Drown #13: the story we tell, part 2

July 2086. Jeremiah Day is 29. Isabelle Gibson is 30. 

soundtrack: "Smile Like You Mean It," by The Killers

* sensitive content advisory for Drown #13, parts 1-7


If this was the game they wanted to play, then Jeremiah would play it. He would jump through their hoops. Tell him which hoops to jump through and how, and he would do it. He would answer all of their ridiculous questions. Jeremiah had never felt any less than physically strong and healthy. "But go on," he said. "Give it your best shot."


"Any loss of interest or pleasure in sex or hobbies?"

"No."

"Loss of energy? Excessive sleeping?"

"No."

"Feelings of worthlessness?"

"No, no, no."

"Fear that someone might be following you or trying to find you?"

"No."

"Voices arguing in your head or commenting on your actions?"

Jeremiah laughed.

"Intense personal relationships alternating between extremes of positive and negative feelings?"

"Maybe."

"Intense anger or lack of control?"

"Sometimes."

"Feelings of worthlessness?"

"I don't think so."

"Threats of self-harm?"

"Absolutely not."

All of the therapists looked long and hard at their notes and had a lot to write about Jeremiah.

"Feelings of abandonment?"

"Yes, people abandon me all the time."

"I can understand why you mention PTSD," they all said. "It’s a term that gets thrown around a lot. You were at war, you saw some things, it’s understandable that you jumped to that conclusion. But what I’m seeing here doesn’t feel like PTSD."

"What does it feel like?"

"We can work that out together," they said. "We can set up a treatment plan for you. We can try some medications. You don’t have to lose your daughter, but I can’t approve you to see her until you start treatment."

"I want a second opinion."

"You’re free to do as you like."

Jeremiah got a second opinion. He got a third.


The third doctor encouraged him not to seek out a fourth. "Let’s get you healthy instead," she said.

Jeremiah's third therapist was young and eager. She was maybe fresh out of medical school, which he hoped might work to his benefit. Although, she also wasn't on board with the PTSD idea and she also wrote pages and pages of notes about him.


His therapist said that each time he inflicted his anger on his ex-wife, he was choosing his vengeance over fatherhood. "Which is more important to you?" she asked him.

"Don’t be ridiculous," he said. "I love my daughter. Of course she’s more important."

"Then let that guide you," she said. "When you feel yourself getting angry, choose your daughter instead. I think it might help if we try some medication."

She said "we" as if she would be taking the pills, too. Jeremiah shook his head. "I don't want to be a zombie."

"If you don't like the way they make you feel, we can try another drug or a different dosage."

"You said it yourself, doc, I don't have PTSD. So there's nothing wrong with me."

His therapist wrote in her notebook for a long time. It made him nervous.

Jeremiah put on a resigned smile. "But if you think that's for the best, we can give it a shot."

He would show her a zombie if that was what she wanted to see, but he would not take those pills.

—

Jeremiah never felt like he lost touch with Bella Bradshaw, even though they hadn't had any contact in four years. On base, they played her soap opera constantly. Here on the ground, her animated feature had just gone to network cable and her voice was everywhere.

It made him think about the past about about all the things that could have happened differently.

He also heard through a mutual friend or two that she'd moved here to Fort Palmetto recently. He couldn't help but look her up. He wasn't going to knock on her door or anything, but if Bella was still Bella, then maybe she still liked to go on those long aimless walks she used to love in college. In the mornings, before it got too hot, somewhere with a nice breeze and some window shopping that she could count as exercise without breaking a sweat.


"Bella Bradshaw," he said.

"Oh, Jeremiah? Wow, what are you doing here?"

She looked around like she'd been set up for a joke.

"Fort Palmetto launch site, remember? This is a military town. I heard you moved here."

"Heard from who?"

"It doesn’t matter, he said. "So why are you dressed like a desperate housewife?"

"What?"

"You just look so different."

"Different, how?"

Not different in the face, but in the way she dressed—oversized denim shirt and ponytail. Even in the way she carried herself, it was like she repelled all of the vanity and attention that she used to crave. She looked like she'd let herself go, which he didn't say out loud.


"So I guess you came back from the moon," she said.

"I was on Europa, not the moon," he said. "You have no idea how foreign that could possibly feel. No one understands. You probably didn't think about me at all."

"Shut up. I probably thought of you once or twice."

She glanced around the waterfront park, not looking for anyone because it was ten in the morning on a Thursday and there was nobody around.

"You know, I'm really glad you made it back from space and everything, but I should get back. I have a neighbor looking after the kids, she's expecting me back."


"Hey, don't go," he said. "Let’s grab lunch, or a coffee, or, hell, we don't have to eat anything if you don't want to. Let’s catch up. Man, it’s good to see you again. Brings back old memories."

"Maybe let’s not do that," she said.

"What? Why?"


"Oh, Jeremiah, you know how we were. We were toxic together."

"So we fought a little."

"A little?"

"We matched each other."

She shook her head. "We matched each other like disaster multiplied."


"You used to call for me," Jeremiah said. "You said I abandoned you. You were right. I'm sorry and I shouldn't have done that."

"No, it’s for the best."

"It’s not."

"Don't you remember what you said to me? You said I had to work out my life on my own. You said you couldn't help me anymore. You said worse, really. I'm not mad at you for that. You said what you needed to say, and that was the end of it. I did learn to sort out my own problems. So, thank you, I guess."

"I didn't mean it," he said. "I needed you. I still do."

"What happened to your wife?"


"She left me."

Bella rolled her eyes. "What did you do?"

"I didn’t do anything. I was at war. She cheated on me with that fucking dweeb she went to school with. She took Willow. She won’t let me see Willow."

"Why won’t she let you see Willow? She really can't do that unless you did something, so what did you do?"

"I didn’t do fucking anything."


"Listen, I’m sorry, Jeremiah. That sucks. But it's like you said, we can't fix each other. I don’t think we should talk again."

"You were my best friend."

"Were we really friends? Really? I don’t know if we were friends."

"We were!"

"We were fuck buddies."

"I loved you," he said. "You were my first love."

"Well, you weren’t mine."

"This is about Cameron? You’re still hung up on Cameron?"

She made a face at him. "Haven't you let that go by now? Maybe it's because you've been away for so long. Listen, Jeremiah, we got married three years ago. It's done now. We have a family. We have three kids."

"Holy shit, when did you even have time to have three kids? You never could keep your legs closed, I guess."

He wasn't finished with that. He was a volcano of rage and vengeance. "It doesn't take much with you sluts, does it? Any old loser just waves his prick in your face and you're all over it. And look at you now, you're washed up already at thirty years old. He ruined you. You used to be the hottest damn thing around."


"Now you're just some dumpy housewife, and is that what you wanted? You were going to be famous, you used to say. Now you're following around that moron and popping out his babies like you have a clown car between your legs."


"It should have been me. You should have stayed with me. You ruined my life, too, because if you just would have stayed with me then none of this other shit would have happened."

She was already walking away.

It was like the rules of the universe had turned upside down. Bella always came back to him, even if it was just to play games. Bella was his first, and he was hers. She might have made him beg, but she never said no. Bella Bradshaw never said no to anyone.




But this girl wasn't his old Bella Bradshaw anymore. She thrust her knee into his crotch. Then, while he was buckled over in pain, she'd dug something out of her pocket. When he reached for her again, she pepper sprayed him in the face.

"You crazy fucking bitch! Why did you do that? Answer me! Bella!"

He couldn't see anything, but he could hear her hasty footsteps running away.

How could he stay calm and rational? His child was out there being raised by another man and it tore him up inside. She looked so much like him. She was his and he would have her back again. He would raise his daughter and she would love him in that perfect and unconditional way that children did. She would be everything that he needed.

He didn't need medication. He just needed his little girl back, then he'd be perfect. He was on the right track. He just had some things to work out, that was all.

Jeremiah didn't care for taking pills, but he did take one piece of advice from his therapist. She said that exercise might help. Meditation was a bust. It only made him bored and sleepy. So he took up boxing instead. That really did help. He loved the ferocious release that happened when his knuckles cracked into the fleshy bag.

—

notes: this chapter takes place five years previous to Bella of 2091 and these events. Not that they're meant to be related at all, but now I'm wondering if Jeremiah planted a seed of something that bubbled up five years later in some of what she said to Cam? Hmmm...