“I’m sorry,” I said, to Patricia who couldn’t hear me, and to the doctor, who didn’t care. I thought of our mother, asleep at home, soon to be confronted with this. She’d try, with good reason, to get Patricia to quit her show and go back into treatment, which she wouldn’t do. I sat in the padded chair next to her bed and watched her breathe, each breath like an accusation. I fell asleep sitting there.

At seven she woke up.

“Oh fuck,” she said.

“How do you feel?” I said.

“Terrible. I feel terrible.”

“God, I’m so glad you’re all right.”

“Well, I’m a junkie,” she said. “Have you talked to Mom?”

“I thought that could be your job,” I said.

“Jesus, she’s probably out of her mind. Give me my bag.”

She pulled her phone out and dialed.

“Hi, Mom? I’m okay. Yes, I’m okay, I promise…”

I walked to the waiting room and chugged a Diet Coke from the vending machine. Christmas morning.

My mother arrived a half hour later. She had dark circles under her eyes and she was wearing a bright red sweater with an enormous green bow on the front, a joke Christmas present from last year that had apparently been appropriated into unironic holiday wear. The doctors told us they wanted Tricia to stay in the hospital for a few more hours. I got my mother some coffee from a machine and sat down next to her.

“Do you ever think about how I’m going to feel when you finally kill yourselves?” she said.

“It was just bad luck,” I said. “This is the last time for this. We’re done now.”

“Why do you even come home?” she said.

“For you?” I said.

“Well, thanks, Steven. Really.”

“I’ll be gone soon enough,” I said. I was trying for ominous but I didn’t make it past petulant.

At noon I told my mother I was going home and instead drove into town blasting Wu-Tang’s 36 Chambers with my windows down, drawing glances of pitying forbearance from the strolling families of Princeton. I did this until the album started over for the third time, at which point my hands were so numb that it was a struggle just to turn the music off. I pulled into the empty parking lot by the bad sushi place.

There were so many choices: I could ask my father for money, drive west, change my life. Stick to weed. Send cards on birthdays and holidays. Learn to love myself and, eventually, someone nice and low-pressure. Raise chickens. Forgo procreation. Show up secretly to the premiere of Tricia’s first Broadway show and sit in the back, waiting until after the standing ovation to reveal myself. Be forgiven.