Chapter 7
The pharmacy on Main smelled like floor cleaner and old magazines. Dad held my teal backpack on the counter like it was evidence, not a school bag. The pharmacist slid two small boxes across to him and I recognized the color right away, that same flat blue.
My dad didn't look at me when he asked her to double-check. He said, "I need it labeled with his name, both of them. One stays in his backpack, one stays at his school. No exceptions."
I'd never seen him ask for two of anything before. He'd always said we didn't need extras, we took care of what we had. That morning he kept his hand on my shoulder while the pharmacist printed the little white stickers. She peeled one and pressed it onto the blue plastic, Jacob M. 7 yrs, and then did the second one exactly the same.
He paid and zipped one inhaler with its clear spacer right into the front pocket of my backpack where I could reach it without unzipping the big part. The other one he left in the box and put in a paper bag and wrote SCHOOL on it in black marker.
In the car he didn't start driving right away. He turned to me in the parking lot with the engine running and the heat blowing.
"We're going to practice something," he said. His voice was low and even, like when he helped me with math. "If anyone ever touches your inhaler again, what do you say?"
I stared at the dashboard. I didn't want to say it wrong.
He said it for me first. "Give it back now."
I nodded.
"Say it," he said. "Loud enough I can hear it."
I swallowed. "Give it back now."
"Again," he said. "Like you mean it even if your chest feels tight."
My throat made a little sound before the words came out. "Give it back now."
"Good," he said. "And if they don't give it back right away, you don't wait. You go to any adult. Teacher, nurse, cook in the restaurant, anybody. You tell them, Dad, I can't breathe, and you hold up your backpack. Do you understand why?"
I said I did. He wasn't smiling. He wasn't mad either. He was looking at me the way he'd looked on the restaurant floor, just focused.
"You are never causing trouble for needing air," he said. "That's non-negotiable. Say that part back to me."
"I'm not causing trouble for needing air," I whispered.
He squeezed my shoulder once and put the car in drive.
At the apartment he lined both inhalers on the kitchen table and had me show him how I put the spacer together and pressed it. My hands shook a little and he steadied the bottom but didn't take over.
"You're in charge of this one," he said, tapping the one from my backpack. "You check it every morning. If it's not there, we don't leave. Okay?"
I clicked the cap on and off. Having two felt strange, like I'd been given permission to need something twice.
We were still at the table when the knock came. Three quick taps, like someone who knew we'd be home.
Dad looked through the peephole and his jaw tightened. He glanced back at me.
"Stay at the table," he said quietly.
He opened the door six inches. She was standing there in jeans and a white top, not the red dress, hair still wavy, holding a white bakery box with a string around it. I could see pink frosting through the little window.
"I brought a new cake," she said. She tried to smile past him at me. "For Jacob. To redo his birthday properly. I wanted to apologize. I overreacted at dinner, honey, I didn't mean —"
Dad didn't open the door wider. He kept his body in the frame.
"You can't come by without calling first," he said. His voice stayed flat, not loud.
"I texted you," she said quickly. "You didn't answer. I just want to talk to him for a minute. Jacob, sweetie, I bought chocolate this time, I know you like chocolate —"
I didn't answer. My hands were tight around the blue inhaler on the table.
Dad cut her off, gentle but firm. "He's not going to talk through this right now. And I'm not going to do a redo dinner to make it look like it didn't happen."
"It's just a cake," she said, and her smile thinned. "I said I'm sorry. What else do you want me to do?"
"I want you to leave the cake and leave," Dad said. "We need to talk properly later, without him in the middle. Not at my doorway with a bakery box."
She laughed a little, like she couldn't believe he was saying no. "You're really going to turn me away over —"
"Over his inhaler," Dad said. He didn't raise his voice. "Over you taking his medicine. Yes. I am."
There was a pause where I could hear the hallway air conditioner humming. She stared at him, then at me, and her eyes got shiny in a way that made me feel guilty even though I hadn't done anything.
"So that's it?" she asked.
"That's it for tonight," Dad said. "I'll call you tomorrow to set a time to talk. Just the two of us."
She set the bakery box down hard on the mat outside, just over the threshold, not inside. "Fine. Tell him I tried."
Dad waited until her footsteps faded down the hall before he closed the door all the way. He didn't pick up the box. He turned the lock and came back to the table and sat down across from me.
"You did exactly right," he said.
I looked at the two inhalers with my name on them, both capped, both mine. My chest felt tight but not from asthma, from holding still that long.
May you like
He slid the backpack toward me. "Show me again where it goes," he said.
I unzipped the front pocket and put the one inhaler back in myself and zipped it closed. The second one stayed on the table for school tomorrow.
