Chapter 2 #2
I take him into his bedroom, the only bedroom, and lay him on the bed, then open a few windows and turn on the overhead fan to get some air circulating.
I make quick work of his filthy, damp clothes, peeling them off him and tossing them in the hamper.
And I realize, as I dress him in a fresh, dry t-shirt and pair of shorts, that he’s not just out of it.
He is out, actually unconscious, dead to the fucking world.
His arms and legs are all floppy, and he doesn’t respond at all when I call out his name, or when I touch his face, or even desperately pinch his cheek.
He’s so terrifyingly corpse-like that for a moment I think he is dead.
But when I fumble for the pulse in his wrist it’s slow and steady, and his chest rises and falls in a regular rhythm. He’s just not there.
I get a horrible feeling he’s more than just blackout drunk.
That maybe the piece of shit who carted him off slipped him something.
But I didn’t actually see that happen, and I was watching them the whole time.
I can’t remember seeing him do anything with Noel’s drinks.
Surely I would’ve? But I guess I was looking at their backs, mostly, and I didn’t see their hands really, or the glasses except when the bartender delivered them, and fuck. I’m an idiot.
I wrap him back up in blankets and wedge him onto his side with a bunch of pillows, in case he throws up.
Then I scroll through WebMD to look at all the possible things he could’ve been drugged with and scare myself shitless.
I wind up dialing my friend Killian—who is well versed in party drugs—and he thankfully answers on the second ring.
“What’s shaking, Lulu?” Hideous nickname I’m unable to deter him from using, even after knowing him for nearly twenty years. “You trying to make something happen tonight? Max and I were looking at our options. Chip in on a limo down to Provi?”
“Not tonight.” I stare at Noel’s wan face, mostly hidden beneath his damp hair, and will him to show a sign of life. “Question. If someone had their drink spiked, what would that look like? You know, with GHB or roofies something.”
“Is this hypothetical? Because you promised me that if you ever did G, the first time would be with me.”
“Killian, be serious.”
“So, not hypothetical.” I don’t say anything right away, and he continues, “It’s sort of hard to help you if you don’t tell me what’s going on, Luca.”
I take a deep breath and let it go, trying not to panic.
Maybe I should just hang up and call 911 instead.
“A friend of mine was given something, I think. He was talking to someone and a few minutes after he drank the cocktail they bought him, he just collapsed. Like, incoherent, couldn’t walk, could barely move.
I don’t even think he drank that much of it.
” I’m editorializing, but I know of all the people in the world, Killian would be the absolute last one Noel would ever want to know about any of this.
“I brought him home and now he’s just—I mean, he looks fucking dead.
He’s breathing fine and everything but he’s just lying there sweating like crazy. ”
“How long’s it been?”
I try to calculate. “From start to finish? An hour, I guess.”
“Hmm.” Killian sounds a little worried. “Mixing G and alcohol’s no joke. Even if he had a mil too much…” He trails off infuriatingly before adding, “Some medications enhance the effect, too. Is he taking anything?”
I glance at his nightstand. There are a couple of orange pill bottles there. I pick one up. “Maybe?” I say.
“Might be why he’s so fucked up, if he only had a little bit.” Killian pauses. “Is he okay? Like, was he…”
“I don’t know.” I feel absolutely sick. “Not for sure. I couldn’t tell.”
“Where’d this happen, anyway?”
“Anathema.”
“You should probably call and tell them. They might have cameras.”
“Maybe. Probably.”
“If he was raped—”
“Like I said, I don’t know. The guy took him out of the club and I had to follow them a few blocks—I lost track of them for a bit. And when I did find them, it was too dark to figure one way or another.”
“Wait. Waaaaaiiit a minute.” I can practically hear the lightbulb snapping on over Killian’s head. “It’s Noel, isn’t it? You’re still stalking him, aren’t you?”
God fucking dammit. I have the urge to shush him even though I know he’s nowhere he needs to be shushed, and I’m irritated and nauseous all at once. “Don’t you dare tell anyone about this? About what’s happened to him. I fucking swear, if you do—”
“I’m not, chill. But, fuck. I thought you quit doing that a while back.” He lets out a noisy breath. “Well, I guess it was good you were there this time.”
I clutch the phone in my clammy hand and look at Noel again and he’s still the same. Unmoving with that sheen of sweat on his sticky, bloody face. “So should I take him to the ER?”
“I’d say give him another ten, twenty minutes. If nothing changes or he gets worse, then yeah. But just so you know, they’ll want to do a whole rape kit on him if you go in there saying his drink was spiked.”
Subjecting Noel to more violation in the process, he means. “I’m gonna go.”
“Keep me updated,” he says. “Good luck.”
We hang up. I dial Anathema and no one answers, so I leave the ominous message that someone’s spiking drinks and they should check their CCTV.
I leave my name and number, figuring I’m a better contact than Noel, who will probably want nothing to do with this anytime soon. Who shouldn’t have to deal with this.
And I know it’s technically wrong that I’ve been haunting these clubs and shit every weekend for months, looking for him and hoping he’d walk in, but I’m not sorry.
Not even a little. I am so damn glad that I was there tonight.
What already happened to him is bad enough.
If it had gone any further—if I’d been even a minute later—
If only I had caught it earlier, though.
I rouse myself and get off the bed, casting one last look at Noel before I go into the bathroom and find a clean washcloth.
It hurts how familiar everything is in this new environment, because none of his habits have changed, really.
He still keeps all the clean washcloths under the sink in a little basket, wadded up haphazardly, and he still infuriatingly leaves the cap off the toothpaste.
He still uses the same shampoo and conditioner—I see them sitting on the shelf in the shower—and he still wears Toy Boy—the bear-shaped bottle is sitting on top of the sink—and the towels and the floor mats are all the same, too.
Of course, why wouldn’t it all be the same? Why would he go out and become a whole new person overnight just because I left? He is so much stronger than that. He doesn’t break so easily; he doesn’t shatter when someone like me takes potshots at his heart, no matter what he’d have me believe.
I close my eyes and slowly inhale, all the scents mingling in here that smell so good and right, like home the way nowhere else ever has. I want, so badly, to be part of all this again.
I snap myself out of it and wet a washcloth in warm water then squeeze it out, and return to Noel.
He’s still the same, so there’s no protesting when I gently wipe the sweat from his brow and the dirt and blood from his cheek.
He looks a little better now, at least, a little more human.
More like he’s just asleep and not in the death throes of some awful fever.
I toss the dirty cloth into the sink before I return to him, sitting by his head and taking his face into my hands.
My lips touch his forehead, featherlight.
“Wish you’d wake up already, stunt girl,” I whisper to him. “I just want you to be okay.”
Don’t know if it’s my voice that wakes him or pure coincidence, but five seconds later I get my wish.
His eyelids flicker and he groans, and I suck in my breath as he slowly seems to rouse himself, struggling beneath the weight of the blankets and pillows.
His beautiful amber eyes blink open, bleary and unfocused at first, before they settle at last on my face and the recognition sets in.
In a gravelly and abused voice he says, “What the fuck?”