We Are Inevitable by Gayle Forman (read aloud txt) 📕

by the basket, but when I was twelve I popped one in my mouth and my throat went scratchy. I popped in another, and suddenly I couldn’t breathe. I was rushed to the ER in anaphylactic shock. It turned out I’d developed what’s called a latent allergy. “What a shame,” Mom said. “He loves strawberries.” To which the doctor had replied, “Unfortunately, sometimes the things we love can also kill us.”

No fucking kidding.

I open an IRS notice next; it’s in my name, threatening a penalty because apparently I have not filed a tax return. The bank statement brings more bad news: a balance decidedly low on digits. I look at Ira, calmly licking his finger as he turns the page, as if we were not at this very moment on the precipice of financial ruin.

How could he have let this happen? No, that’s not fair. I know how Ira let it happen. The question is: How did I?

I gather the bills and shove them in my waistband. Only when the bell over the door rings does Ira look up. “Heading out?”

“Yeah. To see a friend.”

Had Ira been paying a mote of attention, he would have known this was bullshit. I no longer have friends. The ones I once had are at college, and when they come back, if they come back, they don’t call me. I can’t really blame them. We’d always joked it was easy to separate the winners and losers in our town because there were no winners over the age of eighteen. By staying, I guess I joined team loser. The tragic irony of this is that to the people in our town, I’ve always been team loser.

I jog down Main Street, passing Jimmy’s as the lumberjacks spill out at five, which is when happy hour ends. I turn left on Alder, the only other commercial street downtown, which is where our accountant, Dexter Collings, has his office.

“Aaron,” he says as I pound on the door. “I was just closing up.”

I thrust the papers at Dexter, breathing hard.

“What’s this?” he asks.

“More debt,” I reply. “How? Wasn’t the bankruptcy meant to wipe that out? And how did Ira get these credit cards?”

Dexter gestures for me to come into his office, which is a little like stepping into a Texas rodeo hall of fame, even though Dexter was born in Bellingham. There’s a longhorn bracketed to the wall, a row of cowboy hats on hooks, a bronze statue of a rider with a lasso. He sits down into his big tufted leather chair and thumbs through the bills, humming as he goes.

“What?”

“The hospital bill appears to come from after the bankruptcy, so it was not included in the settlement.”

“So we owe that money?”

He nods as he lays that bill down.

“And the tax return?”

“I told your father he had to file. I guess it got away from him.” He flips through the credit card statements. “Hmm.”

“What?”

“These appear to be recent. It’s been a year, so your father was able to apply for new cards. They all have low maximums, at least.” He squints at the fine print and whistles. “And high interest rates.” He pulls out a bank statement. “How’s your cash flow?”

“More like a cash puddle.”

“Are you making enough each month to cover expenses?”

I shrug. “We don’t sell much of anything in the store but Ira says he’s been selling off his rare books collection.” I try to remember the last time Ira had a shipment for Grover. I can’t recall one.

“See this?” Dexter asks, pointing to a deposit on the bank statement for $800, and a charge on the credit card for the same amount. “It looks to me like Ira has been taking cash out of the cards to cover the business expenses.”

Oh, Ira.

“This is not sustainable,” Dexter adds, as if this is not abundantly obvious.

“What do I do?”

“Find a way to increase your income.”

“Trust me, we’re trying. Can I get another loan or something? To cover us? Borrow from Peter to pay Paul?”

“The property’s pretty leveraged,” Dexter says, leafing through the papers, “and because of that, and your age, you’re going to have a hard time accessing credit even with the store as collateral.”

“Speak English, Dex. I don’t know what that means.”

“It means you can’t borrow from Peter to pay Paul when Peter’s broke too. And even if you could . . .” He shuffles the papers together and hands them back. “You’d just be delaying.” He trails off. Dex is a nice enough man. He doesn’t want to tell me we are dinosaurs, post-asteroid. But I already know that.

“The inevitable?” I finish.

Dexter nods. “I’m sorry.”

Sometimes a Great Notion

The store’s closed when I get back from Dexter’s, so I quietly let myself in. I wander over to the case where Ira’s rare collection is housed. It’s locked, but he keeps the key in one of the cubby drawers. When I open the door, the shelves are empty.

The starchy odor of pasta cooking upstairs wafts down, but instead of heading up to the apartment, I unlock the basement, flick on the fluorescent lights, and descend the splintering, rickety stairs.

The basement is split in two. The chaotic side of the room contains the messy Mom Jumble: a dozen haphazardly packed boxes of all the stuff she left behind. The sleeve of the rainbow bathrobe we used to call Joseph sticks out of one box. Her Mr. Coffee out of another. The collection of books on addiction she and Ira read together—maybe the one time when books failed him—sits in a crate in the corner next to Mom’s ancient Schwinn.

Ira has offered to ship her some of her stuff, but she says she moves around too much. This is true, but I don’t think that’s the reason. When she left, it was like she needed to amputate herself from every shred of what had been our life. Her clothes, her books, her bike.

Ira.

Me.

The other side of the basement is neat and