Facing Demons

We were all like some wayward children, orphans who had finally found a home at last.  Both Billy and I were adopted.  Well, I was "half-adopted."  My mother left my alcoholic father when I was two, and remarried when I was five.  My step-father adopted me and I took his last name.  I was so young when it all happened, and I must have blocked everything out because I thought he was my real father up until the time my mother told me the truth when I was ten.  How I could have not known?  I really to this day do not understand. I mean, I remember moving in with my stepfather when I was five.  Other than that, I have almost no memories of my childhood.  My memories really don't take shape until about the age of fourteen or fifteen when I was in high school and started to form friendships outside my home that enabled me to spend more time away from home than in it.  That's not to say I didn't have friends when I was younger.  I always seemed to be friends with kids who had huge families.  In fifth grade, Tina was my best friend, and she had seven brothers and sisters.  It was fun to go to her house because it was more like a zoo or an asylum, but at the time I didn't see it like that.  I thought it was a ton of fun, having a houseful of people that yelled all the time.  I remember the drama and fights Tina would have with her siblings, and while I felt bad for her on one hand, on the other I was jealous she had siblings to fight with at all.  I was never really lonely being an only child.  The ease with which I made friends helped me be around people most of the time, and when I wasn't I had my good imagination to keep me entertained.  I had a few imaginary friends that kept me company in the quieter times.  When I was ten I had Sharon and Doreen who lived a block away.  We stayed friends until their mother moved them, first to Port Jefferson where we still managed to keep in touch, but when they moved again, we lost touch completely.  I have some smattering of memories from when I was really little and had no father at all.  I remember going to Florida with my grandparents, who were really like my parents.  My mother worked all the time and didn't get home until really late at night.  I think I really thought my grandmother was my mother.  I even called her "mom" just like everyone else around me did.  My best memories from when I was young were with my grandparents.  In fact, now, come to think of it, they were my ONLY memories.1

I never really got the particulars of Billy's childhood.  Sure, I knew some things… like the "hand-off" to his adoptive parents happened in a bowling alley parking lot.  I know he wonders how his biological mother feels every November 16th.  It must bother him, but he's a master at keeping everything under control.  I should have known he really did have an eating disorder when I started to really worry about his weight loss.  After all, they say anorexia is all about the control.  But alas, he did seem to have everything under control… the last thought that would have ever occurred to me was how he was really struggling to hold it all together.  I admired him like I admired no one in my life, except for my grandfather who was a scientist.  He was the smartest person I'd ever met.  My husband was the second smartest, and I daresay Billy was the third.  And Pennie wasn't too far behind.2

Pennie was part of our little "group."  It was a loosely formed group, held together by the friendship both Pennie and I had with Billy.  Pennie and I both held each other at arms length, although from time to time we both made the attempt at something more.  But I squelched that when one day I saw how easy it would be for Pennie to remove me from her life much the way everyone in my life had up until this point.  She really didn't have much use for other adults, especially ones who disagreed with her on some point about our "children."  No, we weren't parents.  At least not in the traditional sense.  We were all teachers in the same building, and we all taught the alternative high school in the afternoons… you know, the "wayward children" much like ourselves.  I think we were all so good at it because it hit so close to home for us.  In any event, I realized how devastated I would be if I lost someone else in my life, or went from "loved" to "unloved" status once again.  So there came a day when I realized this was about as close as I was going to get to Pennie.  And she to me.  That was fine because I knew I could still lean on her if I ever needed to, but I didn't have to hold her in the confines of a close friendship, one in which I might come to rely on and be disappointed later when something went wrong.  I was about done with relying on anyone in my life except for my husband who proved time and again his unconditional love.  I trusted him like no other.  Not even Billy, who was without a doubt the best friend I had had in my life up to this point.  Part of me held back my innermost fears and feelings with Billy.  Well… not really.  I just didn't let myself lean on him when I was falling apart.  I would fall apart on my own from time to time, and then come to him about it when I had pretty much put myself back together.  Actually I think that worked out better.  I was able to put myself together much better and much more quickly than if I had a friend whose shoulder I would cry on.  I didn't want Billy to see me like that.  I was too afraid of losing him.  I couldn't imagine him wanting to stick around as my friend after seeing me bang my head repeatedly on the floor or slash my arms with scissors.  My shrink told me I did those things because physical pain is much easier to deal with than emotional pain.  As soon as he said it, I knew he was right.  The physical pain gave me something else to focus on.3

I think we were all good at focusing on other things.  Why else would the three of us work 70 hours a week or more?  Each one of us was busier than the other.  It wasn't a contest between us who could work the most, because each of us shook our heads at the others' psychoses.  Pot. Kettle. Black.  What it really was was a race to see who would collapse first.4

Looking back, I would have rather been the one to win that race.  When you love someone unconditionally, you would bear their pain in a second if it could keep them from harm.  Sometimes you'd rather go through hell yourself than watch the one you love struggle.  Unfortunately, however, I had first-row seats for the inevitable show.5

I would often worry when I beat Billy to school in the mornings.  Normally my arrival time to school in the morning ebbed and flowed depending on the season.  However this year I seemed permanently stuck in "winter."  Billy and I were both afflicted with Seasonal Affective Disorder, but it didn't make him hit the snooze button for an hour each morning.  Once or twice when I did beat him to school, I would wait at his classroom in the morning until I could wait no more.  My classroom was at the complete opposite end of the million-square-foot building.  During the first semester I would call his classroom just to check in to see if he made it in ok.  But his schedule changed in the second semester.  He didn't have a class first period, so when I called on that fateful day and got no answer, I shrugged it off, sure he was already doing his "office duty."6

I hate having other people find out terrible news about a person I love before I do.  Of course, if you think about it, that's really the only way it could happen unless I actually happened to be there when the event occurred.  Nevertheless, when I went into the main office after first period to pick up my mail and saw Pennie hysterical crying, I instantly panicked.  My first instinct was to look across the hall into Billy's classroom.  My worst fear had been confirmed – there was a substitute teacher teaching his class.  7

"What's wrong?  Where's Billy?" I demanded.8

Pennie merely wailed and waved me off in her typical Pennie manner.  She always tended to be on the dramatic side, but now I was just raging with anger at her inability to talk because of her apparent distress.  Finally, a secretary got up from her desk, put her arm around me, and told me quietly, "Billy is in the hospital.  He collapsed last night."9

"What do you mean collapsed?" I asked.10

"He's in Mather Hospital," the secretary replied.11

It was a good thing I had the "cush" job that I had which didn't require me to teach anymore classes for the rest of the day because I ran out of the office, up the stairs to my coat and purse, and ran out of the building before anyone could stop me from getting in my car and driving like a madwoman to the hospital.  Had there been a cop on the road I never would have made it.  I passed every car I possibly could, and even managed to pass some that logic would tell you I couldn't pass.  I stormed into the lobby of the hospital and up to the information desk.  They told me his room number but informed me that he could not have visitors until his condition "stabilized."  I was determined to wait, even though waiting meant pacing the lobby furiously for hours.  Ironically, I didn't have to pace alone.  Billy's boyfriend, not being "family," was not allowed to visit him yet either.  I wailed with the injustice of it all.  12

When we were finally allowed up, my panic ceased.  Bruce and I sat on either side of Billy's bed, and both of us held his hand.  I knew things would be ok when Billy gave me that winning Billy smile.  Even in his hospital bed he was holding it all together and staying in control.  He laughed about it and told us he knew that was the reason he was in there in the first place.  He actually looked eager when he told us he was starting therapy later that day.  It was as if a big weight was taken off those skeletal shoulders.  13

That was six months ago and a lot has changed.  Billy and I both cut back on our hours.  He's spending a lot more time at home with Bruce in the new house they bought, and cooking great meals and actually gaining a bit of weight.  I think he looks gorgeous.  Therapy works wonders when one is finally ready for it, and I know he's amazed at the progress he's making.  I wouldn't exactly say he "came out" to people at work, but he doesn’t guard his words as carefully as he once did.  And no one cares that he lives with Bruce and really isn't having an affair with me like they once all thought.  I wouldn't say he's totally cured of his neuroses.  He still arranges the desks in his classroom "two squares" apart, and when he forgets his lean turkey sandwiches for lunch he will forego eating completely.  But I don't worry as long as he weighs more than I do.  For a while that was getting hard to do because as Billy's weight plummeted, mine was skyrocketing.  In disgust one day I volunteered to God to take Billy's eating disorder away from him by making it my own for a time.  I wouldn't say that’s what happened, but I did manage to lose most of the weight I'd put on in the last two years.14

If any good came out of this, it was that we all started facing our demons.  Well, I'm not real sure about Pennie, but I think she has wrapped herself in a cocoon that shields her from the realities of her existence.  But if she thinks she's happy that way and she isn't hurting herself or anyone else, what does it matter?  We're all hanging on better than before because our friendships have withstood looking death in the eye.  15