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“Of course.”

I dial the 800 number, enter my PIN, dial Nia.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Nia, it’s me.”

“Craig, where are you?”

It’s funny how people ask that as soon as they get you on the phone. I think it’s a byproduct of cell phones: people—girls and moms especially—want to nail you down in physical space. The fact is that you could be anywhere on a cell phone and it shouldn’t be important where you are. But it becomes the first thing people ask.

“I’m at a friend’s house. In Brooklyn.”

I wonder, too, how many lies cell phones have contributed to the world.

“Uh-huh, Craig. I don’t think so.”

“What do you mean?” I wipe sweat off my brow. The sweat is starting again. This isn’t good. I was sweating down in the ER, but I wasn’t sweating at lunch.

“You’re not at any friend’s house. You’re probably at some girl’s house.”

I look at Ebony. She smiles and leans forward on her cane. “Yeah, totally.”

“I know you. Last night you had me on the phone; tonight you’re out hooking up with some girl.”

“Sure, Nia—”

“Seriously, how are you? Thanks for calling back. I was worried.”

“I know, I got your message.”

“I don’t want you to freak out over me. I think you just need some time to decompress a little bit, and not think about me, and think about someone else. Because, like, I know we might be good for each other, but I’m with someone else, you know?”

“Right . . . um . . . I wasn’t freaking out about you last night, actually.”

“No?”

“No, I was freaking out about, like, much bigger things. I was having kind of a crisis, and I wanted to reach out to somebody who understood.”

“But you asked me if we would ever have been able to be together.”

“Well, I was trying to clear that up because, y’know . . . I wanted to do something stupid.”

She drops her voice: “Kill yourself?”

“Yeah.”

“You wanted to kill yourself over me?”

“No!” I scowl. “I was just in a really bad place, and you were part of it, obviously, because you’re a part of my life, just like Aaron is a part of it and my family is a part of it, but I thought you could clear something up for me before I. . .”

“Craig, I’m so flattered.”

“No, you have the wrong idea. Don’t be flattered.”

“How could I not be? I never had a boy want to kill himself for me before. It’s like the most romantic thing.”

“Nia, it wasn’t about you.”

“Are you sure?”

I look down, and the answer is right there in my chest and it’s resounding. “Yes. I have bigger problems than you.”

“Ah, okay.”

“And you shouldn’t assume that everything is always about you.”

“Whatever. What’s wrong with you?”

“Nothing. Everything’s a lot better now, actually.”

“You’re acting like a total dick. Do you want to come out tonight?”

“I can’t.”

“Did Aaron call you? We’re having a big party at his house.”

“Right. I’m probably not going to be partying for . . . like . . . a while. Like ever, maybe.”

“Is everything okay now?”

“Yeah, I’m just. . . I’m figuring some things out.”

“At your friend’s house.”

“Correct.”

“Are you like in a crack den, or something?”

“No!” I yell, and just then President Armelio walks up to me: “Hey, buddy, you want to play spades? I’ll crush you.”

“Not now, Armelio.”

“Who’s that?” Nia asks.

“Leave him alone, he’s talking with his girlfriend.” Ebony taps Armelio with her cane.

“She’s not my girlfriend,” I whisper at her.

“Who’s that?”

“My friend Armelio.”

“No, the girl.”

“My friend Ebony.”

“Where are you, Craig?”

“I gotta go.”

“All right. . .” Nia trails her voice off. “I’m glad you’re doing . . . uh . . . better.”

“I’m doing a lot better,” I say.

She’s done, I think. She’s done, and you’re done with her.

“See ya, Craig.”

I hang up.

“I think that’s over,” I say to myself.

Then I decide to announce it to the halclass="underline" “I think that that’s over!” Ebony stomps her cane, and Armelio claps.

Something deep in my guts, below my heart, has made a shift to the left and settled in a more comfortable place. It’s not the Shift, but it’s a shift. I picture Nia with her gorgeous face and little body and black hair and pouty lips and Aaron’s hands all over her but also with her pot smoking and the pimples on her forehead and making fun of people all the time and the way she’s always so proud of how she’s dressed. And I picture her fading.

I play cards with Armelio in the dining room until Bobby pokes his head in:

“Craig? It says on your door Dr. Mahmoud is your doctor? He’s making his rounds.”

twenty-six

“I don’t want to be here,” I tell him at the entrance to my room, where I catch him before he visits Muqtada. “I don’t think it’s the place for me.”

“Of course not.” Dr. Mahmoud nods. He has on the same suit he had on earlier in the day, although that feels like last year. “If you liked it here, that would be a very bad prognosis!”

“Right.” I chuckle. “Well, I mean, everybody’s friendly, but I feel a lot better, and I think I’m ready to go. Maybe Monday? I don’t want to miss school.”

Also, doc, right now the phone messages and e-mails are bunching up and the rumors are flying. I just talked to this girland I did okaybut the Tentacles are coiled and the pressure is rising, getting ready to pounce on me when I leave. If I’m in here too long, I’ll have that much more to do when I get out.

“We can’t rush it,” Dr. Mahmoud says. “The important thing is that you get better. If you try to leave too soon—suddenly, everything is better?—we doctors get suspicious.”

“Oh. Well, you don’t want the doctor who can sign you out of the psychiatric hospital getting suspicious.”

“Right. Right now, to me, you look much better, but maybe this is a false recovery—”

“A Fake Shift.”

“I’m sorry?”

“A Fake Shift. That’s what I call it. When you think you’ve beaten it, but you haven’t.”

“Exactly. We don’t want one of those.”

“So I’m going to be here until I have the real Shift?”

“I don’t follow.”

“I’m going to be here until I’m cured?”

“Life is not cured, Mr. Gilner.” Dr. Mahmoud leans in. “Life is managed.”

“Okay.”

I’m apparently not as impressed by this as he would like. He arches back: “We don’t keep you here until you are cured of anything; we keep you here until you are stable—we call it ‘establishing the baseline.’”

“Okay, so when will my baseline be established?”

“Five days, probably.”

One, two, three . . . “Thursday? I can’t wait until Thursday, Doctor. I have too much school. That’s four days of school. If I miss four days I will be so behind. Plus, my friends. . .”