universe, he’s very quietly passed out.

  74.

  THE FIRST THING I DO is panic.

  FAT KID GETS HYSTERICAL. Do not pass Go. Do not collect two hundred dollars.

  I kneel beside Curt and huff loudly. I shake him, but I’m afraid I’ll crush him if I grip too hard. He’s bony and hollow through all the layers of clothes. When I touch his skin it’s hot, like a flame. I start to sweat and pound on Curt’s chest and a passerby stops and asks if I need help.

  “Should I call nine-one-one?” the woman asks. She doesn’t step too close, just leans forward as if Curt might be contagious.

  “Yes,” I holler. “Call nine-one-one. No, wait … yes, okay.” I’m hyperventilating. My fat fingers press into Curt’s face and I pry his eyes open. They’re white and empty. I start to shake.

  A jogger hands me his water bottle. “Try this,” he says just as I’m about to start CPR. I don’t know how to do CPR, but I’ve seen it done in the movies. I stare at the water bottle, wondering what to do with it as I consider the fact that I was about to put all my weight onto Curt’s twig ribs.

  “Splash it in his face,” the jogger says. “If he’s passed out, the water might wake him up.”

  Not a bad alternative to crushing someone’s rib cage.

  I open the pop-top and throw the water hard. Curt sputters and his eyes open a quarter of the way. He makes a noise that’s unintelligible, so I shake him again.

  “You fucker,” I yell. My fat cheeks flap. “What did you take? What the hell did you take?” The NyQuil bottle has rolled out of his shirt onto the sidewalk. I keep shaking him and Curt keeps sputtering. I look up and there are a lot of people watching.

  “What the fuck are you staring at?!” I yell. I don’t think about it. The words just come out. Only later do I think, I waited my whole life to yell that, and I didn’t even enjoy it.

  75.

  WE’RE IN THE CAB and Curt is groggy. He’s slurring something about legitimate over-the-counter pharmaceuticals, but I’m unconvinced. I recognized Imodium, NyQuil, Tylenol, maybe a decongestant or an antihistamine … but what were the blue ones?

  “I’m taking you to the hospital,” I announce. I’ve instructed the driver to take us to Union Medical. Curt sits up and shakes his head.

  “Nowayman. I’llgetout Gotnoinsurance …” He leans toward the cab door and attempts to open it, but he’s too weak. We’re at a light, but it scares me anyway and I reach over to pull him back. I pull too hard and his body flops like a rag doll. His head lolls against the seat.

  “You’ve got a fever,” I say, breathing loud. “You need a doctor.”

  Curt curls up.

  “Can’twejustgotoyourhouse?” he slurs. “S’jussacold. Wegottaprac-ticeforthenextgig.”

  I want to give in. Truly I do. I want to go home so Dad can fix this. But there’s no way I’m giving in. Not this time. This time Curt doesn’t win.

  “Hang in there,” I say. “We’re almost there.”

  76.

  THE EMERGENCY ROOM IS PACKED. There are people everywhere. Bleeding, moaning, sick people. The place smells like a battle between vomit and Lysol with vomit clearly winning. The fluorescent lights are so bright they make everything look gray.

  I plow through the crowd, knowing we look like something out of a Twilight Zone episode. Huge pounding Fat Kid and a walking corpse. Curt shuffles behind me, bent over like an old man, complaining that he’s tired and he’ll be arrested. He tells me they’ll call his mom and his stepfather will answer and then he’ll have to hate me because really he’s fine since the medicine he took is doing just what it’s supposed to do. He says this twice, as if I’m the one whose view of reality is distorted. Why can’t I see that this is exactly what was supposed to happen?

  I reach the main desk and try to flag a nurse’s attention. They ignore me. The one time in my life I don’t want to be overlooked and everyone is intent on something else. Curt slides down the wall and I prop him up with my foot.

  Goddamn it, I think. Somebody see me. A doctor runs past as a gurney surrounded by EMTs slides through the hospital’s double doors. I hear the words “gunshot wound” and “two more on the way.” I’m standing in the midst of chaos and every one of these people is hurting. Some of them won’t make it. My eyes must be huge.

  I call Dad from the pay phone, collect. He answers and I hear the television in the background. I hear Dayle laughing and imagine the two of them sitting together watching some game, eating chips. I almost feel guilty, but I’m so scared I can’t think straight.

  “Dad,” I say, “Curt’s sick. We’re at the emergency room, but they’re not admitting him….” I choke. “He’s passed out on the floor …”

  I mean to say more, but Dad doesn’t make me. I hear the control settle into his tone, and know he’s going to take care of things. It’s going to be all right. He asks me the name of the hospital and where our location is. I almost hear him glance at his watch.

  “Okay,” he says. “It’s twenty-one-hundred hours. I’ll be at your location in twenty-seven minutes. Understand? Hold your spot and I’ll be right there. Keep trying to get a doctor’s attention. Do whatever you need to do to get a doctor’s attention.”

  I nod even though I know he can’t hear me.

  “Okay, Dad. I will. I will, Dad. I’ll do it….”

  I keep talking long after he’s hung up the phone.

  77.

  I’M A SIX-FOOT-ONE, three-hundred-pound teenager with no clue how to get someone’s attention when I really need it. I stare at everyone who walks by, but no one is looking at me. No one is looking at me. I almost laugh but the situation is so completely not funny that I think I might cry instead. Finally, I’ve had enough.

  I plant myself in the doorway between the nurses’ station and the waiting room and become THE FAT KID WALL. There is no getting past me. I cross m
y arms and refuse to move.

  A nurse glares as she tries to get through. She’s holding a chart and she snaps at me.

  “Get out of the way!”

  I can tell she wants to push me aside, but thinks twice about the idea. She looks frazzled.

  “My friend needs help,” I say, and the nurse looks around as if I’m lying. I point at Curt and she looks at him without leaning down, then turns back to me.

  “Have you filled out the paperwork?” she asks. “We have to take people in a certain order and right now I’ve got two gunshot wounds coming and a head trauma, so why don’t you fill out the paperwork and we’ll admit your friend as soon as we can.”

  I start to sputter, but force myself to swallow hard.

  “He needs someone to look at him now,” I say. “I can’t fill out the paperwork because I don’t know the answers and no one’s coming who does know the answers, so why don’t you just look at him now.”

  The nurse shakes her head. She hates me, and that’s a shame because she’s a perfect blond with a ponytail and lacquered nails. She frowns, but when I won’t move she has no choice. She leans down and props Curt’s head against the wall. She feels his forehead and opens his eyes.

  “What did he take?” she asks. I move away from the door and crouch next to her. I really don’t know and I say as much. The nurse rolls her eyes. She looks up and calls over the counter. “Dan, I need an IV and a gurney for this one ….”

  78.

  I SIT BY MYSELF in the waiting area. They’ve taken Curt somewhere and I wasn’t allowed to go with him. They wheeled him out as if it were an imposition, a sacrifice they were making on my behalf. They didn’t even see him. I want to sit on them. Pin them to the ground and tell them he’s the best guitarist they’ll ever meet. Instead I do nothing but wait.

  And think about Mom.

  Now that I’m sitting here with nothing to do I can’t stop the single thought that’s been trying to surface all evening. Last time I was here was the day Mom died. I was a skinny kid sitting in the waiting room with my little brother, watching for Dad. We’d been in her room together, but when she coded, the doctors made Dayle and me leave. Dayle was petrified. He held my hand so tight the circulation stopped and when I tried to let go he started to shake. I kept saying, “Everything will be all right. She’ll be fine. I promise.”

  But she wasn’t.

  And I wasn’t. And he wasn’t.

  I wish Dad would arrive. I stare at the double doors willing him to walk through, and it feels like hours before they finally slide open. Then I see him. My dad. And behind him, my little brother.

  Dad looks stoic, as always, but Dayle looks almost as scared as he did nine years ago. He looks like a kid who doesn’t know what’s going on, and I finally figure out that’s what he is. I want to say something to him. To apologize for never seeing that before. For telling him everything would be fine, then acting like it was for everyone but me. But when they reach me Dad goes pale.

  “Curt?” he asks when he sees I’m alone. I concentrate on breathing slow.

  “I don’t know,” I say. “They took him in a while ago and told me to wait here. It hasn’t been very long, but—”

  Dad doesn’t wait. He strides to the nurses’ station and leans far over the counter. I can’t hear what’s being said but after a few minutes a nurse comes around and says, “Right this way.” Dayle doesn’t say much, but he follows Dad too closely, almost stepping on his heels.

  The three of us head down a long empty corridor. When we reach Curt he’s in one of the cubicles. He has an IV hooked up and a tube up his nose. They have him dressed in one of those paper hospital gowns and I wonder what happened to his clothes. I remember the look on his face when Dad threw them out and hope they haven’t thrown them away again. I keep thinking about the clothes as if that will prevent me from thinking about Curt’s body.

  When I look at him I see skinny instead of skinny. His arms are outside the blankets, unearthed from the layers of clothing that usually hide them. They’re black-and-blue bones. He’s a twisted sparrow that’s flown into a window.

  Dayle and I hang back, but Dad sits down next to Curt. He touches his forehead, and Curt’s eyes half open.

  “Igotafever,” he mumbles. My father nods.

  “That you do,” he says. “What did you take for it?”

  Curt shrugs. Or he would shrug if he could move his shoulders.

  “Some stuff,” he says quietly. “Lotsofstuff.”

  My father’s jaw tightens, but he keeps his hand on Curt’s forehead.

  “You took lots of stuff?” he repeats. He’s gentle, the way I remember him being when Dayle and I were little kids. Curt nods almost imperceptibly.

  “Why would you do that?” Dad asks.

  The question is simple, but Curt’s eyes move back and forth between Dad and me. He looks tired and confused.

  “’Cause,” he says, as if it’s obvious, “didn’tfeelwell.”

  79.

  I LOOK UP CURT’S MOM’S NUMBER and we try to get her on the phone. When his stepfather answers, Dad hangs up. I see him standing at the pay phone without moving, one hand still holding the receiver. Dad’s studying the mottled floor tiles and I can see what he’s thinking.

  I almost say, “You did the right thing,” but don’t. I do, however, mentally remove the word “dysfunctional” from the blue light sign flashing above Dad’s head. I turn to my brother.

  “Come on, Dayle,” I say. “It’s time to go. Dad’ll stay with Curt.”

  We take a cab home, and when we get there the apartment is quiet. And empty. I look around for Dad even though I know he’s not here. We turn on all the lights and make sandwiches in the kitchen. I’m tired and starving, but Dayle looks shaky. He’s hardly said two words all night, and now he kicks at the table leg and eats in huge, gulping bites.

  “You okay?” I ask.

  He rolls his eyes as if I’m a moron. Snorts. “Yeah. Why wouldn’t I be? I don’t care what happens to Curt. He’s your friend….”

  He stabs at his sandwich with the mustard knife, and I don’t say anything at first, but then I nod. “That’s true,” I say, “but Curt really likes you. He said you should be our roadie when Rage/Tectonic gets famous. Thinks you’ve got potential.”

  Dayle stops stabbing the sandwich, but looks suspicious.

  “He said that?”

  “Yeah,” I say. “Curt acts like he doesn’t notice people, but he liked you from the beginning. He invited you to the gig, didn’t he?”

  Dayle pauses.

  “Well …”

  “Dayle,” I say, as if it’s an afterthought, “there are people who like you even when you’re not winning sports trophies. You know that, don’t you? Me, Curt, Dad … Mom loved you, too. Maybe you don’t remember, but she was crazy about you from the moment you were born. If she were here she’d tell you that.” It’s probably the most important thing I’ve ever said to my brother. I keep going as if it’s no big deal, but I know it’s a big deal. It would be to me. “Trust me,” I say. “Curt likes you.”

  Dayle bites his lip. “Well, I always thought Curt was cool, it’s just that I didn’t think you guys wanted me around….”

  I don’t make him finish.

  “I always want you around. You’re my brother.”

  In our entire lives I’ve never said this to him. I’ve spent years waiting for those exact words and it never once occurred to me to give them away.

  80.

  I WAKE UP IN THE MORNING and remember something’s wrong. I can’t remember what it is right away, then it comes back to me. Curt’s in the hospital. Dad’s with him. Dayle’s scared. I’m … For once I do not define myself. I get out of bed, shower, and dress in a pair of tan pants and a T-shirt that reads ALBUQUERQUE. I wake up Dayle.

  “I’m going to the hospital,” I tell him.

  He’s mostly asleep, so I accept the half nod I get in response, then write a note and leave it on the counter.
I call a cab and wait for it outside.

  When it arrives, I slide in and tell the driver my destination. The cab smells like cigarette smoke even though the sticker on the back panel reads NO SMOKING. I roll down the window and try to breathe only fresh air. I want to suck it in before I reach the hospital. I’m starting all over again and I want a fresh start. This time around I don’t have room for pollution. I lean forward and breathe, watching the city move past my open window. Today, I fit. I’m just one more anonymous person in a yellow cab.

  I take a deep breath. This is where it begins, I think.

  Fat Kid Breathing in a Cab.

  81.

  CURT’S BEEN MOVED to a real room, just him and an old guy wheezing away in the other bed. I find Dad with the curtain drawn, sitting beside Curt. He looks up when I arrive, and I think we both realize this scene is familiar. Dad is composed even though I know he stayed up all night. Guard duty. Dad’s good at that. I’d smile if he didn’t look so grim.

  “How’s Curt?” I ask, nodding at the pile of blankets in the bed. I wouldn’t know it was Curt if Dad weren’t sitting there. Curt’s lost under the paper-thin hospital blankets. The top of his head barely emerges and his hair is matted back from sweat or grime. Maybe both. Dad sighs.

  “He’ll be okay,” he says. “Tonight was tricky, but he’s sleeping now. He’s got pneumonia and took too much medication for it. He’s malnourished and a bit bruised.” He pauses, then looks at me.

  “Do you know how he got those bruises?” he asks. I shake my head. I don’t, and the truth is, he could’ve gotten them anywhere. Fight, accident, stepfather, thrashing, throwing himself into a drum set … I don’t really know what Curt does to survive. I don’t know how he lives or where he goes, if he has any friends aside from me and the Puppets. I shake my head again, and Dad nods as if he understands.