I Can't Hang

I’d managed to keep from breaking down for that long. My head was spinning too much to even think about shedding tears. But once the world stopped spinning and I was left all dizzy and queasy, then what?

Brady and I walked down and found the hotel we’d stayed in before. The sidewalks were abandoned and cold, a stark contrast from all the lights parading through the buildings as night was singing its song. Horns honked occasionally. Brady and I walked with a gap between us, too caught up in ourselves to notice one another.

My throat was dry and my hands were sweaty despite the chilly breeze blasting through. Brady was shivering and had his hands up to his mouth every ten seconds, blowing hot air into them. He only had on a scrunched-up-sleeved buttoned shirt and jeans – I couldn’t blame him.

This was a second chance. I was given the opportunity to redeem myself yet again. And I already knew I wasn’t gonna give it up and be an idiot.

“We gotta think of something fast,” he coughed, still racing along.

“I know.”

“But I don’t know anything we can do.”

“That’s the problem.” I hated having to come up with crap on the spot. “We gotta make it good, too.”

He stayed quiet for a moment. “Yeah. It’s…it’s gonna be tough.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Inspiration isn’t something that you think about for hours on end and then magically come up with some solution. You gotta wait for it. It’s supposed to come naturally – you don’t force it out.

I already knew that. Brady didn’t care.

He was already trying to come up with stuff as soon as we got back to our hotel. He took a bunch of toilet paper and started mapping crap with the crusty old pen left on our nightstand, scribbling on the makeshift material to try and make something comprehensible.

And to be honest, I had to give him credit. He was really trying this time. Said he had to help James out and be smart about it all.

The problem was that our hotel looked like complete crap then, with all those scrolls of blue-stained paper strewn across the beds. Looked like a wreck, and I’m sayin’ that nicely. I didn’t have to do with any of it, neither. Brady was the one coming up with all that stuff.

I was just waiting for inspiration. He decided to take matters into his own paws.

“How ‘bout we go into the Salvation Army and donate my credit cart to ‘em?” he suggested, pacing around the hotel.

I lay on my back on the bed, a killer migraine pounding in my head from having to listen to him jabber on. I wanted to sleep. It was dark outside, even – 10 PM. But I couldn’t fall asleep. Even if Brady shut up enough.

“That ought’a make us look good,” he said. It was so funny the way he acted, like he was onto some huge discovery.

“People’ll see us,” I stated, pointing out the obvious.

He froze. It looked like his world got shattered, and he smacked his palm into his forehead. “Damn it! I swear, we’re never gonna get back in…”

“Well, of course not,” I told him. “Not with that language.”

“We ain’t angels no more. I can say whatever the hell I wanna,” Brady boasted.

“Bullshit…”

“But you can’t. You’re a minor. That’s bad.” He said it quick and nonchalantly, turning back around and pacing some more. After a couple of minutes, he stopped and then threw his hands up in defeat.

I sat up reluctantly, mustering the little energy I had. “Can’t think of anything?”

He shot me a threatening stare. “I’m thinkin’ of more stuff than you are.”

“Yeah, and all your ideas are crap.”

“So? At least I ain’t lyin’ around, waitin’ for some kind of magical idea to bonk me on the head,” he sneered, hands on his hips.

“This ain’t the kind of thing you can just expect to surface after thinking for a day. It’s gotta come naturally.”

“We gotta get it done fast. What’re you, stupid?” he fired.

“I’m freakin’ smarter than you are! I’m not the reason we’re in this mess!” My voice was starting to get louder, and a surge of energy shot through my bones.

Brady pointed at me. “That’s -” he started, trailing off. Glancing at the ceiling, he turned purple and clenched his fists at his sides. “…Not true.”

I jumped off the bed, my palms facing upward. This was the most vigor I’d had in a while. “You were the one who made us go out and get food when we could’ve just sent James! You’re the reason we got kicked out!”

“You were all for it. You were all, ‘Yeah, we need fresh air!’” he mocked, imitating me by raising his voice and bending his wrists in a certain way. “I ain’t the only one.”

A burst of anger exploded in me. “Like hell! May I remind you that you were the one who provoked me to fall a week ago?!”

He looked at me like I had “dipshit” written on my forehead. “That was your fault. You fell off, not me. And for the record, I was the one who caught you. I kept you from making a bigger scene!”

“You were the one who decided it’d be a good idea to freakin’ take me to Heaven in the first place! Why didn’t you just get someone else to do it? Maybe then, you wouldn’t have pissed me off, and maybe then, we’d still be up there!” I shouted.

“I was the one who took you up because I thought we’d have somethin’ in common, okay? I knew you were an Atheist and I wanted to talk to you, ‘cause I was one too! Then I died – and I knew it was freakin’ crazy to have to go through all that and realize everything! I wanted to…” he trailed off, losing his steam. “I wanted to help you, a’right?”

I gnashed my teeth together. “You didn’t help me at all. You flung me into a phony world with all the big clouds and some weirdo God, and I very well could’a been happy. But nooo! You had to go all big-brother on me and get me in trouble!” Every possible emotion was flinging through my brain. “I’m a good kid. Really, I was.”

“Then if you’re so smart, and perfect,” Brady chastised, flapping his hands and doing that squeaky-voiced imitation of me, “then why’d you step in front’a that car in the first place, huh? Why didn’t you look around for a second before walkin’ out in front of it?”

“I…” I stammered. My heart fell.

“If you’re such a genius, why don’t you try to figure out how to get into Heaven again? Are you too smart for that? Is that it? Is hanging around dumb ol’ Brady too much for ya?!” he continued, odium flashing through his vitriolic words.

“No, I…”

He leaned forward expectantly, hands glued to his hips. “Kyle, I’m trying to help us out. I don’t think you realize that. When I said we were gonna stick together, I meant we’re gonna fuckin’ stick together.”

“All I’m saying is that you’re the reason why we’re in this mess,” I spoke calmly, still steamed a bit. “You took me to Manhattan when I died and had to have a little talk with me, and that ended up nearly blowing it altogether. And then, when all we had to do was lay low for two weeks, you push us into the world again and make us look like dumbasses on camera.”

He shut up. He rolled his tongue around in his mouth for a while and stared me down, but he definitely shut up.

It got harder for me to breathe; I found myself shaking. “It’s not fair. Jesus Christ, it’s not fair.”

His hateful glare softened a little bit.

“It was supposed to be just like any normal day. Life running its cycle. I’d go home and do it all over again the next day. But all ‘cause of one goddamn stupid mistake, I ended up here! Dead! Shocked like hell! All because of one dumb little split second. It’s not fair.”

Brady sunk down on the bed, sitting in front of me.

“I never knew it was gonna happen. I can’t predict that crap! I never got to say goodbye to anyone. I couldn’t tell my parents I loved ‘em before I kicked the bucket, I couldn’t tell the kids at school they weren’t never gonna see me again. And it sucks! It hurts!” My eyes began to burn and an invisible rope tightened around my chest.

Meanwhile, Brady was twiddling his thumbs patiently.

“And I got picked up by some pissed-off loser who tried to be my freakin’ dad or something, and he screwed my afterlife up! I’m supposed to be in Heaven right now, thankin’ my lucky stars that God gave me a second chance when I deserved it. But ‘cause of you,” I spat, pointing right in his face, “I’m stuck in a shitty hotel in shitty Manhattan, staking out and hoping I don’t caught and fed to Satan. And I’m stuck here with some guy I barely even know who thinks he’s some kind of hero to me, when really, all he is, is the reason why I wanna come back to life and kill myself!”

Time seemed to stop when I started crying. And those tears stung when they slid down my cheeks and seeped into my chapped lips. This wasn’t the kinda cryin’ you do when you got the blues or something little. This was the kind that really hurt. It hit you in the heart and made you wish you were never even born.

Brady absolutely froze. His eyes got all wide and his thumbs stopped twiddling. He blurred in front of me, the tears distorting the vision of him.

“This is your fault, and you damn well know it,” I hissed, unable to unclench my jaw.

He didn’t say anything. He only bit his lip.

I dug the sleeves of my hoodie into my eyes, desperately trying to soak up the stinging tears. I hated crying. I especially hated crying in front of other people. When I was little, I never shed tears in front of my peers or my parents. I sucked it up. But I never knew that someday, all that pain would come back to haunt me.

“It’s not fair,” I whimpered. I sounded like a wimp, but at that point I didn’t give a shit.

“Kyle, calm down,” Brady whispered, gesturing toward me. “I…”

I was full-on sobbing, shaking like a shaved Chihuahua with my knees wobbling all over the place and everything. My hands trembled intensely just like nearly every other part of my body; it was kinda scary, really.

“Kyle, I’m sorry,” he spoke lowly. All of a sudden, the air became still and thin, rather than thick with hatred. I could make eye contact with the guy without wanting to murder him.

I just stood there, staring at him blankly. I was still sobbing a little, but not nearly as much as before.

His face contorted up in a weird twist of emotion, and he slumped down even further like he was scared I’d pull a gun out and start shooting. “I mean, I…”

“You’re…sorry?”

“I am,” he mumbled, blushing. “I really am. I mean, I never really knew…about all that stuff you were talkin’ about…”

I shrugged halfheartedly. “No one does.”

Brady stood up slowly and sheepishly shuffled over to me. Then carefully, like he was full of fear or something, he kinda hugged me. It was weird. I’d never been really hugged before, so that might’ve been it. He pulled me close and buried his head in my shoulder, breathing in real deep and sighing heavily. He was soft, though. Took me off-guard.

“S’why I came to you in the first place,” he told me. “I had these real high hopes of us gettin’ along and everything, and talkin’ to you about real deep stuff. I was…I was stupid, I guess, about that…”

I closed my eyes and tried to picture myself in the stars, flying far away from Earth and getting away from everything that was wrong.

“So I’m sorry. Just…I never had a real family, you know? I was thinkin’ you could be it. And right now, even though you hate my guts, I still feel like you kinda are,” he said softly and slowly, like he didn’t wanna say it too fast ‘cause it’d break me.

“I’m not,” I coughed. He smelled like laundry detergent and old cologne.

“But…” He paused. “Well, I know that. That’s why I felt stupid ‘bout saying it.”

“You are stupid. You’re the dumbest guy I know. You screw everything up.” I didn’t care if what I was saying could drive somebody to suicide. I was speaking from too much stress. “You suck, I hate you, and I wish I never met you.”

He sighed real deep into my shoulder again, squeezing me tighter. “Christ, kid. You sound like my grandma.”

I felt like throwing up. It hurt so much to cry this bad, but I couldn’t stop. I’d never been that hysterical – probably ‘cause I’d never been in that position. I choked down the nausea and kinda hugged him back, but only a little bit, since I was still a little freaked out.

“All them other angels up there? Never talked to ‘em. I think I saw James once or twice and we made eye contact, and then I spoke business with a couple’a the others. But I never had a friend, you know? Never could relate to ‘em. Least, none that I came into contact with,” he explained, mumbling into my hoodie.

“Loser,” I coughed.

“I always take up dead people and get ‘em their wings. That’s what I do. I like doin’ it. You’re the first kid I met who was somethin’ like me. I mean, look at me. I never had a family. My parents were dead soon as I went into junior high. Lived with my freakin’ grandma,” he groaned, talking clearer as time went on. “Worked as a cab driver for a while after high school and moved out into an apartment. Couldn’t go to college. Too poor.”

“Sucks for you,” I said bluntly, still trying to calm myself down.

He loosened his grip on me and let me go, and I backed away. To me, he looked thirty years older, like some tired old guy who wanted to kill himself. Bags hung under his eyes. He wasn’t crying, per se, but I could definitely tell he wanted to – it was natural.

“So this is just another thing where I guess I was bein’ stupid and misjudged it,” he mumbled, sitting back down on the bed, slumping his shoulders forward. “Look, I realize you hate me right now and everything, and I totally understand. But for real, can we just look past the stupid shit that happened and just move on? ‘Cause we can’t get back to Heaven if we’re just gonna keep on fightin’ like this. We gotta stick together. I said it before.”

He looked up at me with hazel eyes that looked all sad and forlorn, sticking his hand out like he was trying to give me a handshake. I stared at him for a couple seconds, wondering what his deal was. I didn’t wanna kick the guy when he was down, especially since I just did that a few minutes before when I screamed at him for causing all of that crap. (Which he did.)

So I decided for it. I stuck my hand out, too, and shook his hand, and just then I felt some kinda happy aura in the room that dispelled all the crappiness that had just gone down. I didn’t feel like crying anymore. It was pretty cool. His age retracted thirty years and he looked like he did before, all young and stuff.

“We’re in this as two,” he whispered, not to me but to himself.