Levitating Las Vegas(8)
Author: Jennifer Echols

It wasn’t funny. Tamping down his panic, Elijah turned to his mom. “Hereditary? Did Dad have it?”

His mom took a deep breath and held it.

“Dad didn’t die in a drunk driving accident like you told me, did he?” Elijah asked. “He had this disease and he did something horrible.” His mom had always been vague about the details of his dad’s untimely death. Now Elijah knew why. It had been a lie, for good reason. The truth was worse.

His mom let out her breath slowly. “He wasn’t on medication. You’re in much better shape.”

Dr. Gray patted Elijah’s arm and handed him a glossy pamphlet. “This will tell you more about the disease. Just take your medicine, Elijah”—he picked up the prescription bottle on a nearby table and rattled the pills inside—“and I think you’ll be fine. If you’re not, we’ll move to the next step.” He rose, and Elijah’s mom followed him to the doorway of the examining room, where they talked softly together.

Elijah opened the pamphlet, which was decorated ironically with butterflies, rainbows, and stick people hugging each other. Somebody down at the crazy people’s print shop had a sense of humor.

LIVING WITH MENTAL ADOLESCENT DYSFUNCTION

The news that a patient has mental adolescent dysfunction (MAD) can be devastating, both for the family, who had expected a normal, healthy life for their child, and for the patient amid an already turbulent adolescent period. Patients and their families should take comfort in the knowledge that a diagnosis of MAD no longer mandates a lifetime in a mental institution. A new drug makes normal life possible in many cases. Mentafixol suppresses the symptoms of the disease and enables most patients to enjoy an average lifespan. In fact, all known assaults by patients with MAD were committed when the patient was off medication.1

1 JA Gray, “Mental Adolescent Dysfunction: Long-Term Prognosis,” Journal of Mental Illness.

Elijah frowned at the pamphlet and ran his thumb over a rainbow. He’d been on a wild ride, a strange mix of fact and fiction, he realized now. If only the whole thing were his imagination. Especially the part where Mr. Diamond and Mr. Starr ganged up on him to keep him away from Holly.

Elijah’s mom returned alone and sat at his bedside again. “I’m so sorry, honey.” She picked up his fist and kissed it.

He looked down at his hand in hers. Shouldn’t his knuckles be bruised from punching Mr. Starr in the eye? Maybe the adrenaline from the disease had given him superhuman strength and resilience, like an addict on crack.

Then he looked up at his mom, still young and pretty, with long black hair and dangling turquoise earrings that showed pride in their Native American heritage. Yet for some reason, she was terrified they’d have to live on the reservation—she called it the “Res”—and he sensed one of those lectures coming on.

“You’ve got to be careful now,” she said. “People are prejudiced against the mentally ill. Don’t tell anybody about your disease.”

“I won’t,” Elijah promised. If he did, he would never hear the end of it from the lacrosse team. Worse, what would Holly think? He was almost glad she’d broken their dates. She deserved better than a mental patient. What if he’d gone out with her and hurt her?

“And for God’s sake, stay away from that girl,” his mom said. “Don’t even talk to her. Mr. Starr and Mr. Diamond were understanding of your condition and promised to keep it quiet. But that’s it for you and me, Elijah. Mr. Diamond says if you have another episode, I might have to withdraw you from Holly’s school, or I could get fired altogether, and then I wouldn’t be able to take care of you. You might end up at the Res. You don’t know what the Res is like, Elijah. Promise me you won’t pull any more Romeo and Juliet shit on me. There are plenty of pretty girls you can ask out. Let this one go.”

The next morning, Elijah had trouble getting out of bed, but his mom shook his shoulder incessantly and hissed at him that he had to go to school so no one would suspect anything was wrong. He walked into first-period English on the bell, as usual. Holly was the brightest point in his day, as always, her shining brown curls cascading over her shoulders, her dark brown eyes wide. But she cast them down at her desk the instant she saw him.

He crossed to the opposite side of the room and sat down, all the while reaching over the rows for her thoughts. He tried to read her mind, jonesing for the tingles that had spread through him when he’d read minds the night before. He wanted that feeling from her. But she kept her head down, poring over their Shakespeare textbook, with hardly a sideways glance at the guy she’d just dumped.

He opened his own book. His life wasn’t over, he assured himself. He would keep his grades up, pull his weight on the lacrosse team, make the most of high school despite his illness, and try his best not to worry his mom. Only one thing had changed irreparably since yesterday: there was nothing left between him and Holly but regret.

2

PRESENT DAY

Kaylee Michaels saw Holly walking toward her across the casino floor and felt her face light up. When Mr. Diamond had taken in Kaylee a year ago, he’d made her head of security at the casino though she’d been only twenty-one years old at the time. She was at the height of her mind-changing powers, the strongest person seeking refuge at the casino besides the many teenagers and twenty-somethings drugged with Mentafixol. The burden of the responsibility weighed on her every second, but she accepted it, seeing her job as a way to atone for the terrible things she’d done while she was at the Res.

Holly was her window onto the carefree life of a college girl. When Kaylee had first arrived, Mr. Diamond had encouraged her to befriend Holly and rent an apartment with her. He pointed out that, during her senior year of college, Holly would get the freedom from her parents that she’d longed for, yet Kaylee could still keep her safe. What had started as a business transaction had unexpectedly turned into Kaylee’s closest relationship ever. Despite herself, Kaylee had let her defensive walls crumble in front of this bubbly girl, and they’d been the unlikeliest of best friends since.

Now Holly glimpsed Kaylee and galloped toward her between two rows of slot machines, long brown curls bouncing, somehow looking even more glamorous in jeans and sandals than she ever did in her magician’s-assistant getup. She was leading a man by the hand. A handsome, clean-cut man about their age, but still. Even as Kaylee switched her bag of Thai food to her left hand and put out her right to greet him, her senses went on alert.