Lick and a Promise-Diary of a Rock Star Groupie (Rock Star Series Book 1)
Page 20
I heard other people talking in the room.
“What are we going do with her man, we’ve got shows to do…”
“Don’t be a dick, can’t you see she OD’d? She almost fucking died.”
“Yeah, well I was being insensitive, I just meant, I mean, oh fuck…”
I squinted and saw the lead singer talk to a doctor that just came into the room. He showed him the brochure to the rehab center and the doctor came over to the bed near me.
“Miss Bishop, can you hear me? My name is Doctor Hamilton and you are in the hospital. Do you remember anything or do you know why you are here?”
The nurse had removed the tube from my nose and it burned when she pulled it out.
“Yeah, I was on the bus with the band and…” I looked around at the two band members in the room, the singer and the drummer. The nurse was behind me checking on my stats and Doc Hamilton was standing in front of me waiting on an answer.
“Okay…what else do you remember?”
I swallowed hard, sighed and said, “Um, I shot up something in a syringe. I thought it was heroin. Doctor, I’m a junkie…” I began to cry.
“Well,” he said, “what you injected was 100% pure heroin and it caused your body to overdose. You are very lucky to be alive.”
I nodded.
“I understand from your friends here that you have plans to check into the Oasis Drug and Alcohol Center in Phoenix is that correct?”
I nodded.
“We’ll take care of everything doc, we’ll get her there,” the lead singer said.
“Well, I’m sure Miss Bishop appreciates that but no more tour buses.”
“Right,” the singer said.
“Do you think you are well enough to fly?” the doctor asked me.
I nodded.
“Okay then, well let’s get you checked out and I’m sure your friends will make sure you get to the airport and it is my recommendation that you check into the facility when you land, okay?”
“Thank you doctor,” the singer said as he shook his hand.
“My daughter is a big fan,” the doctor said, “she won’t believe that I met you.”
Doors Start A Lockin’ and Voices Come A Knockin’
I barely remember the plane ride but I remember the warmth of the Arizona sun as it tenderly embraced me as I touched down.
The 80’s band had arranged a car to pick me up and take to me to the center. My rock star didn’t know I was coming.
I thought about him in that place, that place that I wanted to be awful so I could talk myself out of going. That place that was probably like a retreat to help people instead of the padded cells of the 1930’s insane asylum that I had imagined.
My biggest fear in life was going insane and being put into an institution and here I was, I was walking around in a strait jacket that I had put myself in to and I was the only one who had the key to set myself free.
I got there and was taken aback by its modern southwestern décor. I got checked in and was told how everything had been paid for by “Mr. Torrance”…I laughed at the fake name he used when he didn’t want the fans to find him.
“Does he know I’m here?” I asked.
The woman, Jane, who was my counselor, shook her head. “Do you want him to know?”
“No,” I said quietly, “not yet?”
She smiled.
“He’s still here isn’t he, I mean, he hasn’t left already has he?” I panicked.
She sighed and said, “We aren’t allowed to discuss our patients…”
I put my head down and began to sob.
Sensing that I was desperate, she lightly touched my hand and said, “This is a 6-week program and if you know when he checked in…I can tell you that no one has been discharged in that time period.”
Relief washed over me. We were now under the same roof again. For all I knew, he could have been on the other side of that wall.
I was taken to my room, which reminded me of a jail cell, and I got settled into hell week…or 666-weeks.
Now the panic began to knock on my door.
If you know anything about the pain and despair of withdrawal, I can sum it up in four words…you want to die!
Imagine the worst flu you ever had and then multiply it by three. Funny thing is, you know you can make it all go away and feel better with just one more prick into your hungry veins. Come on baby, you know you want me…
It’s like a desperate lover who will do anything for your attention…your mistress who will suck your dick when your wife won’t do it. The whore who will take you around the world when your ol’ lady comes to bed in curlers. It’s a drug, a lure and it will do anything for you.
That’s the magic of it all…the attraction of staying addicted…who wants to walk away from the shit when you know you are going to feel like shit anyway. You might as well stay hooked.
Jane was trying to explain that since I was trying to quit using, my body was trying to get back to the way it was before the drugs. That’s what made withdrawal a living fucking nightmare.
She prepared me by saying that these symptoms would start about 8-12 hours after my last fix. Hell, the last fix I had killed me and put me on my back on the floor of a tour bus and now the real fun was getting ready to start. That pain was just a warm-up for the real fireworks.
I could feel the fuse had already been lit and it was just about show time.
The joys that I could look forward to would be sweating, anxiety, depression, cold sweats, chills, severe muscle and bone aches, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, gooseflesh and fever.
Oh fuck, just shoot me now!
I thought about my rock star behind one of those walls. Was he going through this right now? I needed to be there to help him but I was a fucking mess. I needed to be like he said he needed me to be…a woman who was strong and stood by him and was there for him.
Jane also warned me that many addicts would scratch themselves compulsively and that wicked behavior could cause my already fair skin to bruise. Great!
“Withdrawal is very, very difficult,” she said, “that’s why so many people go back to using. Just to take the pain away. You made the right decision in coming here. We will take care of you.”
There were three phases of heroin withdrawal and the first phase was going to be the hardest to get through. It would peak after about three days and end after five, so terrified, I buckled myself down for the monster who was starting to crawl out from under my bed.
I was scared shitless but knew I had to go through this in order to be clean. I kept telling myself that I was not alone, and I had the voices in my head to keep me company.
I tried to sleep but my stomach felt like it was eating me alive. I began to hear voices talking to me calling my name, “Poppy…Poppy…”
I was vomiting at the same time I was shitting myself from the pain. Make it go away, I screamed! Make it go away…the pain was so intense…just give me something…anything to make it go away.
This lasted about four days and I wanted to die just to escape this hell on earth. Why, why, why…I kept thinking to myself…did I let things get so far out of hand?
I need him…help me…is there anyone out there on the other side of that door who can hear me scream at night…or are my screams drowned out by the others?
The next two weeks my body was trying to re-learn the process of making endorphins which my body had been substituting with heroin.
My skin felt gross like I had goose flesh and my legs would cramp so bad I would scream. My nights were filled with panic attacks and every time I tried to sleep, I would awaken in a cold sweat and swear that someone was knocking on my door all night and someone else was in my room talking to me, calling for me to come with them. “Poppy…Poppy…”
It was the drugs, the devil, and Jane told me not to listen to them, it wasn’t real, not real in any way but they sounded real and I wanted to go with them, to take another hit, shoot up and make this all go away
. It was that simple, but I couldn’t score anything in that place. No pushers, no shovers, no anything evil behind these four walls.
Jane warned me that the first two weeks would be very, very bad. I would have to go through hell to get to heaven and oh man, I was in hell now.
Crying, screaming, complete and utter terror, intense pain…all that was missing was a pit of fire and brimstone. I was drowning in the lake of fire and at that moment, I deserved it.
I survived the first two weeks of withdrawal and what a ride. Between my alone time in my room, my counseling sessions and the fact that I was not really dying although it felt like it, I could breathe a little sigh of relief.
The third phase of withdrawal could take anywhere from a week to a couple of months.
Jane said that after this phase I would start to feel better which encouraged me but at the time, I couldn’t believe it although I wanted to.
Three weeks, four weeks, five weeks, six weeks…I survived and was now drug free.
My Rock Star
I felt like I did when I was a little kid. I cannot describe to you the feeling that I had, I just can’t. Every pore in my body seemed to breathe again, my head was clear, and my heart didn’t bounce all over my chest.
It was weird at first feeling “normal” but I did actually feel normal, and it was fucking amazing!
My eyes were like vampire eyes and everything was clear again, beautiful.
The colors on the trees, the flowers and the sky all looked vibrant and I thought I could hear the grass grow.
I know that sounds dumb as shit but that’s how I really felt. It was like heaven on earth and I couldn’t wait to jump into the arms and the bed of my other heaven, my rock star.
I had had no contact with the outside world and I don’t even know if he knew I had been there or if anyone from the band knew where I was.
I assumed my rock star was still at the facility but no one would or could tell me anything.
On my last day there, I kinda panicked. I knew that I was going back out into the world, the real world, and I had nowhere to go.
I don’t even know if the band was clean and back together or what the hell was happening.
I packed up my never know bag, had my last session with Jane and that was it. I was on my way and headed out the front door.
The bright Arizona sun beamed down on me like it was a greeting from the heavens. I was free from the ties of the drugs that bound me to an unearthly place.
I shielded my eyes from the ball of fire and reached into my never know bag and grabbed the big rock and roll starlet sun glasses and placed them gently over my eyes.
However, the sun was not the only thing that was blinding me.
In front of the building was a long, white stretch limo, just sitting there watching me.
As I made my way down the sidewalk, the back door opened and there he was…my rock star.
I looked back at the facility’s door and there was Jane watching me with a big smile on her face. I guess he did know that I was there.
I stopped when I saw him and I began to silently sob.
There he was in front of me again for the first time in a long time. Black leather pants, no shirt and a black leather vest…long black hair with cool rock star blonde patches on the side…skin like muscled velvet and that smile…that crooked rock star smile.
He ran to me and swept me up in his arms.
Crying, I said, “How did you know?”
Laughing he said, “I didn’t…I just got out myself and Jane told me to wait in the car for a few minutes and then I saw you…have you been here the whole time?”
I nodded.
“You did this…for us?"
I nodded. He said us.
“You look amazing Baby,” he said as he held me tighter. “Oh God, I’ve missed you…I need you.”
Hugging him, I melted into his strong arms. This was a high that no drug could ever give us.
“I don’t know what it is”, he said…“it just feels like I’m supposed to love you. It’s you Poppy, it’s always been you…I love you Poppy Bleu…”
I smiled as my heart skipped a beat.
“I love you too Joe.”
The End of Book One
About the Author
Veronica Moreau is the erotic fiction alter-ego of author Lisa V. Proulx.
Veronica writes about the wild world of sex, drugs and rock and roll…raw, steamy erotic fiction with a rock and roll edge.
As Lisa, she walks the fine line between Heaven and Hell, writing tales of horror and unspeakable fear to inspirational stories that will uplift and motivate your spirit.
When Lisa isn’t busy writing about her latest rock star hero or daring heroine, she can usually be found on her farm in Maryland, raising Rottweilers, belly dancing and – of course – listening to the classic rock that has always inspired her.
She is also a columnist and feature writer for her hometown newspaper.
You can learn more about Lisa/Veronica and her books at:
www.lisavproulx.com