Page 125 of The Unraveling

“Can we not do this right now? We need to get her to a hospital.”

“A hospital? What’s wrong with her?”

“She’s what’s wrong with her.”

“It’s not my fault,” says Arabella. “She was like this when I found her.”

“I don’t understand, I thought this girl didn’t have any money. Explain what the fuck is going on!”

“Not now, we don’t have time for this. Go call nine-nine-nine, now!”

I try to sit up, but my body feels like it’s been hit by a train.

“Deal with your whore yourself,” says the woman.

I see her shoes turn and go the other way.

“Dammit.”

The man lets go of me, and I feel my body fall onto the ground as he leaves the room.

Then I hear laughter.

Chapter Thirty-Four

Iwake up the next morning with a pounding headache. It’s dark in the room I’m in, and for a long, hazy moment, I can’t tell where I am.

My environment materializes as if out of dust.

I’m in a bed. I’m under the covers. I’m in the bedroom of the apartment with the curtains drawn. I have no recollection of getting here.

I put my hands over my eyes, my muscles feeling shaky and uncertain. The last thing I remember was being on the bathroom floor and all those people—who were they?

Arabella, I know she was there. And she was being a bitch, I think. But then again, she did get me home when I needed to get home.

The man—it was Alistair, I feel almost certain it was him. He had me in his lap. But then there was a woman there. Who had that been?

My mind’s eye squints through the blackened memory. The shoes. The legs. The voice.

Oh my god, was it Clementine?

Holy shit.

Well, that’s it. I’m going to be fired. They came over and found me crouched over a toilet, blacked out.

What happened? I never get that wasted. I know I had that glass of champagne, then that strong gin, then some of that cocktail, but I only had a few sips of that. That’s enough to get a little too drunk a little too fast, but definitely not enough for me to get so sick. I’m sure of that.

That’s when I remember the whisper of suspicion from the night before.

Arabella.

Did she fucking drug me? Is she that bad?

There’s a sound from the other room and I sit up fast in surprise, then regret it as pain shoots through my skull as if I were being hit by a hammer.

“Fuck,” I say out loud.

I manage to creep out of bed, seeing that I somehow got into my big old Nike T-shirt that I’ve had since high school. I go over to the door and open it, hoping that it’s not Arabella. I don’t have energy for her. Who else could it be? Alistair, I assume. He’s the only one I can imagine.

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