Page 128 of This Side of Beautiful

Now, standing in this moment, saying my own words out loud, I wondered if this was how she felt. Did she believe, deep down, that she could do everything in her power to keep that vow? That she could choose to fight it, just like I was choosing now?

Mama nodded, then suddenly collapsed against my chest, sobs wracking through her body. I wanted to hold her, but the restraints hindered me. I also had no more tears to shed.

I was done breaking. I was done being helpless. Not as a boy. Not as a man. Not ever again.

July 26

I stared blankly ahead as the social worker drilled me about my mental health. My mother and I had met with the doctor and requested that the restraints be removed, and that had happened shortly after I regained consciousness yesterday. The residual grogginess from the sedative had faded and I wanted to be discharged. Two days of this hospital was more than enough. The social worker asked for privacy, and my mother had gone to the cafeteria.

After spending the last hour asking me question after question about my physical and mental symptoms and family history again, she finally asked me, “When’s the last time you wanted to kill yourself?”

“I’ve never wanted to kill myself,” I replied. “I keep telling you all that, and I’m still in here. I got into a fight with my father, and it upset me. I just ended a relationship, and there was a lot going on. The anxiety hurt so bad that I begged to die. But I don’t and never have had plans to take myself out. Please discharge me.”

She rose. “It’s up to the doctor. He’s diagnosed you as being on the autism spectrum. You landed in the hospital because you had a severe panic attack with psychotic features, and he has a treatment plan he wants to review before he discharges you. I can do it with you if you prefer.”

“I told him already that I disagreed. I have anxiety sometimes, but that’s it. I am not psychotic or crazy.” I clasped my hands, refusing to allow anyone to label me.

“Mr. Hayes, anyone can break from reality when everything is happening at once. Psychosis is the result of that, where you aren’t sure anymore of who or where you are. You lost touch with the present because your mind wanted to protect itself. You said you were going through a breakup, and then the fight with your father might have been too much for your mind to handle. We just want to offer you ways to cope.”

“And I told you that I’m good. That doctor can’t keep me here because I disagree with the diagnosis. You tell the doctor that I’ll sue for mistreatment and discrimination, because I’m not supposed to even be in here. My mother didn’t know what to do when I was having an episode. I would’ve been fine without medicines or the hospital.” I slammed the bed with my fist. “Get me the fuck out of here.”

The social worker grew flustered and rushed out of the room.

“I always knew you had it in you.” My father’s chuckle outside the door iced my blood. I was still weak and had no way to protect myself.

Despite my vulnerability, anger and not fear ruled my emotions. “Get out, you horrible piece of shit. I don’t want to hear anything you have to say.”

He walked fully into the room, with a slight limp, also in shades and with a bandage across his nose. It was really laughable how we, as a family, even under the direst of circumstances, wanted to uphold the Hayes name and legacy.

“I wouldn’t want to talk to me either.” He shrugged and jammed his hands in his pockets. “Keeping them there so you know I won’t touch you.”

“Mama will be back soon, and I don’t want her to know you were here.”

My father exhaled and pulled off his glasses. His eyes were almost swollen shut, and his light skin was mottled red and blue around his cheeks and temples. His lip had a cut. “I’ve been staring in the mirror for hours at the damage I’ve done to this family. At what I’ve become. And I thought… for a long time, I thought the best thing I could do was disappear. But leaving this world wouldn’t fix anything. It would only bring more pain to you and your mother.”

“All you ever cared about was image. Now you’re saying you have to stay because it would make the Hayes name look bad,” I scoffed.

“No. No, this isn’t about me. This is about you and your name. The world is your oyster right now. The public wants you, and I can’t allow my actions to pull you down anymore. I won’t contest the divorce. She can take whatever she wants, and I’ll leave you and her alone. I’m not here for forgiveness because I know that won’t and shouldn’t come, though I am sorry for everything.”

“I’ve heard this before. You’ll change, and you’re sorry. All lies to me. The next time you want to send a message, send it through your lawyer.” I could feel my chest tightening, and I couldn’t allow my father to bring me to that lonely, awful place ever again.

“I know you hate me. You always did.” He spoke so softly that I had to strain to hear him. “Do you know how hard it was to have you as a son? From the beginning, you didn’t like me. You would scream at the top of your lungs whenever I touched you or tried to pick you up. I used to be so frustrated. Me and your mother had waited ten years to have you, and when we did, you couldn’t stand me. Then, when I noticed you loved to hum as an infant and moved your head to my music, hope came back that we could bond the way I’d always wanted.”

“So what? You can’t love me because I’m not the son you envisioned? You can’t see the man I’ve grown up to be and be proud?”

His head snapped back. “I am proud.Beenproud.”

I shook my head. “No. You’re not. I don’t always recognize social cues, but I know when you’re being genuine with me. All I see is jealousy. And I don’t know why. What do I have that you haven’t already achieved?”

My father stared at me a long time before he finally replied, “Your freedom. Being different allowed you to float under the radar, to move how you wanted. You didn’t have to be social and weren’t expected to be anything but what you dreamed. You rose to the top even when I couldn’t push you because you would break—”

“Well, guess what? You did push me, and I did break. Why else would I run away from home at sixteen? Sixteen, and I’m on the street trying to figure it out. Can’t go to either grandparent because they live across the country, and I knew my dream was here in New York. But that was the best thing you could’ve ever done to me. It forced me to ignore my need to hide. I had to overcome being shut in a room, playing my music. I had to survive. I had to open my mouth. I had to figure out how to be normal, and sometimes I still fail. But I’ve come a long way with the help of Cedrick and the guys who loved me for who I was, I am, and will ever be.”

His jaw tightened, and he rolled his neck. “I recognized your struggles before your mother did, and maybe I was hard on you because I didn’t want you to be me. Ironically, now I can’t stand that you’renotlike me. You learned how to exist without using a damn thing. You know why I drink myself into a stupor every other night?” He laughed loudly. “It’s to fight off my own panic attacks and depression. You are the me I was too afraid to be. All these years, and your mother never knew that every time I grabbed a bottle it was to fight off that gnawing and scared feeling that I was losing control… that I didn’t fit in, no matter how hard I tried.”

I gasped, though he didn’t appear to notice. His description of the constant nervousness and feeling like an outsider was the same as mine.

He studied his feet before he stared back at me. “This is the last piece of advice I will ever give you. You’re in here because you still need help. Don’t be a fool like me and lose everything and everybody you love. Get the help you need and see how much further you will fly. You didn’t name your band The Hollow Bones for nothing.”

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