Miracle (The Pagano Family Book 6) (2 page)

“Hey,” she said as she crossed the room and sat on the opposite side of the sofa.

Joey nodded and started the movie going again. They watched in silence for a while, then, just as Mr. Blonde was about to torture the cop, Manny picked up the remote from the space between them and paused the movie again.

“Everybody’s pissed at you.”

Joey just nodded again. If he’d have spoken, it would have been something brilliant like
Duh.

“They’re talking about you more than they’re talking about the wedding and the presents.”

He shrugged. Also duh. He was the family fuckup and the family project.

“Why are you being such an asshole?”

That surprised him. Sure, Manny always said whatever was on her mind without much filter, but he thought she understood what a suck it was to be him. Besides, she had freakouts, too.

“Please?”

“I like…I
love
you, Joe. You’re like my second-favorite Pagano. But you’ve turned into a whiny little bitch lately. Not to mention a lard-ass.”

Hurt feelings and shock threw up walls in his head right away, and he couldn’t even get his favorite word out. “F-f-fuck…”

Anticipating where he’d been trying to go, Manny shrugged. “Fuck you right back, buddy. You’re an asshole.”

His chest was going tight, and he sucked on his inhaler. “F-freaked…out.
FUCK
! Th…th-thought…you’d get it.”

“I get what happened at the church. You were right to leave before you lost it all over the wedding. I’m talking about your life, period.”

Now he was really angry. His heart pounded like a war drum. “Bitch….Like y-you’re…so normal.”

“Normaler than you. I work at it every fucking day. Every time I have to talk to somebody or go to the market or have dinner here when everybody’s talking all at once. Every day, I have to work to be a human being. It’s a lot better than it used to be, but it’s hard fucking work.
You
just sit around and eat junk food and pout. I bet you came back last night and felt sorry for yourself because nobody chased after you and fluffed your pillow and made sure you were okay.”

So what if he had? Like usual, everybody had ignored him. “F-f-f-f—”

“Yeah, yeah, fuck me. Whatever. I’m gonna go up and find Luca.” She stood and flicked a dismissive hand at the television. “Enjoy your vicarious badassness.”

“Easier…for you. Can talk.”

Manny stopped and turned back. “You could, too. When you were doing therapy, you were a lot better. All the things fucked up in your life—you did them to yourself.”

He barked a hoarse, gasping, bitter laugh at that ridiculous statement. “Yeah…sh-shot…myself.”

“No. But you gave up. You quit. That’s on you.” She turned and went back upstairs.

Joey flipped off the empty space where she’d been standing. Then he started his movie again.

Fuck her. Fuck them all.

~ 1 ~

It was Christmas before John would speak to him.

After presents, he and Katrynn took control of the day
again
with the news that she was pregnant. Married at the beginning of the month, pregnant by the end. The whole damn holiday season had been about them.

In the clamor of congratulations, Joey took the opportunity to disappear back to Adele and Pop’s house.

He went to his room and took a shower, since Pop and Adele had practically dragged him out of bed that morning to go next door for presents, and they hadn’t given him a chance to do more than take his meds and shove his body into some clothes.

He always felt like he could breathe better in the shower, so he stayed in there until the hot water ran out. After he dried himself off, he wiped the mirror, preparing to shave, but for some reason, his scar, which he’d seen every day for more than ten years and barely noticed anymore, caught his eye. It was red and a bit puffy from the heat of the water. He had more scars than this one—scars from being a dumb daredevil of a kid, from fighting, from getting the shit kicked out of him when he’d been working for the Uncles, from surgeries—but this one was the worst one. The one that had ruined his life.

Staring into the steamy glass of the mirror, Joey ran his fingertip along the uneven flesh of the scar. Then, for some reason, his eyes decided to catalogue his whole body. Generally, he tried not to see much of himself.

There was a time, before he had that scar on his chest, and even again since, for a few years, that he’d had a good body, and he’d spent some time at the mirror, admiring himself, taking selfies and posting them online. He’d worked hard at his look. His family was maniacally active—surfing and running and hiking and even fighting—and they all looked it, but Joey had, like his brother Luca, put real effort into bulking up. He and Luca had similar builds: big and broad, like their father. Weightlifter bodies. Carlo and John were both taller and leaner. Ottermode guys.

After the shooting, Joey had been weak like an old man for a long time, and he’d gotten skinny and flabby. But while he’d been in therapy, he’d built a lot of the tone back. He hadn’t been shredded like he’d been before, but he’d had definition, and he hadn’t minded being on the beach again, even though surfing and most cardio activity was still and would forevermore be beyond him.

Now, though…fuck, look at him. When had he gotten so fucking fat? He poked at his side and watched his finger sink into the flab. Fuck.

Why was he looking? Why did he care? It wasn’t like he was going to be in a position to get naked with a woman ever again. So what did it matter?

There was a knock at his bedroom door, and Joey rolled his eyes. He’d hoped they wouldn’t have even noticed he was gone.

“Joe.”

That was John’s voice. Joey’s heart sped up, and his throat threatened to tighten. His brother had literally not said a single word to him since the wedding. Not at family dinners, not at Mass, not during Christmas presents earlier that day. Nothing. He’d made an obnoxious display of snubbing him.

Joey took a breath. “Yeah.”

“We need to talk.”

“F-fuck off.”

John responded to that with a knock on the door and nothing else. Joey didn’t think that meant he was so lucky that John had given up, so he bailed on the idea of shaving and got dressed. He took his time about it, though.

John was in the kitchen, leaning against the counter by the sink, his arms crossed. Rather than the usual ‘fuck-you’ sneer he’d been wearing whenever he turned Joey’s way, he now seemed merely expectant. Possibly even sympathetic.

Joey went to the fridge and pulled out a carton of eggnog. John said nothing as Joey poured himself a glass. He didn’t offer his older brother one.

Before he took a drink, he said, “So talk.”

“You can’t spend Christmas Day over here by yourself.”

Joey shrugged and finished his eggnog. When he set the glass on the counter, John picked it up and rinsed it out. Like he couldn’t trust Joey to clean up even that bit of mess.

“Jesus, Joe. What the fuck is with you lately? Crawling back to live with Pop and Adele was bad enough, but for weeks, you’ve been acting weird as shit. What happened?”

Joey shrugged again—because he didn’t want to talk, and because he didn’t have an answer. The big answer, the easy one he always gave when he felt inclined to give one, was that there was no point. His life was shit, and it would always be shit. He’d just finally faced that reality.

But that wasn’t new, and John was right—the past few weeks, he’d felt like he was swirling down the drain. Since that freakout at John’s wedding, he’d been just this side of suicidal.

No—he’d been actually suicidal, except that he didn’t want to spend eternity in hell, and since he wasn’t crazy, that was where he’d end up. Still, it wouldn’t be a bad thing to cash in, and he’d been wishing for it pretty much daily.

As long as it wasn’t because his lungs stopped. Not being able to breathe was some fucked-up shit.

Like all their family, John was used to having one-sided conversations with Joey, so he wasn’t bothered by body-language responses. He just filled in the silence himself. “I’m worried, little bro. Everybody is. Tell us what you need. There’s not one of us who won’t help you get it.”

He needed to be able to talk. He needed to be able to breathe and not become a gasping, blue-faced moron at the slightest stress or excitement. He needed to have a life of his own, like everybody else got to have. There was nothing he could do to have that, and nothing they could do to help.

He shrugged again.

John’s sympathetic expression sharpened into anger. “Let me lay it out this way, dude: Pop is dying. He’s got a few months left. He’s afraid he’s leaving you to fade away. He’s over there crying over his Christmas muffins because he can’t save you. Give him some goddamn peace of mind, you asshole. Show him you still have some fucking fight left in you. As long as he’s with us, at least pretend to give a fuck.”

John pushed himself away from the counter. “Now, you’re going to walk over to the house, or I am going to drag you, but you are going to spend our father’s last Christmas with your goddamn family, you selfish piece of shit.”

~oOo~

“Gwee-sepp Pagano?”

Jesus. Seriously? A receptionist in Boston didn’t know how to pronounce an Italian name? Joey tossed aside the copy of
Sports Illustrated
and went to the little redhead in blue scrubs with a flowered top. Women who worked in medical offices always dressed so fucking cheerfully. Like manic clowns. Except doctors. Male or female, doctors were all business.

“Giuseppe,” he pronounced correctly. His own name usually came right out. “Just Joey.”

“Sorry!” she cheered, though it was clear she hadn’t really paid attention to what he’d said. “This way, please.”

After the usual routine of weight—holy shit!—temperature, and blood pressure, Cheery Flower set a paper gown on the examining bench thing and, with a perky pat, told him to take his shirt off and the doctor would be right in.

He took off his shirt and ignored the stupid paper gown. Waiting for the doc to come in, he occupied himself by staring hatefully down at his gut. When the fuck had that happened?

A light knock on the door, and the doctor came in—and, awesome, she was hot. Blonde-streaked dark hair and big green eyes. Tits for days under her white coat. Just great. Joey sucked in his gut, then couldn’t think why he’d bothered and let it sag right back out.

“Hi, Mr. Pagano. I’m Dr. Turillo.” She held out her hand.

Cold hand. Short nails, no polish. “Just Joey. Hi.”

“It’s nice to meet you. Before I examine you, I’d like to talk for a few minutes, if that’s okay.”

Yeah, right. Like that was no big deal. Still, he shrugged.

She sat and tapped around on a tablet for a few seconds. “So you’re here on a referral.”

Joey took a slow breath and prepared himself for the Mt. Everest that this explanation would be. It would be easier for him to just write it out, but he fucking hated that. Even stuttering and pausing his way through a sentence wasn’t as humiliating as handing over a damn note and sitting there like he’d just presented an excuse from his mom.

“Yeah…my…d-d-doc… …retired. Need a…new one. S-start…th-th-th…” Fuck. The word ‘therapy’ slammed against the side of his brain maze. He could think it, but his fucking mouth had no idea how to make it.

What went on in his brain was unpredictable. Sometimes, he couldn’t find the word he wanted at all. He knew he knew it, but it wasn’t where it was supposed to be. Sometimes, it was right there, ready and waiting, and he couldn’t get it out. Sometimes, he could get part of the word, his tongue just catching the first syllable, but the rest would fall away. They were maddening in their own ways, and from word to word he had no idea what was going to hang him up. It made every fucking sentence he had to say like a mental marathon.

Dr. Turillo had cocked her head and frowned as he’d slogged through that stunted explanation. “Aphasia. Anomic?”

He nodded. God, he loved yes/no questions.

She tapped her tablet some more and then found something she wanted to read. Joey sat and watched, relieved to have the quiet.

“And restrictive lung disease. Both due to trauma, more than ten years ago.” She looked up at him. “And no improvement in all that time?”

Joey could have cried. The explanation she needed was not a yes/no answer. She needed a goddamn essay. He stared helplessly, hopelessly, trying to figure out how he’d find all the words he’d need and knowing there was no way in hell it would happen.

He used to bring a sibling, or his father, to appointments with him, so they could talk for him in situations like this. But he was thirty-fucking-five years old. Almost thirty-six. If he was going to make this effort to get a life, any kind of life, back, he couldn’t do it with somebody holding his hand.

But he didn’t know what to do right now.

Dr. Turillo smiled kindly and opened a drawer in the cabinet. She pulled out a notepad and a pen. “Can you write fluently?”

Much more fluently than he could speak. He nodded and held out his hand. Feeling relieved and self-conscious in equal measure, he described, as succinctly as possible, the past ten years of his history: the couple of years of intensive therapy right after the shooting, the continuing therapy for the next few years, the high point of his recovery. He skipped over the part about why he’d stopped, but explained the ground he’d lost and what he wanted now, and why he’d come all the way to Boston to get it.

When he was done, he tore off the pages and handed them to her, then sat there, feeling silly, while she read them.

“You’ve lost a lot in the past few years.” She nodded at his belly. “And gained a lot, too.”

Great. She was a comedian. Joey shrugged and nodded.

“May I ask why you stopped therapy?”

He shook his head. Not her business.

“I ask because if we’re going to put together a therapy plan that gets you back some of what you lost, I need to know if there’s a psychological dimension we need to consider. Depression? Stress?”

“Not…nuts.”

She gave him a maternal, disappointed look. “Depression would be a fairly sane reaction to the trauma you experienced and your difficulties since.” After studying her tablet some more, she said, “You’ve gained thirty-seven pounds since the last notation in your record, and that was three years ago, when you spent ten days in intensive care with double pneumonia.”

He knew his own history.