Chapter 21 #2
My hands flew up as Shio stood over my desk. Powder was smeared across the surface, and the black box was shattered on the floor now. My eyes met his, and the menacing glare in his was enough to make me want to concede, as if I weren’t a grown man and he a child.
“There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.” He looked me up and down before storming out of the office.
Dipping my pinky in the residue, I rubbed it across my gums, shuddering at the tingling sensation. Closing my eyes, I repeated the motion.
“First John, chapter four, verse eighteen.”
Boom Boom
Slamming the worn notebook shut at the sound of pounding, I looked at the locked door. “?Si?”
Boom Boom Boom
Putting the notebook down, I stood, exited the bathroom, and went to the steel door.
“It’s me, Bella. I’m sliding Walmart bags in the slot. I grabbed you a few things. I also got you some food.”
“Gracias, Bella…”
The slot opened, and bags and food were pushed through.
I held my breath, hoping that she would leave.
I appreciated the company from the young ones some days, but today, I did not care for it.
I’d been grateful that Italian had only left my food and didn’t bait me for much conversation earlier.
Mahzeyah had to have been here because that was the only time he seemed occupied.
“Aite, I’m gone, Solana.”
The slot slammed shut, and I heard her feet ascending the stairs. Instead of looking through the bags, I went back to the bathroom and grabbed the phone. The voice message I’d sent showed “kept” as the first one had, meaning he’d listened to it and saved it.
Swallowing air, I pressed record again.
“I apologize. I do care, Shio. I care so much. The many days here, my mind is crazy. Please forgive me. I care a lot. I care so much about you. You are important to me, Shio.”
Sending the message, I placed the phone on the bathroom counter.
Going back into the room, I began removing the pajamas and haircare products from the bags.
I was so grateful for Bella because she had gotten high-quality products, and I could tell from the packaging.
Hopefully, after another hot bath, sleep would come easily.
Weightless
“Arghhh! Arghhhh! Arggghhh!”
Rubbing my hand into my head as my face burned, I pulled at my scalp that felt like it was on fire. A million needles felt like they were being injected into my follicles at record speed. I couldn’t breathe because of the pain.
I’d gotten up to use the bathroom, and each time I took a step, it felt like I was dragging a ton of bricks behind me at the ankle.
I dropped to the floor, exhaustion overcoming me, and the longer I lay on my back, the more cemented I felt.
Sleep had been better the last few days, but every time I woke up, I experienced a new type of pain.
Pain mentally. Pain physically. Pain emotionally.
Reaching up, I rubbed my chest slowly, hoping to relieve the weight that seemed pressed into my cavity and robbing me of my next breath.
I’d been religiously working out and had even cut back on eating so much, but still, it felt as if I weighed a ton.
I knew it wasn’t physical weight. I was sane enough to see that nothing was attached to my body.
I was carrying weight mentally. There was so much baggage within me that made me feel as if I were sinking from just the minor thoughts of my life.
Suddenly, everything was too much. The light was too bright, and the silence was too loud.
I closed my eyes since I was staring at the white ceiling, and the stark color was becoming too much as well.
Then, the darkness was too overwhelming, making me feel as though I was falling into an endless black hole.
Being in this room was too suffocating. Being alone was too noisy.
When I tried to use the TV to drown out the quiet, the sounds would only make my head hurt.
Nothing I did could lift the weight, so my best option was to lie here and pray that I would feel better tomorrow.
Sssssk
I knew that sound all too well. It was one of the slots in the door opening.
I felt so heavy that I couldn’t lift my head to see who it was.
Peeling my eyes open, I swallowed, my throat not feeling as dry as it had been in previous days.
I was thirsty even though I’d drunk plenty of water today.
My stomach knotted for something solid, not a liquid.
My urges hadn’t been as strong as they had been, but I still yearned for the drug.
I didn’t know who I was without it. Being trapped in this room wasn’t helping the cravings, in my opinion.
All it was doing was driving me mad. There was only one other thing that I felt I could indulge in to take away the feeling of wanting cocaína, and it was not a thing. It wasn’t even an it. It was a man.
Shio.
If I couldn’t have the drug, I’d settle for the man.
“I will overcome this addiction. This addiction will not get the best of me. I am bigger than my addiction. I am in control.”
“Hmm?”
“Repeat it, Solana,” the young feminine voice ordered.
I cleared my parched throat. “I will overcome this addiction. This addiction will not get the… best of me. I am bigger than my addiction. I am in control.”
“Yes! Look at you. I didn’t have to repeat it or nothing.”
“I’m… good with directions.”
“I don’t like this for you.”
Closing my eyes, I tried to place the voice.
Bella?
No, she has a bit more of an accent in her speech.
It’s not Pearla’s—her voice is much lighter.
Mahzeyah?
Yes, it’s Mahzeyah.
“Neither do I, Mahzeyah,” I responded, somewhat tired from just trying to figure out who was talking to me through the steel door’s opening.
I didn’t like being here either, but my days of hating that I’d been thrown inside this room were gone.
There was no sense of dwelling on things I could not change, at least not in the present.
I had some days ago to make the best of what this was, but my body and mind needed to get on one accord with reality.
“How do you feel?”
Horrible. “I feel okay.”
“You do not.”
Chuckling, I shut my eyes tightly because the small laughter had hurt.
Every part of me hurt, down to my fingers and toenails.
I couldn’t do another day of feeling like this, and if I had to, then I’d put a pillow over my face and end it myself.
That wasn’t me being suicidal. It was me being overwhelmed by the pain.
“Tell me the truth. How do you feel?”
Mahzeyah—So bossy and so sassy.
She and Bella had that in common. They were both sharp at the tongue.
But, like me, I could tell Bella had grown up around boys, and I was sure there were many boys.
As bonita (pretty) as she was, she had this force in her.
There was a streak as wide as a river of defiance in her.
Mahzeyah, on the other hand, was bossy because she was an only child or the oldest. I didn’t know the specifics, but I could almost guess their lives from simple conversations.
She had the traits of an only child. I didn’t have any close relationships with people back home, but when I was in school, I had classes with Valeria.
We took classes together for many years, and although they were of different ethnicities, Mahzeyah reminded me so much of Valeria.
They were both confident, mature, and responsible.
I knew Mahzeyah was responsible because she had been given free rein by her parents, and she was over here almost every day since I’d met all of them.
Those were just a few traits that I knew to be true that children without siblings held.
Self-centered was another, but I had not seen that in Mahzeyah just yet.
“Everything hurts,” I answered her.
“Mentally or physically?”
I couldn’t see her face since she was behind the door, and my head wasn’t at the slot, but I imagined her arched brow rising.
She was a little lady, much more in tune with the world than I was at her age.
She also possessed things that I had not—friends that loved and adored her, loving parents, and a boy who was obsessed with her, although neither of them knew what to do with it yet.
“Both…” I groaned. “But today is all physically. My hair. My nails. My chest. I feel...”
“Heavy?”
“Si.”
“I get what they are doing, and it’s not for me to speak on it because, one, I’m a child.
Well, almost a young adult, but I’m a child right now.
And, two, it’s not my place to get in their business.
However, this isn’t right. I get Shio wanting you to get clean, but this isn’t the right way to go about it.
If you’re not mentally strong… or physically support… This could—”
“It could kill me… Si. I know.”
We both grew quiet with Mahzeyah sighing loudly.
How did I tell a child that death was better than this?
How could I articulate that being without the two things that made me feel something felt like death in itself?
My body was not only detoxing the drugs, but the man too.
While it was trying to rid my system of Shio, I was holding onto every bit of him that I could.
The way the sweat dripped off his deep skin as he worked out.
The meal preps he ate religiously when he wasn’t prepping our meals fresh.
The way his glasses sat on the tip of his nose as he wrote in the journal.
The way his muscles flexed as he removed stacks of money from the counting machine before binding them with rubber bands.
These days, I’ve only been thinking of all things Shio, and when I wasn’t thinking of Shio, I was thinking of cocaína (cocaine). So, yes, I knew this method of rehabilitation could kill me— the Alexa machine told Italian and me as much, but there were things far worse than death…
Like being ignored by Shio.