BY THE TIME we get to the meditation place, I am calm and even a little excited to try it. I will keep an open mind, I keep repeating as we drive over. I will not make jokes out of every little thing.
This is immediately challenging, because Thomas and Laurelei did not tell me that we would be meditating in a kids’ classroom in a church. All around us on the walls are colorful posters with Bible sayings on them. One features an electrical socket and a cord plugging into it. It is unclear why, or what the hell that has to do with the accompanying saying: “Since I live, you also will live.” Another has a lightning bolt and reads, “Go into all the world and preach the Good News to everyone.”
I get the feeling you get when some girl you really like and want to talk to has food stuck in her teeth and you think, Oh no, not her too. I thought Thomas and Laurelei said they gave up religion. Aisha has an alarmed look on her face as well. I tug on her sleeve. “We don’t have to do this.”
She doesn’t give in to my tug. “I kinda want to try.”
“We can meditate outside. Or you can, and I’ll just pretend, since it isn’t actually a thing.”
Aisha walks over to Laurelei, who is helping a woman clear desks out from the middle of the room. “All the religious stuff pretty much makes my head explode,” she says.
Laurelei finishes moving the desk and puts her hands on Aisha’s shoulders. “This isn’t a Christian meditation. Don’t worry about any of that. It’s simply the room we use because it’s empty at this hour.”
Aisha nods and says, “I guess I can always leave if y’all start with the Jesus.”
Laurelei laughs. “Tell you what. We’ll leave too. Okay?”
Aisha looks back at me, and I shrug. Fine. Whatever.
Thomas and Laurelei put down their mats and greet the other six or seven meditators warmly. The leader, an old woman with gray hair and a body that looks almost elastic from the way she sits tall while folding her legs in front of her so effortlessly, explains that we will use the next thirty minutes to simply be together, in silence. We are grateful for this time, and we thank our higher power for it.
At the mention of a higher power, my throat tightens. That sounds like God to me.
“Praying,” she says, “is talking to God. Meditating is listening.”
I look over at Aisha. I’m not so sure God is tuned to our church in north-central Wyoming. He may be a little busy with the people in Africa and the Middle East to talk to a bunch of happy old folks and two wayward teens in Thermopolis.
The leader ends her introduction by saying that we will accept exactly where we are. Sometimes thoughts are hard to put away. If they come, we will welcome them. We will acknowledge them, and then we will let them float away. We don’t need to focus on them. We will allow our minds to be as they are, and we will not judge ourselves harshly.
The last part almost makes me laugh. Right, starting this very minute, I will stop judging myself harshly. This seems likely.
I take a deep breath, trying to move past the idea of God and into our harmless little meditation session. Okay, I think. I guess this is fine. I guess it’s cool. I can try this.
Then the silence begins, and my brain is on fire.
Okay, thoughts and visions, I say to myself. I welcome you. Howdy.
Howdy howdy howdy howdy howdy.
Hello hello hello hello.
C’mon. Nothing. Think of nothing.
God! God! God! HELLO THERE, YOUNG CARSON! YOU SHALL KILL YOUR FIRSTBORN SON, OR I SHALL SMITE YOU.
I shake my head, trying to spin the thoughts out. I toss them onto the floor beside me. I open my eyes and look around. The room is very still. Aisha is very still.
A rare Billings memory floats by. Watching cartoons with Dad on Sunday mornings. He’d bundle me up in blankets on the floor in front of the television, and he’d lie on the couch, and we’d watch The Mouse and the Monster and Space Strikers, plus old-school cartoons like Road Runner. I was warm and whole and happy. Dad made me feel that way.
My throat catches. Something unwelcome trembles my body, a wave of cold and static and tingle. I close my eyes tighter, shake my head.
You’re free to go, the voice says.
No. No. No.
No.
Let the thought be?
Okay. Fine. I’ll let the thought be.
You’re free to go, says the voice. A male voice.
We are in the kitchen. They are, anyway. Mom’s head is buried in her hands, and she is making cat noises, it sounds like. Dad is saying words. I am holding a red ball. I stand in the hallway alone. It’s playtime. Dad said he’d come home and we’d play in the backyard, but he’s late. It’s too dark to go out, but I’ve been waiting up. I’ve built a fort in my bedroom out of pillows. I fell asleep under the fort, but then the door slammed and voices shouted and I came out to see, to listen, and Mom is on the kitchen floor and and I am confused.
“You’re free to go,” Dad says, and to my three-year-old brain, she seems to be meowing.
I hold the ball between my hands. I try to crush it. I can’t. The harder I push, the harder it pushes back. Mom’s wailing hurts my ears. It makes my chest feel like it’s going to cave in. I want to make it stop. I need to make it stop. Moms are big people. They are not cats. They are not supposed to wail.
Daddy? Mommy? Did I say those words? I think I did. But no one heard. No one came.
Then the world ripped in half.
Her: “I’m taking Carson. We’ll leave in the morning. Is that what you want?”
Him: “What I want is for you to leave me the fuck alone.”
Her: “You’re a disgrace. You’re a failure of a man.”
Him: “Tell me about it.”
Her: “You’re losing your son.”
Him: “Bound to happen.”
My throat feels so tight. I don’t want to think about this. I never goddammit want to think about this why did you make me think of this stop it stop it stop it!
I jump up and run out of the room. I swing open the church door and sprint to Aisha’s car. This was a big mistake. Aisha will come out soon, and we’ll say we’re sorry but we can’t stay. I tried and I failed.
Minutes go by. A lot of them. I check my cell phone. No messages. Why would I have messages? I never do. I turn and look out into the distance, this mountain range with just a hint of snow on the top, framed by a juicy blue sky that makes me thirsty. Across the street there’s a bar, and I get this crazy idea again. Maybe just one drink? Maybe they’d serve me?
I stare at the bar until my eyes blur and there are two of them, two bars, side-by-side, drifting in and out of each other as I focus and unfocus my eyes. This is how it starts, probably. This is how I become my destiny. My dad. My granddad. A drunk. I make myself turn away.
And then I turn back toward it. I can do this and no one will know. I’ll sit in a bar in Bumfuck, Wyoming, and drink a beer like an adult who is free to do whatever the hell he wants, because my dad is dying, and my mother doesn’t care, and my best friend is better than I am. Why not?
I walk to the bar, and again I’m two people. One is saying, What are you doing, Carson? You know better than this. The other is saying, One, shut the fuck up. I’m living my life.
Inside, the bar is dark and somber. There’s a guy at the far end, nursing a beer. His grizzled, pruned-up face makes him look maybe a hundred and fifty, give or take ten years. A bartender in overalls sits on a stool behind the bar, reading a newspaper.