by Payge Galvin
“See?” Allie chirped as she rolled my monster bag up behind me. “It doesn’t even look like a rehab. It’s like a fancy hotel. And they have spa services and equine therapy. All you have to do is go to meetings and participate in therapy, and you can get facials and massages and pedicures! And swim and ride horses! It will be like a thirty-day vacation!”
“A thirty-day vacation, from which there is no escape,” I muttered.
“I’m trying to do you a favor here, Violet.” She opened her shoulder bag to show her stacks of hundred dollar bills stuffed into the bag. Frantically, I closed the clasp on the bag and shoved it under her arm. “And I convinced your parents to let me use my share of the money to foot the bill at this place, so don’t tell me I don’t care. I’m paying the twenty thousand dollar deposit now, and I’ll pay the rest after you finish the program—which I’m sure you’ll do, because you’re awesome and I have faith in you.”
“How did you talk my parents into that? And where do they think you got the money?”
“I told them I won some big lottery scratch-offs,” she said with a shrug.
“I can’t believe they bought that. I can’t believe you told them that. You’re all insane,” I sighed. “I am the only sane person here. In a rehab.”
Allie exhaled slowly, as if she were trying to gather her thoughts. “Okay, you may not be an alcoholic, but you are having night terrors and anxiety attacks. You’re clearly traumatized by what went down that night in The Coffee Cave and you obviously need some sort of therapy, Violet, so why not just get it here? On my dime. You’re worth the investment, Vi.”
“Fine. But this is the last stop on the Violet-Allie crazy train. I can’t do it anymore. I won't let you do this to me again. If you want there to be any chance of us ever being friends again, things are going to have to change,” I said in my no-bullshit tone I only used when I was really pissed at Allie.
I sighed and glanced around the New Beginnings lobby. A place like this would be perfect for her, but she couldn’t check in with me. She couldn’t, really. We weren’t supposed to be anywhere near each other. We’d agreed—along with everyone else who was there the night of the shooting—not to talk or stay in touch. “I tell you what. I’ll stay here and get help for my problems if you get help for yours.”
Allie pulled a sanctimonious face, all wide eyes and pursed lips. “I haven’t had a drink all week. I don’t black out anymore. I know my limits now. I don’t need help.”
“Awesome. Getting so drunk that I had to cremate the body of a guy whose shooting we witnessed is your limit. It’s good that you know that now,” I muttered.
“Would you please pipe down?” Allie clapped her hand over my mouth, but I shook her off. “And technically, we didn’t witness the shooting. We just overheard it.”
“You didn’t treat the addiction, Allie. I’m not saying you haven’t made progress. But you’re still drinking, which means you still haven’t realized how completely fucked up your behavior is.” My voice dropped into a fierce conspiratorial whisper. “We’re not even supposed to be in contact anymore. You’re breaking the rules just by talking to me. You always break the rules, and if you want me to ever speak to you again, you have to swear right here and now that you’ll get help.” I glanced around the beige-and-blue tiled lobby. “Otherwise, once you walk out that door, you’ll never see me again.”
I slung my arm toward the fancy frosted glass double doors.
“Therapy?” Allie repeated, frowning at my emphatic nod.
I nodded. My mouth was dry and my hands were shaking, but it was from nerves, not detox. I’d always sucked at confronting people, and this conversation, combined with the earlier scene with my parents, was the limit of what I could handle in a day. I crossed my arms around my body, as if I was trying to hold myself together enough to see this negotiation through.
“That’s the deal. I want you to stop leaning on crutches and face your problems. I want you to commit to something and actually follow through with it for the first time in your fucked up life. I want you to grow up, Allie. And after today, you have to stay away from me until I get out of here.” Allie barely leaned back in time to avoid a face-poke from my wagging finger. “You know the rules.”
“You want me to pinkie promise?” Allie held out the smallest finger on her right hand, grinning to make light, but I only scowled at it.
“I want you to look me in the eye and tell me you’ll get therapy. Your word’s good enough.”
“Because you trust me?”
“Because you can’t lie for shit, Allie. My parents must have been desperate to believe your lottery story.”
“Fine.” Allie closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “I’ll get therapy.”
“You swear? You have to follow through and get therapy in an actual recognized therapy program, not from some guy in a van who promises you that the pretty crystals you’re paying three hundred dollars for will cure you of all your negative energy.”
“Those were ethically mined from Mongolia, Vi! Also, they matched my eyes, and if that’s not good retail therapy, I don’t know what is.”
But I only rolled my eyes and ignored her excuses. “And you have to finish the program, just like I will.”
“I will. Start to finish. We’ll do it together. I swear on our friendship.”
For the first time since the coffee shop, I allowed Allie to hug me. As always, she hugged with all of her might, practically picking me up with the force of her enthusiasm. Tentatively, I wrapped my arms around her waist and sagged against her. As much anger and resentment as I held toward my childhood best friend, it felt good to hug her again.
And I felt the first prick of guilt for Allie spending her share on my rehab. For just a second, I thought about telling her to keep her bag full of money, that I would pay my own way. But then, I remembered my father’s threat to cut me off without a dime, without any resources. My dad had never threatened to do that before. And I couldn’t trust that he wouldn’t threaten to do it again if I got a speeding ticket or a B or something. I would need to hold onto that cash just in case I needed to pay for my tuition and an apartment. So I would keep my mouth shut and let Allie pay my way.
I put my head on her shoulder, breathing deep. “Thanks, Allie.”
Chapter 2
It seemed that once you agreed to stay in rehab, they didn’t give you time to rethink the decision. Allie broke the hug and turned to the nearest intake to inform the blue-clad staffer, “Laswell, checking in!”
Two more employees swooped in like vultures to grab my bags and “escorted” me down a long beige-and-white hallway to an open office marked, “C. Wentworth – Addiction Counselor.”
“I’ll see you soon, Violet!” Allie called after me, waving her arms like she was seeing me off at the airport for some exotic vacation.
“No, you won’t!” I reminded her, shooting a stern look over my shoulder.
Allie frowned for a second and then nodded. “Oh, right. I won’t see you soon!”
If I wasn’t being dragged away by the tee-totaling goon squad, I would have rolled my eyes so damn hard. The staff members – which, given my bad mood, the toadstool buildings and the amount of blue they were wearing --I had decided to call Smurfs, dropped me into the chair in front of Mr. Wentworth’s unmanned desk.
Great. I’d been lured to the den of Papa Smurf himself. Other than a motivational poster reminding me that commitment was the difference between “trying” and “doing” and a single framed photo on the desk, showing an older couple posing with two ridiculously hot, dark-haired guys my age, the office was completely lacking in personality.
The older man in the photo, silver-haired and handsome, but stern, was obviously Mr. Wentworth. You couldn’t have a name like Wentworth and not be a stern, old white man.
I buried my face in my hands, my sandy hair falling in front of me, shielding me from the world. Between the stress of the sentencing and the lack of sleep, the dull thro
b of pain between my eyebrows had blossomed into a full-blown, eye-crossing headache. The door behind me opened and I tried to straighten in my chair, but the best I could manage was raising my head. A male form stepped near the desk chair as my eyes slowly came into focus.
Papa Smurf, he was not.
As miserable as I was, I couldn’t help but stare at the gorgeous man across the desk. He had high cheekbones, a perfectly square chin, and dark hair that fell over a high forehead. His wide-set eyes were green ringed with cobalt, the color of Caribbean coves and filthy promises. His teeth were blinding white and perfectly straight, as if he had a dentist on call for emergency whitening appointments. A soft-looking Cupid’s bow mouth framed the smile nicely. And while the face was absolutely, heart-stoppingly perfect, even it was not enough to distract me from the body.
The. Body.
Somewhere, there was a romance novel cover missing its bare-chested rogue hero. Tall and lean with broad shoulders, long runner’s legs and elegant piano player’s fingers, it was practically a crime to cover that level of perfection with clothes. And if it wasn’t illegal, I was writing my Congressman, because I was willing to sponsor the “Mandatory Nudity for Hot Rehab Employees” Bill.
I wanted those fingers on me, in me, all over me. I would be willing to admit to blackout benders involving cockfights and illegal music downloads if he would put those hands on my –
“Violet, I’m Cameron Wentworth. I’ll be one of several counselors who will be over-seeing your treatment during your stay here.”
Right, yes, rehab. I snapped to attention. There was no propositioning your counselor in rehab. That was probably a rule.
Mr. Wentworth stretched his hand out to shake mine. It was warm and smooth against my sweaty fingers. I snatched my hand back, wiping it against my jeans. “How are you?” he asked.
How was I? Was there an answer that might get me out of this place faster? Repentant? Committed? Yes, I would be a good, sober girl from now on? But I was sure Cameron of the soul-probing green eyes had probably heard all of those excuses before. So I went with honesty.
“Not thrilled to be here,” I said as he slid into his chair.
The corners of his lips twitched. “Well, that’s to be expected. Now, I need to ask you a few basic questions for your intake paperwork, so we can decide the best course of treatment for you. How much would you say you drink?”
“Less than some and more than others?” I guessed.
When Mr. Wentworth lifted his eyebrows, I added, “One to two shots, maybe once a month. I’m a college student. If I don’t drink at parties, people make a big deal out of it. They think you’re a religious nut or judge-y or something. So I take a shot or two and then coast on Diet Coke for the rest of the night.”
I twisted my hands in my lap as my cheeks grew red. How did I get here? How did answering these questions become my life? How was it fair that Allie waltzed out of this place, click-clacking around in her designer shoes, and I was sitting here in this beautiful man’s office telling him all about my non-existent alcohol consumption?
“Is vodka your drink of choice or are you more of an equal opportunity drinker?”
I had to stop taking mental vacations every time he asked a question. It was off-putting.
“Mostly vodka,” I said. “Mixed into those girlie fruity test tube shots. I embrace the cliché.”
“And how is that spread out over the course of your day?”
“Considering I only have one to two drinks once a month or so, pretty thin.”
Mr. Wentworth sat back in his chair, folding his hands on his desk in a way that made me want to toss his desk blotter across the room and jump him. “So I’m assuming that you would not consider yourself an alcoholic?”
Something about the way his voice sounded, the disapproval for daring to think I might not be an alcoholic, set my teeth on edge. So I was considerably sassier than I normally would be under the circumstances. As if anything could be considered normal under these circumstances. “You are assuming correctly.”
“Well, that’s going to make it difficult to get past the first of the twelve steps,” he muttered.
I wanted to tell him that I didn’t need the steps, that I’d never been a problem drinker. That the one time I’d let myself go crazy – to celebrate my birthday – all hell had broken loose. But I couldn’t tell him any of that because of the pact, the agreement I’d made with Allie and Sugar and Blake and Whitney and all of the others, because we all had something to lose. I really missed being the sort of person who didn’t have something to lose. But instead of blurting all of that out, I just shook my head.
“Would it surprise you to know that your mother estimated your alcohol consumption to be more along the lines of five to six drinks a day, not counting weekend binges?”
My mouth dropped open. I had never been drunk in front of my mother. Hell, I’d never had so much as an experimental sip of wine in front of my mother. How in the world could she estimate that I was a binge-plus-six-drinks a day drinker?
The truth hit my brain broadside. My mother had lied to the rehab center to make it easier for them to admit me. An anger so hot and bright it made me wince flared behind my eyes. How fucking dare she lie about me that way? How could she? I wanted to throw up in Mr. Wentworth’s trash can, but I clenched my teeth and breathed through the urge.
“It would shock the hell out of me, because it’s not true,” I told him tartly.
“Any idea why your mother would put incorrect information on your admission form?” he asked, though his tone was definitely in the “please tell me another lie” end of the disbelieving range.
I shook my head. There had to be a reason for mom doing this. She wouldn’t just make up something so demeaning unless she thought it would help me. She had to be doing what she thought was best for me. Maybe she was afraid the center wouldn’t let me in if she told them I didn’t really have a drinking problem. Maybe she was trying to protect me from Dad’s threats of disownment by making it easier for me to get in. There had to be an explanation.
“I’m sure Mom had her reasons,” I said, forcing my voice to be calm and even.
“A DUI with a blood-alcohol reading of .09 after what you claim to be a lifetime of relative sobriety is a pretty dramatic shift in behavior. Why the sudden change?”
“It was my birthday, and my DD fell through,” I told him.
“Do you regret making that decision?”
“Yes, I do.”
He pursed those soft, annoyingly lickable lips and nodded. “Your mother noted on your pre-admission form that you’ve been having trouble sleeping recently and that you’ve lost weight. Was this a result of your arrest or part of a larger picture?”
“I don’t follow,” I told him. Honestly, it struck me as odd that my mother would note weight loss as a negative on my admissions form. She watched every calorie that went into her mouth, and by extension, mine. She was always reminding me of the fat content of this or the carb count of that. Sometimes, I wondered if she insisted that I live at home and commute to school so I could avoid the freshman fifteen. For her to put that on my admission form, she had to be scrabbling for reasons for me to be admitted. She must have been really worried about me.
So why did it make me feel so freaking horrible?
“I’m asking because I’d like to know whether there was some sort of incident that we would need to address in therapy or group as a part of your recovery. Any sort of trauma: an assault, an accident, a death in your family. Honestly, an upsetting encounter with an ex can send some people into spirals. Has anything happened to you recently that you might want to talk about?”
I shook my head, even as my palms started to sweat. My skin seemed to grow too hot, too cold and too tight all at once, as if I would burst out of it at any second like a newly molted, emotionally damaged snake. The already-weak hold I had on my emotions slipped. In my head, I could hear the strumming of Dillon’s guitar in the distance. I c
ould hear Allie’s drunken, outraged yelling at the moaners in the bathroom. And then the gunshot, that weird firecracker sound that made everyone run toward the coffee shop counter.
“Violet?”
I closed my eyes and dug my fingers into the leather-covered arms of my chair. My pulse pounded in my ears, squeezing at my throat and keeping my breath from my lungs.
Allie was hunched over the battered little café table at the Cave, using that serious “drunk person trying too hard to appear sober” expression, which was pretty much rendered useless by the way her eyes rolled up toward the ceiling. I had been downing coffee for the last half hour, trying to get sober enough to get Allie home. I’d had far more than my usual “two-shot maximum” tonight and for the first time in my life, I was super-SUPER drunk. So far, the experience was not meeting my expectation for awesomeness.
Some grubby musician who introduced himself as Dillon was plucking at his guitar and crooning about the girl he left behind. Under normal circumstances, I might have enjoyed the music, but I was more focused on the nausea that had me clutching the sides of the table. My “birthday girl” tiara hung askew in my mussed blond hair, and I was sure I looked like a pissed off, disgraced princess.
“I don’t feel so good,” I said, frowning. “I have this weird, watery taste in my mouth.”
Allie’s blue eyes went wide. “We gotta move.”
Allie lurched forward and her hip slammed into the table as she dragged me out of my seat by one arm. “Allie, what the—”?”
Allie tripped over her leopard-print stilettos as she yanked me behind her like a tantrum-throwing toddler in the cereal aisle. “Unless you wanna throw up in front of people, come with me.”
As Allie shoved me ahead of her on the way to the bathroom, she made several clumsy attempts to grab my hair and hold it back. “Ow!”I yelped as I jiggled the flimsy metal handle to the ladies’ room. “Just fucking – ow! Cut it out, Allie!”
“Do you want to puke in your own hair?” Allie demanded as I yanked on the latch. From the other side of the door, we heard a low anguished moan and an answering giggle. Allie pounded on the door with her fist. “Get out of the bathroom! Puke trumps pee!”
