Page 47 of Forever Not Yours

“Don’t know.”

I did. I knew everything. I just couldn’t make sense of it.

“I’m Barry. My sister is diabetic, and you look like she does when she’s not kept her sugars right and such. Do you have an emergency glucose pen?”

I did. At work in my drawer. One in my gym bag. And of course not in my suit pocket. Who carriedstuff like that in their suit pockets? Good people, apparently. Not people like me. Awful people like me who just couldn’t keep things straight.

People like me fucked up. All the time.

“Come on, mate. Drink this and we’ll have you back to right in no time. There we go.”

A glass. Forced to my mouth. A firm hand on my neck as he made me drink.

I liked it.

Just like Jake.

Fuck. Jake.

“Jake,” I managed to say, in between fighting the glass against my lips. “Jake.”

“That your name or your boyfriend?” the man asked. Or perhaps the bartender. A nice-looking chap with a ridiculous amount of piercings now staring at me, holding another bottle of juice in his hand.

“He need another one?” the bartender asked. I couldn’t make out what Barry said back, but somehow, I was making my phone spring back to life. Light. A welcome screen.

“There you go! Bit of battery. Good job. Where’syour sensor, mate?”

Who was this guy again? I found my app and scanned the sensor. Still shaky. Still muddled. Fuck. Low. Far too fucking low.

“And another glass of OJ for you, I think! Another two sugars, bartender, please?”

Whoever this guy was, he wasn’t funny. Barry. Whatever.

Jake. I needed Jake.

Brain back online, slowly powering up like an iPhone after being shut off. How fucking stupid was I? This was dangerous. This was how you ended up in A&E in a diabetic coma. Oh, yes. Been there. Done that. Bloody stupid. Lunch. I’d completely skipped that part, and now I was reaping the rewards of that little mishap.

Everything was too much. The thought of going back to the office terrified me. I wasn’t even wanted there anymore. Driving? Right now, I couldn’t even figure out how to get up from this bar stool, let alone figure out where my car fob was.

The noise around me. The dull light. The fear that was slowly overtaking everything. I didn’t want this. I hadn’t asked for any of this.

The call connected and he picked up. The relief in me was almost crippling as I huffed out his name, tears stinging in my eyes.

“Bastien. Where are you?”

Calm. Calm the hell down. Too much noise. Noise everywhere. I could suddenly hear the disco beat playing behind the bar, the sound of people talking. More people than this, Barry. I looked at him. Big chap. Older. Muscles. Tattoos. The kind of guy I would have so easily let fuck me. Reckless.

I was always reckless. Stupid.

I wasn’t a good person.

“Can you please come and get me?” I whispered in desperation. “Please?”

“Where are you, Bastien?”

His voice. Strong. In control. Jake.

“I don’t know.”

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