Forever Trying to Rescue You
The following story, originally published in Esquire, February 2021, is why I do what I do.
Dear Rob,
I love you, Dad.
Those are the last words you said to me the day before you killed yourself.
They’re also the last words you said to me in the first letter I wrote to you in this magazine, 24 years ago. Back then you were “Robbie” and I was “Daddy,” and I never thought I could possibly love you more than I did. Then again, I never imagined I’d be writing this letter to you now.
At least, not consciously. But deep down, I came to fear this day would come. On some level, I felt that, no matter how hard I tried, there was nothing I could do to stop it.
The letter I wrote when you were seven was about how I hadn’t wanted to adopt you—it was Mom’s idea—and how that feeling vanished the moment I first saw your beautiful face.
This letter is about another kind of feeling, one that will never vanish.
Sometimes I feel that you’re right here beside me. I hear you talking to me–like right now I just heard you say, “Dad, I hate it when you sound so sad. That’s the worst.”
It’s the worst for me too, dude. There was a whole lot of “the worst” those last few years. Ending with the worst of the worst. Which I didn’t see coming when we had lunch at our favorite Chinese restaurant in Los Angeles the afternoon before you did what you did.
We ate soup dumplings and talked about the usual random bullshit—how we were both rooting for Tyrion and Arya to be the last two standing on Game of Thrones and how we both loved new songs by Watsky, Boogie, 2Young, and other names I’d never heard of before your brother Zach, ever the family DJ, turned us on to them—and though you looked exhausted from juggling three minimum-wage kitchen gigs, it felt like just another day.
I knew you were having a rough time and owed a bunch of money to the kind of person no one should owe money to, but you uncharacteristically insisted that you didn’t want my help. That should’ve been my first clue. Then you mentioned something about going backpacking in Europe with your cat, Biscuit, or maybe joining the Navy.
I don’t remember what else we talked about, but I do recall how nice you were to our waitress, who was wearing a “trainee” tag. You were always kind and courteous to servers in restaurants and insisted that I tip at least 20 percent. “Cough up a buck, you cheap bastard,” you deadpanned, quoting from Reservoir Dogs, a Carlat family film festival staple.
It wasn’t until you said my four favorite words and walked away from my car that I realized something was different. You seemed to be moving in slow motion. I remember noticing your dirty desert boots with the broken laces. You looked small and defeated. It was like with each step, you were becoming my little boy again.
I wish God would take the sadness off of me.
You said those words when you were seven, and He made you wait 21 years to get your wish. I’ve always believed we come into this world fully baked, and you came in howling. You were a cranky baby, a difficult child, an angry teenager, a volatile adult, and an unreliable narrator every step of the way. You were depressed for as long as I can remember and struggled with drugs, alcohol and bipolar disease from your late teens until you shot yourself. You were such a pain in the ass...
...and yet I adored you. Because you were also sweet, charming, sensitive, whip-smart and funny as hell. When you laughed, it felt like all was right with the world. And nothing pleased me more than one of your wisecracks that sounded just like me.
I love Zach and Mom with all my heart, but there was something especially intense about my love for you. Maybe it’s because you needed it so much. No one in the world is more easy and loveable than Zach. I rarely worried about him, but was forever trying to rescue you.
Yet I didn’t want you to follow me to L.A., where Maura and I were starting a new life after Mom and I divorced. I warned you it was expensive, that it would be tough to find a job and impossible to get around without a car. I told you that you couldn’t come live with us in Venice because Maura worked from home and we didn’t have a spare room.
What I didn’t tell you was the truth. I was almost as big a liar as you were, but we lied for different reasons. Mine were lies of omission. I was scared that if I told you what I really thought about what you were doing or not doing, you’d cut me out of your life. I was scared that I’d lose you, and that you’d be lost and alone.
Still, our lies had a certain symmetry: I lied to protect you and you lied to protect me.
When you eventually did come to live with Maura and me, it kinda sucked and was kinda nice. It kinda sucked because you disrupted our life and amped up my anxiety to 11. And it was kinda nice simply because we got to spend so much time together.
The nice part seems even nicer now. As for the suck part, I had no idea what suck really meant back then.
It was especially nice watching you cook. I loved when Maura called you “the kitchen elf.” Do you remember the night you prepared that special meal for us? We went to Whole Foods and bought a Flintstones-size chunk of rib-eye and a bunch of veggies (mainly for Maura) and then picked up a bottle of bourbon. That made me uncomfortable, but you assured me that the whiskey would burn off and give the dish a rich, sweet flavor.
While you were prepping, I looked in occasionally to make sure you weren’t sneaking any of the alcohol. Finally, you brought out your piece de resistance, and it was absolutely…disgusting! The meat was so drenched in bourbon that we could barely choke it down. Of course, we told you it was delicious, the way I used to rave about anything you accomplished when you were a little boy.
Goddamn it, Rob! Not a day goes by that I don’t miss the hell out of you. I miss us hanging out and singing the Thundercat song (“I wish I had nine lives…”) and the way we’d sing the “meow” part together. I miss shooting pool with you in that shitty bowling alley in Torrance, and I miss secretly loving it when you beat me. I miss hearing you say “Yeo” and us bumping fists. I miss you whipping out one of your Bad Motherfucker wallets, which you constantly lost, proving that you were anything but. I miss walking around the Del Amo Mall with my arm around your shoulders the day before you killed yourself, thinking that things would somehow get better, which of course they didn’t.
When I think about our lives together, you know what makes me sad? I just heard you answer: “Everything?” And that’s not far from the truth. But more than anything, I wish we had more joy.
A while ago, at the end of a meeting of my grief group, a moderator asked everybody to share happy memories of our kids when they were little. One by one, the grieving parents recalled Hawaii vacations, birthday celebrations, Little League games, normal family stuff. But when it was my turn, I drew a blank. It was a daily shitshow at our house right up until you fell asleep at night. And then I told them about Disney World.
All I remember was you crying nonstop. While Mom and Zach went on the rides, we watched from the ground, me desperately trying to distract you from whatever demon was upsetting you. Aside from one shot of you eating a churro, the photos from that Florida trip have a consistent theme: Zach beaming in Magic Kingdom heaven and you looking miserable in Mickey Mouse hell.
Years later I asked what you remembered about Disney World. You said it was the best time we ever had as a family.
The irony of that cracks me up, but so many other things break my heart—like the fact that I have so little that belonged to you. I left the bulk of your stuff in your Long Beach apartment, including that oddball collection of about 200 BIC disposable lighters. All I took was 20 of your crazy-ass T-shirts, which I sent to Mom, who had them sewn into a memorial quilt.
Quick funny story: When I came down to the lobby with those T-shirts in a plastic trash bag, I ran into Theresa, the building manager. “I’m so sorry for your loss, Mr. Carlat,” she said. “Rob was such a good guy.”
“Thank you,” I said.
“You know, a lot of people wanted that apartment, but we let Rob have it because he was so nice and smart and charming,” she continued, “and because he was a cancer survivor.”
Dude, I nearly burst out laughing when I heard that lie.
In addition to the T-shirts quilt, I have one saved voicemail from a few years back. It lasts all of 10 seconds and it’s just you saying, “Hey, happy birthday. Gimme a call back. Love you. Bye.” Full disclosure: I sometimes listen to that voicemail when it’s not my birthday.
I also carry a Robbie memento on my keychain: a six-month sobriety chip from the only AA meeting you invited me to. It was the one time you really gave the program a shot, and I remember the leader asking if there was anyone celebrating six months sober. You stood up and smiled and I could see that you were trying to contain it, to look cool, but pride beamed out of you like sunlight breaking through clouds.
Of course, I started crying, just as I’m crying now. You accepted the chip while everyone applauded. Then you returned to your seat, handed me the chip—the greatest gift imaginable—and said, “Happy Father’s Day.”
You always hated it when I told you how much I worried about you, but I had no choice. I worried when you wailed endlessly as a baby. I worried when you didn’t have many friends in grade school. I worried when you flipped out at 17 and had to be hospitalized. I worried when you left Long Island for the first time to move upstate. And I worried when you told me you were moving to L.A. and every day after that, until we ran out of days.
“You can stop worrying now, Dad,” I just heard you whisper, and I won’t argue with that. But here’s another truth: I’d give anything to have one more day of worrying about you.
I often wonder about what you were thinking on that terrible night. According to Police and Coroner’s reports, you were hammered on Hurricane malt liquor (it surprised me that no drugs were found) and playing videogames with two friends from AA. They ducked out for a minute, and that’s when you ducked out forever. I don’t think you were thinking about anything more than making the pain stop. I’ve pictured you playing with the gun (that was another surprise), putting it in your mouth, closing your eyes and silently saying, “Peace out.”
As if that image wasn’t upsetting enough, this appeared in the Police report: “Upon officers’ arrival on scene, the decedent’s cat was on top of the decedent licking his hands.”
When I read that, I knew that you did what you did “accidentally on purpose.” There was no way that you’d plan to leave Biscuit behind. You had rescued her, but she couldn’t rescue you. In that moment, you weren’t thinking about your cat, or how killing yourself would break the hearts of everyone who loved you. It was an opportunistic and impulsive act. Still, if it didn’t happen that night, it no doubt would’ve happened down the line. With all the close calls you had in the past, it was amazing that it hadn’t happened already.
That reminds me of the first close call. Not long after we bought your first car, you got into a major accident, the first of many. Mom and I jumped into my SUV and raced to the scene. It was pouring rain, and I remember seeing the flashing lights of a fire truck and an ambulance and thinking that this wasn’t going to end well. Then we saw your Ford Focus, T-boned and crushed like an accordion, but there was no sign of you or your girlfriend, whose name I’ve forgotten. Mom and I were freaking out, and I bolted out of the car and ran to the ambulance, where I saw your girlfriend lying on a stretcher wearing a neck brace. You were next to her, with some bruises on your forehead but not really looking much worse for wear. When I asked if you were okay, you replied, “I’m invincible!” I never wanted to slap some sense into you more than at that moment.
You scared the shit out of me, Rob. You were fearless, reckless and self-destructive—a recipe for disaster that often took you right to the edge. Like the time you made a daredevil leap from the second floor of a parking garage—Wile E. Coyote running off a cliff—and broke your left leg, pelvis and I don’t remember how many other bones. (I’ll never forget how you cursed out the doctor when he tried to remove the staples from your leg and how you wound up taking them out yourself.) Man, it sucks being scared of someone you love. And it sucks even more when that someone is your little boy.
You are the sand, little boy, and I will always be the water.
That’s a line from the first letter I wrote to you. It refers to a day at your Uncle Stephen’s beach where I tirelessly poured water into what was supposed to be a moat surrounding a sandcastle. The sand immediately drank up the water, but I kept at it, refilling the bucket and pouring in more water, determined to keep you happy and make everything perfect. I had that line tattooed on my left forearm a few months after you permanently left us. In fact, we all got tattoos in your memory—Mom and Zach as well as me—like we needed another reminder of how you got under our skin.
There’s something I never told you—or anyone else, for that matter. It was the second time you threatened to kill yourself (a year before you made good on that threat), when you came to my house in the middle of the night to say goodbye forever, and I wouldn’t let you inside because I was doing the whole “detaching with love” thing. We shook hands, as if we’d come to a formal agreement, and you walked away, becoming smaller with each step. That’s when I had the horrible thought that maybe it would be better for everyone if you weren’t here anymore. I still hate myself for thinking it, though I no longer hate you for making me think it.
When we were considering what to put on your headstone, I came up with something that I thought you’d like: A pain in the ass who was deeply loved by many. Mom shot down that idea, but I still think it rings true.
For years, I thought that love would be enough, but as much as we loved you, the trouble never stopped. Even long after your funeral, I got a call from a collection agency that was trying to track you down. (Don’t worry, I told them you couldn’t come to the phone right now.)
You knew how I felt about adopting you, but I’m not sure how you felt about being adopted. Don’t get me wrong: I know you loved us and I’m sure you knew that we loved you. But the adoption part was tricky. Adoption came with an asterisk, one with sharp points that cut deep.
When you were a little boy, the topic made you angry, and as an adult you just shut it down. You never showed any interest in meeting your biological parents. Maybe that was because you were happy that we were your folks or maybe it hurt too much to think about them, I’ll never know. All I know is that I never thought about you as my adopted son. You were just my son, I was just your dad, and that’s just the way it was.
I don’t know if you were “around,” but I was in New York not long ago with Mom and Zach, and the three of us went to visit you in the cemetery. (Did you know that your headstone is right behind a guy named Eugene Levy?) After that, we drove to Huntington Harbor, where Mom had chartered a private boat. Its name was Too Happy, and so were we. We were supposedly celebrating both Mom’s 60th birthday and Father’s Day, but it was really just about us being together again.
It was a beautiful morning, and we had a great time cruising around the North Shore of Long Island. It was too early for cocktails, but we said fuck it and each grabbed a beer. “To Rob,” we toasted.
About an hour in, the boat anchored, and we clambered out to the bow with a woman who was onboard to guide us through a meditation. I don’t think we could’ve done this at any other time in our lives, but at that moment it seemed like the perfect thing to do. We rolled out yoga mats, did some movement and breathing exercises, and then she asked us to lie down and close our eyes.
She told us to imagine ourselves somewhere relaxing and beautiful, right before sunrise, and I immediately saw myself on a beach, watching waves gently break on the shore. Then she told us to picture ourselves in the middle of a circle, surrounded by the people we love.
Wherever I looked, I saw your face.
There you were with Mom sucking on a baby bottle, there you were in the bathtub rocking a shampoo mohawk, and there was little Robbie, wearing a beanie and parka, holding a snowball. I kept looking around the circle and saw you sitting up in a tree in our backyard in Woodbury, and then there you were with your arm around Zach’s shoulders when you guys were teenagers. There you were again in my house in Venice with Zach on Christmas a few years ago, the last happy day the three of us had together. And then there at the beach, a few weeks before you died, were you and I—the sand and the water—looking out at the ocean for the last time.
I have a space in my heart that never closes.
You uttered those words when you were four, and now, at 65, I find myself saying them every day. I love you, Robbie James Carlat, and after all the bullshit and heartache, after the sleepless nights waiting for the inevitable phone call, and now despite the pain of living in the world without you, I will go to my grave (not too soon, I hope) convinced that adopting you was the best thing I ever did. If I had to go through all of it again, I’d do it in a heartbeat—the heartbeat that connects the two of us forever.
Peace out,
Dad