Chapter 19
I’m sitting on something cold and wet. There’s a tambourine digging into my side. The smell of marijuana oozes from the upholstery and cycles through the air vents.
Riding in the back seat of Teacher Rob’s Prius feels like drowning in the murky waters of a bong.
“Can we open a window?”
DJ Spider reaches into his breast pocket and pulls out a cigarette. “Got a light?”
I shake my head. “Sorry.”
“I’m sure there’s one back there somewhere.” Teacher Rob gestures toward me. “See anything, Phoebe?”
I use my feet to rifle through the mess on the floor, treating the task like a game of I spy. An open bag of Doritos. A kazoo. Three loose Monopoly bills. A tub of Vaseline. A shattered iPod Touch. A hose.
“Oh!” I reach down to pick up a book of matches from a local Italian restaurant. “Here you go, DJ Spider.”
“You can call me Nick.” Sparks fly as he strikes a match and inhales deeply.
As he exhales, a plume of smoke makes my eyes water. The smell fills the car immediately.
“That’s not a cigarette,” I cough, and the pungent, skunk-like odor grows stronger by the second.
“A buddy of mine grows his own reefer on his roof.” He hands the joint to Teacher Rob who, despite driving, takes a deep hit before passing it back to me.
At this point, I have nothing to lose. I take it from his hand, wiping away any lingering traces of saliva before raising it to my mouth.
The smoke burns my throat and launches me straight into a coughing attack.
“Water,” I croak. Teacher Rob hands me a can of root beer from the cup holder. It is warm and flat, but serves its purpose. After I chug the remainder of it, the coughing subsides.
“Whoa,” I say, and my voice sounds like it’s coming from somewhere else. Somewhere far off.
“Did you say something?” I ask the front of the car.
There’s a ringing in my ears. I can’t make out their responses.
“Do you hear that?”
I fiddle with the broken window lever to no avail. I need air.
I can’t breathe.
Relax, I tell myself. You’re just high.
Am I, though? This feels more like a medical emergency. Could I have contracted something from Teacher Rob’s root beer?
I open my email, where I have an old message from Sandy in my saved mail folder. After the time I got too high and sent myself to the emergency room, she wrote a mantra for me to recite should it ever happen again:
I am not dying. I am under the influence of marijuana, and I am safe. This is a temporary feeling. It will pass.
Sent from my iPhone
I repeat the mantra over and over in my head until I start to believe it. I am not dying. I am just high, that’s all. I am as safe as I can be with Teacher Rob behind the wheel. This feeling will pass, just like it did last time.
Only…this feels different from last time. Whatever kind of weed DJ Spider’s friend grows on his roof must be stronger than what I’m used to. Maybe “reefer” is a different drug entirely. One that has the potential to kill me.
It was probably laced with something.
It’s very possible that my organs are shutting down.
I open my front-facing camera to search for any visible signs of distress. My eyes are alarmingly red, which could be a result of the joint.
It could also be a sign of something far worse.
I google “eyes extremely red and shortness of breath.”
Pulmonary edema. A buildup of fluid in the lungs that makes it difficult to breathe. Lack of oxygen may cause blood vessels in the eye to dilate and appear red.
Just as I had feared.
“I think I’m dying,” I announce.
“Good stuff, huh?”
There’s a pain in my side. The tambourine. Was the ache there before the tambourine, though? I can’t remember.
I google “red eyes shortness of breath pain in my side.”
Liver failure.
“Maybe I should go to the hospital,” I suggest.
“Listen to this, Phoebe.” Teacher Rob turns up the volume.
“It’s our new demo. Tell me, what do you hear?
” The thump, thump, thump of the electric bass gets my blood pumping.
Blood. There is so much of it in my body.
I am nothing more than a sack of skin and blood and organs.
I study my hand, squinting hard enough to make out each vein.
“Do you hear the synth, Phoebe?”
I google “why are my veins so huge.”
Deep vein thrombosis.
Blood clots.
My head starts to ache.
Aneurysm.
“Here we are.” We pull up to the bus stop. DJ Spider opens the door and exits the car. “How about you come sit up here next to me, Phoebe?”
I open my door. Only instead of slipping into the front passenger seat, I begin to walk away from the car. “This is perfect!” I yell to Teacher Rob. “Thank you for the ride!”
I ignore his protests, walking until I can no longer make out the outline of his Prius. I don’t stop until I spot the backlit menu of a Carl’s Jr. drive-thru on the corner. I order a double cheeseburger, fries, and a milkshake before picking up my phone and calling for aid.
—
I struggle to lift myself into the passenger seat of Jonathan’s truck.
“You have to put the cheeseburger down first. Here.” He extends a hand, and I place the burger in his open palm.
“Thank you for getting me.” I successfully buckle myself in. “I got you a vanilla milkshake.”
“Oh, hell yes.” He looks at me with a raised eyebrow. “Where is it?”
I look down at my empty hands, mentally retracing my steps. “I have no idea.”
“Phoebe, you’re stoned.” Jonathan cackles, and the sound heals something within me. I no longer feel weighed down by the sheer amount of blood pumping through my body. I feel weightless.
“I smoked reefer,” I say with a laugh.
“Isn’t that just what old people call weed?”
“Maybe. Whatever it was, I never want to do it again.”
“Let’s get you home.” Jonathan blasts the AC and drives us out of the Carl’s Jr. parking lot.
I take a deep breath, curling myself into a ball in the passenger seat and leaning into the comfort of Jonathan’s presence.
For the short ride home, it’s easy to pretend that everything’s okay.