Page 47 of What About Us
Her sigh comes out irritated, and I know it’s just her high blood sugar making her prickly. But it’s what she says next that has me wondering just what the fuck is going on with my best friend. “Yes,” she bites out. “It’s all I have, ok? Just help me to the bedroom and I’ll be fine.”
Fine. If this is the way she wants to play it, I’ll drop it for now. But wearehaving this conversation at some point, whether she likes it or not. I stay behind her while we climb the stairs, and when we get into her room, she sits on the edge of the bed. Her hands are resting on her thighs, palmsup, and her shoulders rolled in. It doesn’t look like she’s going to make a move to change out of her dirty clothes, take her insulin, or anything.
I crouch in front of her and untie her shoes, before pulling them off. I look up at her from the floor to find her watching me.
“What’s going on, Finn? Where is your pump?”
She doesn’t answer me. Just leans over and grabs an insulin pen from the nightstand, clicking a dose. She fumbles with the needle a bit, but once she has it connected, she lifts her shirt to expose her abdomen. I watch her press it to her skin and inject herself.
She sighs and falls back against the bed, her feet still on the floor.
I take the pen from the open hand laying on the bed next to her thigh. “Socks on or off?”
“Off,” she says and throws an arm over her eyes.
I pull off her socks and stand up. She looks so small, so tired. “Do you want help with your clothes?” I ask, and it’s then that I notice she’s crying.
Shit.
I sit next to her, with one leg on the bed and the other hanging down, my foot resting on the floor. I run my hand over her other arm, hoping it’s comforting instead of intrusive. I know how she can get overwhelmed when she’s upset. So, I just sit in silence and wait her out; she’ll talk if I just keep quiet and give her space to do it.
“I don’t have a pump anymore,” she says into the quiet of the room.
“Ok,” I say. “Why?”
“It broke at the first of the year.”
My first instinct is to immediately assume she’s been too careless to get a replacement, because what other reason is there? But that doesn’t sound like something she would do, especially with something so important to her health. All it would take is a phone call to her insurance. She’s busy, but she’s notthatbusy.
The initial flare of anger I felt at her being reckless dissipates when it hits me that I saw her mostly naked when I watched her strip on the Fourth of July, and I never noticed it was missing. Granted, at the time, her diabetes was the furthest thing from my mind, but still, isn’t that something I should have noticed when I was watching her undress like a creepy asshole?
No, because you were too busy thinking with your other head,dick.
“Your insurance will cover all of this stuff,” I say instead. “The pump should be under warranty, no?”
“It would,” she huffs out a humorless laugh, “if I had decent insurance.”
“What do you mean?” I ask, confused.
She lifts her arm and turns her head on the bed, finally meeting my eyes. “It doesn’t cover anything.”
I scoff. “They should cover everything.”
She shakes her head. “Not this insurance. And even if it did, I still couldn’t afford the copays.”
I run a hand down my face. “Is that why you don’t have any insulin?”
She sighs. “I do have insulin. I just don’t have enough. It’s rent and food or medication.”
What the fuck?
Is she telling me she’s been rationing insulin? Wouldn’t I have known that? Why didn’t I know that? Admittedly, I haven’t been paying attention to whether or not she still had a pump. Shehadone. I saw it at Christmas when she was visiting Paige and me in New York. I’ve been so wrapped up in getting Paige settled and trying to keep myself from jumping Finn every time I see her, I’ve completely missed that my best friend is struggling to get the life-sustaining medication she needs.
Thinking back, it all makes sense. Her dizzy spells—although they can be attributed to low blood sugar, they can also be a symptom of it being too high. Her guzzling water and running to the bathroom all the time. Itall makes sense. I thought she was just not eating, not paying attention, but it wasn’t any of that.
“Is your monitor still working?”
She nods, arm still slung over her face.
