Page 141 of The Glass Girl

“Come,” she says.

I look up at her. “Where are we going? Are my parents here?” My stomach feels rotten; I’m filled with shame and sadness at the thought of having to face them.

“No,” Tracy says. “They aren’t.”

“I don’t understand.”

There’s no pity on her face. There’s no sympathy or disappointment. There’s only matter-of-factness. She must have been through this a million times before.

“We’re going to Detox,” she says. “You’re back at Day One.”

The thundering in my head gets louder and louder as my brain screamsNonononononono want to go home, want my bed, my sister, my mother, my father, my fairy lights, my home my home my home, nonononononono.The thundering mixes with my sobs as Tracy waits, patiently, hands in the pockets of her parka.

I worked hard and then I didn’t and then I worked hard and then I broke but then I had hope and then I could just see the light at the end of the tunnel and all I had was one more day, twenty-four hours, and it was just going to be a little, just the smallest bit, and it felt so good in my mouth, my throat, and those first few sips hit hard, setting my blood on fire and it felt so good and I feltme,I feltmeagain, I felt—

I bury my head in my knees and smell the damp piss on my jeans as I choke and cry.

Tracy throws the Polaroid picture at my feet.

I lift my head and look at it in the dirt.

I look…unreal.

“Do you like sitting in your own waste, Bella? Is this how you want to remember yourself, years from now?”

That girl’s face in the picture. Smudged with dirt and snot. Puffy and unkempt. Her body soaked in her own pee.

“No,” I say.

“Do you need help, Bella?” Tracy asks.

Do I answer? Do I make a sound, other than my crying? I can’t tell. I’m breaking into bit after tiny bit, watching myself float away.

“Do you need help, Bella?”

I wipe my face clean with my hands.

I had twenty-nine days and now I’m sitting in my own piss.

Wasted and hungover.

I can’t do this anymore.

“Yes,” I say. “I need help.”

I look up. I take her hand.

Day One

We pass a groupof kids running desperately after Chuck on our way back to the building. They seem angry, scared, tired, forlorn. All those things at once. They don’t look at us. They don’t want to lose sight of Chuck. They don’t want to get lost. It’s easy to get lost, even here.

Tracy sees me watching them.

“No one likes labels, Bella. But sometimes it helps to have a name for something. When we name things, we understand them. We know where we fit. It’s not a cage. It’s a field of possibilities,” she says.

I know what she wants me to say.

“I’m an alcoholic.”

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