Nothing Read online

  “Um, okay.”

  “Maybe we could have her over for dinner.”

  Over my dead body.

  “She’s busy,” I say, and Mom senses the shift in my tone immediately. Well, it’s pretty obvious. The thing I’m not expecting, though, is her reaction. Her eyes get misty.

  Well, you know what? Too bad. There’s no way I’m subjecting Julianne to a family dinner. I’ll pull out all my toenails with my front teeth before I do that.

  “Why are you home anyway?” I ask, my voice cool and unfriendly.

  Mom blinks furiously, and I feel horrible that I will probably never, ever be able to have a normal conversation with her because of all the mileage between us.

  “We have something to tell you,” she whispers. “Later. At dinner.”

  She turns to go.

  –––––

  I call Julianne back, and she’s so thrilled to hear from me, so sweet to me, that I feel as happy as Mom felt about me having a girlfriend.

  I feel so great after I hang up with her that I’m positive Julianne will cure me.

  I’m in a fantastic mood when I come down to dinner.

  “I hear you have a girlfriend.”

  Dad’s beaming at me just like Mom did.

  If I had any idea all it took to liven things up around here was me getting a girlfriend, I would’ve done it a long time ago. Why is my getting a girlfriend a cause for celebration? I can’t remember the last time Dad was so cranked about something I did.

  I crave his approval like junk food. It’s an emptiness that never gets filled. No matter how much I try to fill it, load it, stuff it, cram it, it doesn’t feel full.

  It’s a feeling of perpetual … nothing.

  Dad clears his throat and says, “Kids, we need to tell you something.”

  “Breast cancer.”

  It lingers at the table like a bad smell.

  I haven’t heard much of my father’s short speech—I’ve tuned him out—but I immediately latch onto those two words.

  Danielle and I both turn to Mom with worry on our faces. I may have issues with my mother, but I don’t want her dying on me.

  “It’s not your mother,” Dad says, and for the first time in my life I’m not scared of him, because he looks tired and old and … defeated.

  “It’s me.”

  –––––

  I’m in my Audi and I’m going almost a hundred and I don’t care because I have to get to the supermarket.

  NOW.

  Pieces of conversation from dinner buzz in my head like white noise from a radio stuck between stations.

  “One percent of breast cancer patients are men.”

  “I’ll undergo the same treatment women do.”

  “Surgery, chemo, radiation … ”

  I’ve never, ever, ever, ever heard that one-percent statistic, much less knew men could get breast cancer.

  Leave it to Dad to scale new heights of medical territory.

  It occurs to me, as I’m frantically pulling packages of Oreos, pretzels, and Sun Chips off shelves, that this is really inconvenient. Every time I need food, I have to jump in my car and get it.

  Why don’t I buy more than I need right now, and store it somewhere?

  I fill my shopping cart to the top. At the checkout line, the cash register blinks $137.38 at me. Did I buy that much? I’m lucky to have enough cash to cover it. I could use my credit card, but that bill goes directly to Dad.

  At home, I hide my food behind a bunch of old shoe boxes in my closet. As I fall asleep that night, it isn’t thoughts of Julianne that lull me to sleep. It’s knowing I have a stash in my closet.

  75 days before

  Danielle

  I don’t know what to talk about first!

  Parker getting all the attention at dinner

  again

  because he has a girlfriend?

  He didn’t mention Julianne

  being not Jewish.

  It’s nice, actually, that she’s

  not a JAP like the rest of them.

  She doesn’t wear shirts that say

  Supermodel

  across the chest in pink rhinestones

  or short-shorts that say

  Hottie

  across the butt.

  You’re probably wondering

  why I’m babbling about my brother’s harem

  instead of talking about

  Dad

  but to be honest

  I’m in shock.

  A man with breast cancer?

  I don’t know

  what to think

  or

  what to do

  or

  what to say.

  It’s funny,

  well, not funny in a hahaha way,

  but funny in a weird-funny way,

  that everyone always wants to be

  different from each other,

  unique,

  special,

  one of a kind.

  I want it too,

  I want it a lot,

  but not like that,

  not that different,

  not that unique,

  not that special.

  That’s more like being alone.

  74 days before

  Parker

  I devour the American Cancer Society’s web pages on What Is Breast Cancer in Men?

  My dad’s breast cancer is called a breast adenocarcinoma, and the type he has is called a ductal carcinoma.

  Not that these words mean anything to me.

  Breast cancer is one hundred times more common in women. In 2007, 450 men died of breast cancer in the United States. And 40,460 women.

  Talk about an elite group.

  73 days before

  Danielle

  I ask Mom how she met Dad

  even though I’ve heard

  this story before

  like a zillion and a half times.

  We’re stuffing blue gift bags

  with silver tissue paper

  dotted with tiny stars of David

  in the living room

  for Fashion for Philanthropy,

  Mom’s charity group

  to support wounded soldiers in Israel.

  Every time I crumple up the silver tissue paper

  I see my reflection in it,

  distorted.

  “It was at a youth group dance at our temple,”

  Mom says, smiling at the memory.

  “He was the only boy in a suit.

  Some of the boys wore ties

  and some of the boys wore jackets,

  but your father was the only boy in a suit.”

  “So?” I ask.

  Mom looks right at me,

  her hands frozen in place,

  tangled up in silver tissue paper,

  but her eyes are seeing something

  in the past.

  “So I knew he was a serious boy,”

  she says.

  “I knew he would take things seriously.”

  She frowns.

  “Too seriously.”

  We don’t talk for the rest of the stuffing.

  My reflection in the silver tissue paper

  with the tiny stars of David

  gets more funny-looking

  the more I look at it.

  My dad’s name is David too

  like the star

  like the king.

  I keep trying to picture him

  dancing with Mom,

  but I can’t.

  It doe
sn’t make sense for Dad

  to do anything that doesn’t involve

  making money

  or bossing people around.

  72 days before

  Parker

  I’m out of money, so I go downstairs to see Dad.

  Usually he pays me every week, but he must have forgotten.

  I’m not used to him hanging around the house so much, doing nothing. He sits in his study downstairs, behind his big desk, and stares out the window for hours.

  I knock on the door even though it’s open, and my dad looks up, surprised, and I almost turn around and leave because my knees have gone weak all of a sudden.

  Dad says, “Come in, Parker, sit down.” Not in an unkind way.

  So I do, and as I get closer, I notice my dad looks old, like Mom. And … tired.

  He’s wearing a green bathrobe. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him undressed. Or, if I have, I can’t remember it.

  I sit down in the big chair in front of his desk, but before I can decide whether I want to go through with this or not, he says, “Please don’t tell anyone … about this. I’ve been meaning to talk to you. I can only imagine what people will say.”

  He’s asking me to keep a secret.

  He cares about what people will say.

  Dad opens a drawer in his desk, unzips a black leather pouch, and pulls out a fat stack of crisp and fresh bills-from-the-bank. I can actually smell the money from where I’m sitting. It smells clean and new, energizing, like a jolt of caffeine.

  “Here,” he says, handing the stack to me.

  “Thank you,” I say, accepting it automatically. I resist the urge to run the stack under my nose for a closer inhalation.

  It’s more than usual, and I realize it’s a … bribe. But, then, it’s all a bribe, isn’t it?

  Dad winces. Is he in pain?

  “How are your grades?” he asks, and some of the old fire creeps back into his eyes, and just like that, I’m back to being Jell-O again.

  “Great,” I answer in a whispery voice, even though the big fat red C on my calc quiz has probably tied me with Amber Weinstein.

  Dad nods. “I’m counting on you, Parker.”

  Counting on me for what?

  71 days before

  Danielle

  After school I sit in our home-theater room

  and watch The Music Man by myself.

  The Music Man is a Technicolor

  song-and-dance fest

  about a place in Iowa

  where people make chocolate fudge and

  grow pretty flowers on trellises and

  nothing bad ever happens.

  Mom took Dad to the cancer center

  again

  and Parker’s out

  again

  and I’m alone

  and I wish

  I could jump

  into the big screen

  and live in River City, Iowa,

  with the fudge and the flowers

  where nothing bad ever happens.

  I hear footsteps

  and suddenly Parker’s

  standing in front of me,

  staring at the huge tub of buttered popcorn in my lap.

  “Hey,” he says.

  “What are you doing here?” I ask.

  “I thought you had forensics.”

  He smiles. “What—do you know my whole

  schedule by heart?”

  “Yeah,” I say. “Actually, I do.”

  “It was cancelled,” he says.

  He studies the screen.

  “The Music Man?”

  I nod.

  And hope.

  He stands there,

  weighing his options.

  Homework?

  Julianne?

  Or watching a movie with his little sister?

  He plops down next to me.

  I want to do a dance

  but I offer him popcorn instead.

  “No,” he says, shaking his head vigorously.

  70 days before

  Parker

  Julianne’s going to cure me.

  I’m in love. I know it.

  When I go to her locker after school, she jumps into my arms and wraps both of her legs around me. She doesn’t seem to care about all the people staring at us and I don’t either. I hold her tightly off the floor and kiss her frantically.

  “Can I watch you today at track practice?” she asks after we’ve pulled apart.

  I run my mouth along her neck. “I don’t know … I might get distracted with you there, imagining all the things I want to do to you.”

  She giggles. “Want to meet me at the diner after?”

  I freeze.

  Julianne bites her lip. “Is something wrong, Parker? Did I do something wrong?”

  “No, no, no,” I say, bringing her hands to my mouth and kissing them. “It’s just … ”

  “How about you come over tonight?” she asks, rescuing me.

  69 days before

  Danielle

  I mention the funny smell in the bathroom to Parker,

  and he acts all weird about it.

  Why?

  What is it?

  A few hours later,

  there’s a new smell

  in the bathroom.

  It’s nice.

  68 days before

  Misty Mountain Strawberry,

  according to the pink-and-red spray can

  on my side of the sink.

  67 days before

  Parker

  I eat two bananas for lunch and successfully don’t pig out on Mom’s horseradish-crusted London broil, one of Dad’s favorites.

  66 days before

  Danielle

  Dad has a paintball-corporate-retreat fest

  in the Poconos with his office every year.

  I’ve always wanted to go.

  It sounds like fun.

  I wonder if he’ll take me this year.

  “I have really good aim,” I say,

  when I come down to visit him in his study.

  “If you aim at nothing,

  you’ll hit it every time,” he replies.

  “My aim is awesome,” I say.

  “Ready, aim, aim, aim, fire!” he answers.

  Sometimes Dad can get a little annoying

  with all his “life sayings,”

  but I still want to do paintball with him tomorrow.

  Parker

  Dad wants me to play paintball with him.

  “It’ll be awesome!” he says as we stand in the living room putting the finishing touches on our protective-clothes-layering. I’m so puffed-up with protective layers I feel like the Michelin Man.

  Mom frowns at us. “David, really, Parker doesn’t have time for this nonsense.”

  “Sure he does,” Dad replies absently, tightening a scarf around his collar. “And it’s not nonsense. It’s a team-building activity.”

  “He’s got homework and midterms and papers,” Mom goes on. “He’s got serious work to do. He doesn’t need to be running around the woods like a crazy person.”

  “He needs a break from the books, Beth, he needs fresh air and exercise.”

  Danielle studies us from under half-closed eyes. She’s still in her nightgown—it’s just after dawn—and I wonder why she even bothered coming down to see us off.

  “Parker gets enough fresh air and exercise,” Mom counters, her voice growing shrill. “He’s on the track team, remember?”

  I wish they’d stop talking about me as if I’m a wind-up doll they can just plop down wherever they
want.

  Dad ignores Mom’s comment and turns to me. “Ready?” he asks. “Let’s move out, pardner.”

  Mom throws up her hands. “You’re being completely unreasonable, you know.”

  “Bye, honey,” Dad responds, giving her a quick kiss.

  We move out.

  First stop: Starbucks.

  –––––

  The line for Starbucks spills out the door even at this godless hour.

  Unshaven guys read The New York Times while women in yoga pants stare into their cell phones.

  I get my usual three coffees—venti, black. Dad gets a tall cappuccino—hold the foam—which I guess makes it technically a latte.

  “Do you always drink so much coffee, Parker?” he asks as we head back to my Audi.

  “Um, yeah,” I answer, feeling suddenly self-conscious about it.

  “What—are you secretly putting in time at NORAD or something?”

  It occurs to me that Dad doesn’t know how late I’m up most nights, and frankly, I’d rather keep it that way.

  In fact, I worry Dad will grill me the whole way to the Poconos about my life, but after just two minutes on the road, he’s off in La-La-Land, snoring away.

  –––––

  I get lost twice, and by the time I pull into the paintball place I’ve been driving for almost two hours and could use a serious nap. Dad wakes up as I bring the car to a halt in the gravel parking lot.

  “Perfect timing,” he says, stretching. He claps me on the back. “You ready?”

  I shrug.

  “It’ll be awesome,” he says.

  We exit the car and walk across the parking lot. There’s a hut on the other side with a neon sign that says:

  Poconos Paintball Inc.

  Groups Welcome

  Reunions—Corporate Retreats

  Fun For The Whole Family

  Everyone from Dad’s office is already inside the hut, crowded around an ancient-looking coffee machine, looking like an army of puffed-up Michelin Men.

  “Hey, everybody, glad you could make it,” Dad says. “Anyone have trouble getting here?”

  People murmur, shake Dad’s hand, make small talk, and otherwise act like caffeine-deprived weekend warriors.

  Dad puts his hands on my shoulders. “This is Parker, everybody, you remember him.”