Page 127 of Life of the Party

It was too much to bear. I swallowed thickly, keeping the bile at bay.

“Grey,” my voice was unrecognizable, harsh, and choking in my ears. “Grey, please…I can’t do this…I can’t…” I wept, tears of anguish disappearing into the beads of sweat on my cheeks.

He turned over to me; I knew it hurt for him to do so. Every movement hurt. He was in just as much agony as I was.

“It’ll get better. I promise.”

“No, it won’t. It can’t. I’m sick, Grey. I’m so sick.”

“I know.” He reached for my hand and brought it to his lips. “Please, just be strong. For me, be strong…”

Hours passed. It didn’t get better. I was writhing, flipping in pain, groaning and gritting my teeth, my body pulsing with sweat and nausea. I was dying. That was all there was to it. I was going to die.

Grey voiced my exact thought. “I’m fucking dying here.” He groaned. I’d never heard his voice so full of agony; I’d never seen him so weak. He sat up on the edge of the bed and dropped his head into his hands. “I can’t do this. I can’t do this.”

“Grey…” I reached for him, but he was gone. “No, Grey, don’t leave me, please. Don’t leave me alone.” I meant to yell for him, but my voice was no stronger than a strangled whisper. I collapsed back onto the bed, too weak for anything else, all my energy pent up in my racking sickness. Crying, sobbing, shaking, trembling, I pulled myself into a ball and waited for death.

A voice came to me from beyond the pain, the voice of an angel.

“Mackenzie.” Grey was calm again, in control of himself. I pried my eyes open, cringing as the light assailed them.

“Grey.” I cried. “Please. Make it stop.”

His face was before me, tortured, his blue eyes desperate and sad. I barely felt him grip my arm, barely registered the sharp sting of the needle…

And then everything was good again. The sickness receded, falling back, surrendering to the sweet heat of the drugs sweeping through my veins, killing off every ill feeling, every ounce of pain that plagued my body. My muscles relaxed, my body slackening against the bed. A few moments more and I found myself actually smiling, something I didn’t think I’d ever do again.

“Thank you,” I sighed. “Thank you.”

Grey was playing his music. It came to me from beyond my dreams, making me smile in my sleep. When I opened my eyes, he was sitting on the edge of the bed, quietly strumming his guitar. Even without the practice, he didn’t make one mistake, and the notes weaved in and around me in a beautiful melody. I sighed happily.

“Grey?” I sat up.

“Hey,” Grey turned back to me, “how you feeling?”

“Good.” I realized with surprise. “Better. You?”

“Better.” He nodded, looking back at his guitar. He seemed resigned…relaxed, almost. I wasn’t sure what I expected, but I thought he’d be more upset about our failure to get off the drugs. We’d given up; we hadn’t been able to last.

He smirked at me sheepishly. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“Making you go through that. If I’d known it would be so hard to quit, I never would have started again. I never would have let you do it. It was such a stupid thing to do; I didn’t realize…”

“Of course you didn’t.” I stopped him short. “Don’t worry, Grey. I’m totally fine.”

“You are now.” He grimaced. “You didn’t look fine a few hours ago.”

“It felt like I was going to die,” I admitted with a shudder. “What do we do now?”

“I don’t know.” Grey frowned, strumming idly. “Cut back so next time’s not so bad?”

“That makes sense.” I couldn’t help but feel relieved—this meant there was going to be more heroin in my near future. Again, Grey’s attitude surprised me. It made me wonder if he’d been hoping this would happen. I knew how much he loved the drugs, almost as much as I did. We may have found it too hard to quit, but at least now we could say we tried.

“We do need to cut back, though,” he insisted, as if trying to convince himself. “Seriously. We have to get clean.”

“Yeah.” I agreed. But they were just words. Empty, meaningless words said with no real conviction. I loved heroin. I didn’t really want to quit, and I knew Grey didn’t want to either.

---