Schizo Read Free Page A

and cawed and fought to get in.
    Honestly, I’m not sure how long I stayed there curled up on the cold gray concrete floor, or who first heard me screaming in terror, but no one could get the door open, so the fire department had to come and break through the lock with an ax.
    Of course, I thought the firemen were the crows coming to take me, so I screamed even louder when I saw them and tried to run and I had to be tied down and then sedated.
    It was an entire day later that I came to in the hospital.
    I woke up and the doctor explained my diagnosis—starting me on my first round of medications.
    They kept me on lockdown for another seventy-two hours, until finally my mom and dad brought me home.
    And it was only then, over four days later, that I found out about Teddy.
    No one had been watching him while I was screaming for help locked in the bathroom.
    No one had been watching . . . and no one knew what happened.
    When the police arrived, they found a witness who told them she’d seen a boy fitting Teddy’s description getting into a Ford Explorer with a middle-aged white man—tall and thin and balding. An Amber Alert was immediately issued. They posted flyers and ran advertisements.
    A few other people came forward as witnesses, too.
    And there were many false leads.
    But no real evidence ever surfaced as to Teddy’s whereabouts.
    He had disappeared.
    But, of course, there was also the other possibility.
    I mean, I hated to even let myself think about it, but the fact remained that the witness could have been wrong.
    Maybe the boy she saw was not Teddy.
    After all, Teddy had been out playing in the ocean by himself. The undertow, combined with a heavy riptide, could’ve easily been too strong for him.
    He could have been pulled out to sea.
    But I refuse to believe that.
    After all, his body was never found.
    And the cops and Coast Guard agreed it should have washed up on shore by now.
    Teddy had to be out there.
    Somewhere.
    He’d be nine years old now.
    It wasn’t completely unheard of. Just look at that Elizabeth Smart girl. She was missing almost ten months before they rescued her.
    Teddy could’ve been taken like that.
    I have this sense that he’s alive somehow. I’m not sure how to explain it. I just
feel
him—like he’s not that far away at all.
    Even if everyone else has given up hope.
    My mom, my dad, the police, the private investigator—they’ve all stopped looking for him. They assume he died that day, I guess, or has died since.
    But me? I can’t stop looking; I can’t give up hope.
    Because it was my fault.
    It was all . . .
    All of it . . .
    My fault.
    So what fucking choice do I have?

4.
    DR. FRANKEL LEANS FORWARD again, resting his meaty elbows on his short legs.
    â€œWell?” he asks, clapping his hands together. “Are you still fixated on that day at the beach?”
    I breathe out long and slow and go on, fighting back the tears.
    â€œI don’t know,” I lie. “I guess not.”
    â€œMiles. I can’t help you if you don’t talk to me. The medication can only do so much.”
    He frowns then. The clock tick-ticks on the table next to him.
    â€œI think maybe we should try upping the Abilify then, along with the Zyprexa. Does that sound agreeable to you?”
    â€œAgreeable?” I try to laugh a little, but it doesn’t come out right. “Not really—but I’ll do it.”
    Dr. Frankel picks up the bag of carrots again.
    â€œI promise you, Miles, you don’t have to keep blaming yourself for having this disease. It is a disease, after all—completely beyond your control. You understand that, don’t you?”
    â€œYeah. No, of course,” I say.
    He smiles. “And no one blames you, either.”
    The clock keeps on ticking.
    And now all I do is wait.

5.
    THE BUS GOING DOWN Geary toward our little house in Outer Richmond is an