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Back Dear Universe Save as PDF
Contents (64)
  1. Copyright
  2. Contents
  3. Prologue
  4. {OCTOBER}
  5. Days ’til prom: Eons
  6. 1
  7. SECOND HALF OF SENIOR YEAR {JANUARY}
  8. Days ’til prom: 103
  9. 2
  10. Days ’til prom: Still 103
  11. 3
  12. Days ’til prom: 100
  13. 4
  14. Days ’til prom: Still 100
  15. 5
  16. Days ’til prom: 89
  17. {FEBRUARY}
  18. Days ’til prom: 83
  19. 6
  20. Days ’til prom: Still 83
  21. 7
  22. Days ’til prom: 65
  23. Days ’til prom: 64
  24. 8
  25. Days ’til prom: 61
  26. Days ’til prom: 57
  27. 9
  28. {MARCH}
  29. Days ’til prom: 51
  30. 10
  31. Days ’til prom: Still 51
  32. 11
  33. Days ’til prom: 50
  34. 12
  35. Days ’til prom: 49
  36. Days ’til prom: 48
  37. 13
  38. Days ’til prom: Still 48
  39. 14
  40. Days ’til prom: Seems irrelevant now
  41. 15
  42. Days ’til graduation: 31
  43. 16
  44. Days ’til graduation: 30
  45. 17
  46. {APRIL}
  47. Days ’til graduation: 17
  48. 18
  49. Days ’til graduation: 11
  50. Days ’til graduation: 6
  51. 19
  52. Days ’til graduation: 5
  53. 20
  54. Days ’til graduation: Still 4
  55. 21
  56. Days ‘til graduation: Still 2
  57. 22
  58. Days ’til graduation: Still 2, but minus a few hours
  59. Epilogue
  60. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  61. PRAISE FOR
  62. Dear Universe
  63. PRAISE FOR
  64. Love & Other Carnivorous Plants

“So, let me do something,” he cries. “You never let me do anything.”

“Because you can’t do anything!” she screams. Her shoulders slump, and she slides to the ground with her face in her hands. My dad pushes his other arm through his shirt, and the only sound in the room is the fabric sliding over his head.

“Maybe I shouldn’t have pushed it,” she says softly, “and I’m sorry, Scott, if you felt ignored. I want you to have as much say in everything as you can, but sometimes I have to step in and make decisions.”

He crosses his arms. “I’m never going to one of those things again. And no more hospital or doctors. I don’t care if I have a stroke. I’d rather lie there and die than go through that prison again. They wanted to poison me,” he says, his voice rising like he might cry.

I touch my throat, hoping to push the lump in it down, but it’s getting bigger and bigger. My mom crawls over and puts her head in his lap. At first his arms are stiff, but then he touches her hair. I turn away and make for the stairs. All the things I haven’t felt, every instance ignored, every time I was an asshole when really I was just scared, every time I looked away, comes rushing up my esophagus. This is what I was afraid of. To see how it hurts and then to feel it: from my dad, from my mom, from myself. I want to hide in my room if I’m going to cry, because if I start crying I might not stop. But at the last minute I bow my head and squat down next to my parents.

“Hey, Dad?” I say, but my voice hardly makes a sound. Why is it so hard to show the people we love the most how much that is? Why is it so hard to show how scared we are and just the vastness of it all, how much there actually is inside me, and all of us? It’s like there’s a whole universe in there.

I wrap my arms around him, resting my cheek on the back of his sweater. His arm jerks a little under mine, and I can’t keep it in anymore. Everything from the last few years and the last few months and the last few days condensates. I cry like the first day I was born. The tears lead to more tears, and eventually I get into some deep belly crying and hiccuping.

“I’m sorry, Dad,” I say, voice muffled in the soft fabric. “I’m so sorry.”

17

{APRIL}

Days ’til graduation: 17

HERE’S THE THING ABOUT HIGH SCHOOL. AND TIME. AND herpes. (Okay, everything, I guess.) It doesn’t need my help. Even if I stop counting down the days to prom, the days still get closer to prom. Even if I look away while my dad gets sicker, he still gets sicker. Even if I start a rumor that Helga has herpes, she doesn’t actually have herpes. (I didn’t start that rumor, okay?)