Schizo by Nic Sheff

in half, crushing the back hoof of one of the flattened reindeer.
    The next house has a fake chimney propped atop its shingled roof with plastic Santa’s legs sticking straight up, as though he were actively sliding headfirst into their fireplace. There’s a sign, made up of colored lights just below it, wishing the entire neighborhood a “Merry Christmas.”
    The holidays are still over three weeks away, but nearly every house on the block is decorated.
    At home we haven’t gotten a tree yet, or put up any lights or anything. We’ve barely celebrated Christmas at all these last two years. Jane gets excited about it, naturally, and we pitch in to get her presents and watch Christmas movies and take her ice-skating at the Embarcadero.
    But how could any of us ever be truly happy knowing that my brother is out there somewhere—terrified, alone?
    That is why I’m here.
    And I will not stop ’til I find him.

11.
    DOTTY PETERSON’S HOUSE IS even smaller than ours—all dark paneling, with a wall of built-in bookshelves, stacked unevenly with paperback novels like you’d buy in a grocery store. There are also at least five or six cats roaming around the house. And way more cat furniture—those complicated, carpeted, always dirty-looking geometric structures—than people furniture. The cats are scraggly. They keep alternating between scratching themselves and pouncing on one another, fighting and squabbling.
    The smell of cat piss burns like ammonia at the back of my throat.
    But Dotty is very nice—just like she was on the phone. She makes me Lipton tea in a small porcelain cup—with cats printed on it, naturally. We sit together on a deeply sagging couch, the brown corduroy upholstery torn from countless cats’ claws.
    She’s a large woman, with a sagging chin and neck hanging down. Her glasses are square and thick, so her narrow eyes are strangely magnified. She has short, dark, graying hair. Various cats jump on and off her lap as we talk.
    â€œYou poor dear,” she says to me, alternately sipping her own cup of tea and eating from a tin of butter cookies on the coffee table. “I wish there was more I could do to help. I suppose you’ve talked to that Detective Marshall. He struck me as a capable man.”
    â€œNo, not yet,” I answer, though, of course, I recognize the name as the primary detective in charge of Teddy’s case.
    Dotty sits up straighter, smiling, as though she is actually quite excited by all this. It makes sense, I guess. She must be lonely here in this dark little house. I mean, maybe she has a husband or a girlfriend or something—but I kind of doubt it.
    â€œWell, you should go talk to him. I imagine he’ll tell you whatever you want to know. Why, I still have the business card he gave me on my refrigerator, I believe.”
    â€œFrom two years ago?”
    â€œCertainly. It was such an excit—I mean, terrible tragedy. But I’m sure Detective Marshall will make time for you. It’s just, they’re so busy, you know, the police up in San Francisco. A case like your . . . your brother’s, well, they usually accept whatever answer is the easiest. An open case looks bad for the department. I learned that watching
Law & Order.
It’s so good. Have you seen it? I love that Jack McCoy.”
    She gestures toward the flat screen TV, which looks strangely out of place in this falling-apart living room that practically has mold growing out of the corners.
    â€œNo, I, uh, I haven’t.”
    â€œWell, never mind. The point is, the police don’t like having unsolved cases on their books. That’s why they insist that Teddy . . . your brother . . . must have drowned. Even though I’ve told them over and over again what I saw. They refuse to believe it because . . . because they want everything neat and tidy, wrapped up with a little bow on