Page 4 of Without You, Scotch and Sammy 2

We’ve been separated for more than a decade now, but I still feel the sting of being cheated out of something amazing.

Despite my melancholy today, I don’t often think of him this much. I’m usually so busy I don’t even have time to pee, so thoughts of Samuel Turner are few and far between – until I’m home at night and in bed alone. I don’t think a single night has passed since the last time I saw him that I haven’t thought of him. It’s not always sad memories; sometimes I smile as I relive the good times. Sometimes it’s only a passing thought, like he was simply a guy I went to school with and I wonder what he’s up to these days. But no matter what my memories throw at me on any given day, I try and beat it back. I have no energy left to give, my well of tears long ago dried up.

I move through the city streets at a speed barely above walking pace, and after a full forty-five minutes of listening to the monotony of city workers and their machinery, I pull in and wind my way from one floor to the next of the multi-story parking complex that hospitals insist on slapping parking meters on and charging the sick and grieving out the ass to use when they’re already tired and broken.

Just another cog. Just another broken system.

Just another unfair facet of life.

I grab tissues and shove my hands into my blouse to mop up boob sweat that won’t stop coming, then I grab my files and climb out of my car.

I’ve been in this hospital a million times before. I know who to speak with to get answers, and I know which ward Shari is likely in – though she’s probably still in emergency for now.

It takes no more than ten minutes to find her room, but when I walk in, I find her asleep with a drip in her arm and crusty dirt on her face and hands, so I take a seat and wait.

I sit in the visitor chair beside Shari’s bed for hours, working on my phone and handwriting notes for her file, and I watch her small baby belly lift and fall under the white hospital blanket as she sleeps.

Who’s just on the other side of that skin? Is it a boy or a girl? Will he grow up to be a musician, or a school teacher? Will she grow up to be a ballerina, or an engineer?

Will she grow up to have track marks bruising her delicate skin like her mom?

Doctors said Shari will be fine. She didn’t overdose, though she did take the drugs. She’s simply hooked up to fluids today because she’s dehydrated and likely very hungry. If I thought it was hot in my office, it would have been positively stifling sitting behind a brick building exposed to the elements.

The nursing staff said that she’ll be free to leave tomorrow or maybe the next day. They’ll strongly suggest she stay, but we all know she’ll sign waivers absolving the hospital of any responsibility, and she’ll go back to the diner or gas station and shoot up again.

I hate this system. I hate that we can’t even try to help that baby until it’s born. As it stands, Shari has more rights than her baby, so we just get to stand by and watch Shari kill them both.

Eventually, as my back aches and my boob sweat threatens to drown me, as my straightened hair curls from the humidity and the paper on which I was making notes begins to curl up at the edges, Shari stirs awake in her bed.

Her hair is matted and dirty, her face smudged with dirt and a hard life. Her hands come up to pat at her face, and I note her nails have dried mud caked underneath them. She looks wild, like those Wildlings on that TV show.

As soon as her drowsy azure blue eyes lock onto mine, her bottom lip begins to wobble and she breaks down into sobbing tears. “I’m sorry!”

I jump up, tossing my paperwork into a pile on the floor beside my chair, then I hit the nurse call button. I take Shari’s hand without the needles and I clasp it between both of mine.

“I’m sorry, Ms. Samantha. I’m so sorry.”

I look up to the still empty doorway, and I silently plead for the nurses to hurry. I don’t want to tell her it’s okay, or that it’ll be okay. It’s not okay. What she does to her body and her baby’s, is not okay.

“It’s just so hard,” she cries, pulling me closer and burrowing her face into my chest. “I tried to stop. I swear I did.”

A portly, older nurse, bustles into the room and stops on the spot when she notices us, but then with pursed lips and wringing hands, she moves forward and shuts off the buzzer. She turns to the bag hanging on the pole beside the bed and plays with a few buttons, then she turns to Shari and takes her shoulder. “Come on now, Ms. Lytto. Lay back now and let me get a look at you.”

“I tried to quit.” She allows the nurse to settle her back against her pillows, but she continues to stare into my eyes. “I swear. I stopped for a full month. I stopped for my baby, but then…”

“But then what?”

“Well, Clayton got a bit of work over the weekend, then he got paid--”

“So you guys grabbed the cash and went straight back to your dealer? Shari--” I want to scream at her. I want to ask what the hell she was thinking. I want to shake her and take her baby to safety. But I’ve studied the minds of addicts. I know it’s not entirely her fault. It’s an illness, but understanding won’t make her baby healthy. “I have to report this, Shari.”

Her eyes turn from sad to defensive. “You can’t judge me, Ms. Samantha! This isn’t your life to judge. I’m doing the best I can.”

I have nothing to say. I simply pry my hand from hers and step back to grab my paperwork. I don’t know why I’m here – I can make my reports without sitting by her bedside for hours, but I can’t find it in my heart to leave. I pick my dropped pen up from the floor and begin taking notes again. I’m a type of addict too, I guess, because I can’t seem to leave her and her belly alone.

My non-reaction to her defensiveness turns her back to a crying mess, and she sniffles into tissues and wipes her face on her arm. “Ms. Samantha?”

I silently look up from the notes in my lap.

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