“What kind of drugs?” The friendly tone was gone from Dr. Hearn’s speech, replaced by instant clinical concern.
“He took four milligrams of Valium, some scotch on the flight here, and some marijuana hard candies. I don’t know how effective they are, but they must have been pretty good, because his speech is slurred, he can barely walk, and he’s blacking out.” I really hated what I was going to say next. “I don’t know how to put this delicately, but it would be unfortunate if this required an emergency room visit.”
More than unfortunate. Neil wasn’t as famous as a movie star, but since his retirement, he’d had more time to attend social events, and his face had begun showing up in the society pages. He wasn’t the most famous billionaire in the world, but he was high profile enough that a trip to the ER while ODing had the potential to be publicly embarrassing. He didn’t need that on top of grieving his mother. Emma didn’t need that on top of losing her grandma.
“Oh, no, I don’t think that’s necessary,” Dr. Hearn said. “Four milligrams isn’t a heavy dose. My only concern over this interaction would be for his respiration. Do you know how to check respiration and heart rate?”
Did I ever. I just wished I wasn’t having to track those functions again. “Yes, from before.”
“Take those vital signs every fifteen minutes for the next few hours, and should there be anything wrong, ring me. Try to get some coffee into him, if he can wake up enough to drink it.” Hearn sounded weary. I wondered how many of his patients did this on the reg.
I thanked him and hung up then turned back to Neil. If I stayed there a moment longer watching him snore and half smother in the bed, I was going to be mad enough to pack my bags.
Kneeling beside him, I shoved at his shoulder. I couldn’t roll him, so I slapped his cheek. One eye peeled slowly open. I smacked him again.
“I’m awake!” His indignation was made somewhat less serious since he sounded like he was talking with a mouth full of hot oatmeal.
“I called your doctor. I need you to try to wake up. I’m going to go get you some coffee.” I was so pissed. He reached for me, and I dodged his hand. I didn’t want to comfort him.
For as fuming angry as I was, when I got out to the hallway, I lost all sense of purpose. This was such bullshit. I’d already done the medical panic thing with him more times than I cared to count. I didn’t want to do this again. It was unfair of him to put me in this position.
I went to find Emma and Michael, and I lucked out on my way down the stairs. Michael was quietly closing the door to Emma’s room, and I motioned for him to come over.
“What’s up?” he asked with a slight frown.
“Is Emma taking a nap?” It would be so awesome if we didn’t have to worry her with this.
Michael nodded. “Yeah, she’s completely wiped out. How’s Mr. Elwood?”
“He’s…” I glanced to Emma’s door and lowered my voice. “He’s kind of ODing on some stuff, right now.”
Could you OD on marijuana? I didn’t think you could.
“Jesus!” Michael swore. “We have to call an ambulance.”
“No, no. I already talked to his doctor.” I pressed my fingertips to my forehead. “He’s going to be fine. He’s just having an interaction between a ton of THC and Valium. But I need to get coffee in him, and I don’t want to leave him alone. Can you go up there and see if you can keep him awake?”
“Yeah, no problem.” He smiled a grim sort of smile. “Did that for plenty of my fraternity buddies.”
“Great. Thanks.” I was halfway down the next set of stairs before I realized how weird it sounded for me to say “great” in response to his admission that a bunch of his friends had gotten life-threateningly fucked up.
In the kitchen, I made the strongest coffee in the world by using a French press and way too little water. It was like sludge. I hoped Neil hated it.
Emma had said her father didn’t handle grief well. Was this a common occurrence in the face of it, then? I was about to marry this man; it was something I needed to know.
I slipped my phone from my back pocket and blew out a long breath. I didn’t want to make this call. Oh, how I did not want to make this call. But I needed someone who knew Neil, and who wouldn’t hesitate to tell me something that might make me reconsider my relationship with him.
I hated myself, but I hit the call button.
* * * *
I met Valerie at the door. She went immediately to the bottom of the stairs in the foyer and looked up. “Is he awake?”
“On and off. Michael is with him, right now, trying to sober him up. Here, let me get your coat.” I helped Valerie out of her burgundy duster and took it to the closet to hang it up.
“I should go up and see Emma.” Valerie already had her foot on the first step. She and Neil were so alike in their shared worry for their daughter. Despite my personal disagreements with Valerie, there was no denying she was a good, loving mother.
Which is why I knew she would understand when I said, “No, don’t. She’s sleeping. She doesn’t know any of this is going on. Michael and I are trying to keep it quiet, because the flight was hard on her. Neil should be okay in a few hours.”
Valerie frowned. “I’m confused, Sophie. Why, exactly, am I here if I’m not needed?”
“You are needed.” It was the hardest thing I’d ever had to say to another human being. “I need you. I wanted to talk to you about something.”
She looked irritated but followed me into the kitchen.
“Should I put the kettle on?” I asked, gesturing toward the electric kettle. “I finally figured out how to use this.”
“Sophie, I flew in this morning, as well, and I am exhausted, as I’m sure you are. We don’t particularly enjoy each other’s company, so be direct with me.” She pressed her fingertips to her temple, like a person in an Advil commercial.
“Fine.” The faster I got her out of my house the better, in my opinion. “You knew Neil back when his father died. Did anything like this happen then?”
She froze like the proverbial deer caught in the headlights.
I took advantage of the moment to add, “I’m about to marry him, Valerie. I need to know.”
After our huge blow up the night before Emma’s wedding, a fight in which I’d threatened Valerie with physical violence and boasted of my ability to manipulate her right out of Neil’s life—not my finest moment as a human being—she had no reason to participate in a difficult heart-to-heart with me. But she cared about Neil, and I hoped it would be enough to get me the answers I was dreading.
“Oh, Sophie. I apologize for being so brusque. Of course you’re concerned about this.” Every trace of irritation or dislike of me vanished from her expression. She looked genuinely remorseful. After a pause, she answered, “Yes. When Leif died, Neil did something very similar to this. Only then, he ended up in the hospital.”
“This time, it was Valium and pot and booze,” I told her, sliding onto a stool on the other side of the island.
Valerie leaned against the fridge. “Sleeping pills and vodka.”
A chill went up my spine. “You don’t think he was…”
“No.” She shook her head to reinforce her answer. “I don’t believe he was suicidal. You know Neil and his need for control. This is just a manifestation of that. If he can’t will himself to stop feeling, he’ll drink himself into a stupor or reach for the Klonopin. I’m amazed he’s hid it from you for this long.”
“He didn’t.” I just hadn’t noticed the pattern. When Emma had gotten married, he’d responded to his grief at “losing” his daughter by keeping his blood alcohol level up. After our abortion, he’d bought weed. Any difficult conversation? Alcohol was there.
The room around me seemed to vibrate, but it was just sudden, relentless tension in my skull.
“Sophie? Are you all right?” Valerie stepped forward, and I waved her back.
“Just a little…” I tried to breathe to calm my nerves, b
ut it didn’t help. “Anxiety attack.” My chest buckled, and in a horrifying split second, I started outright sobbing in front of Valerie. And I couldn’t stop. I’d never felt so hopelessly stupid and willfully blind in my entire life. I wanted to storm upstairs and shake him. I wanted to demand to know why he hadn’t told me. Did he even know?
I clutched the countertop and focused on the light from the skylights overhead making the granite glitter under my fingers. Over the sound of my heartbeat in my ears, I heard water running then Valerie’s high-heeled boots clacking on the tile.
“Shhh,” Valerie soothed, dabbing my forehead with a cold, wet tea towel and a motherly touch. “You’re all right.”
Any compunction I’d ever had about showing “weakness” in front of her faded in the face of my misery. “Don’t…go,” I managed between sobs.
“I’m not going anywhere.”
If someone had told me I would ever be relying on Valerie in a moment of extreme vulnerability, I would have thrown something at them. If they had said she would put her arms around me in a cradling hug, I would have started something on fire. But it was happening, and I was so grateful for her compassion, even after all the times I’d been a complete bitch to her.
When I calmed down, my face was hot, and my eyes sore from crying. Valerie went to the sink and rewet the cloth with cool water then came back to wash my face. I let her, even though I felt like a child.
Maybe that was where the mothering feeling was coming from. Emma was the same age as me, so Valerie was literally old enough to be my mom. There must have been some kind of transference going on between us, a confusion of our roles.
We were supposed to hate each other, weren’t we?
“I take it Neil has something of a problem, then?” There was a gentle scolding in Valerie’s tone, but it wasn’t directed at me. She sounded put out at him. When I nodded, miserable, she asked, “How long has this been going on?”
“I don’t know.” Just sitting there, I couldn’t put my finger on it. It might have been easier to imagine a time when Neil hadn’t responded to a bad situation by reaching for the booze. “It seems like…a very long time.”
It had been. Neil had been on pills when he’d returned home from seeing his mother in London after her stroke. He’d said he took them to cope with flying, and I’m sure that was a part of it. But there had also been…
“Oh my god.” I put my head in my hands, resting my elbows on the island. “It’s been every single time. Any time anything has been difficult or bad…”
“Then, it sounds like he’s back to where he was when Emma was little.”
I blinked at her. “What do you mean?”
Valerie took the now room-temperature tea towel and refreshed it under the faucet as she spoke over the sound of the water. “Neil has always had a bit of a problem. He wouldn’t have told you, because he doesn’t admit it. Not to Rudy, not to me, and he’s hidden it from Emma. But I don’t think he believes he has a problem.”
“I wish…” I almost started blubbering again. “Valerie, did you not tell me about this because…”
She paled, and shocked hurt lined her face. “No. I never told you because I didn’t know it was happening again. Even if I had, it wouldn’t have been my place to interfere.”
“So, this whole time…” I almost choked. “This whole time, I’ve been living with some version of Neil that’s, what? Just the result of some low-level recurring addiction?”
“Neil is a low-level recurring addiction,” Valerie said, her mouth pulled down in a frown. “I could slap him for this.”
I had to admit, that took me by surprise. I would have thought Valerie would be happy that Neil and I were having problems. “Why are you helping me?”
“I’m not a monster, Sophie. You’re in pain. What was I to do, say ‘ta!’ and leave?” She turned and faced the cupboards. “Where will I find a glass in here?”
I pointed down the row of glass-fronted cabinets. Valerie got a tall cut-crystal tumbler and took a bottled water from the fridge. She poured it for me and slid it across the island, continuing, “You haven’t been living with some alternate version of Neil. He wasn’t drinking during his chemotherapy, was he?”
I shook my head and sipped my water.
“I don’t think he’s going to sober up and fall out of love with you. Honestly, I don’t know if he can sober up, but I know he can’t fall out of love with you. Still, this was extremely unfair. I know Rose has just died, and I know you wouldn’t look askance at him having a drink or two to blur the edges, but pharmaceutical interaction isn’t a proper response to grief.”
My chest hurt as words I didn’t want to say poured out. “I’m so stupid. I should have known. I’m supposed to know everything about him… I thought I did.”
“This isn’t your fault, Sophie. Neil is very good at making people see what he wants them to see.” A wistful note in her tone made me wonder if she was referring to their long-ago relationship. “But you’re also very good at calling him out for his bullshit.”
“I’m not sure I can do that. Not right now.” Not when his mother had just died. It seemed too cruel at a time like this.
“Not right now,” Valerie agreed. “When you return to New York, perhaps? Though I do think you have a right to object to this particular incident as soon as he’s coherent enough to listen.”
“Yeah. I’ll… Maybe I’ll call our therapist.” And shit. Now, she knew about that.
Thankfully, she was still in Kind Valerie mode. She nodded and assured me, “This will all come out all right, Sophie. You’re a smart girl, and you love each other. The two of you will work it out.”
Why did that actually make me feel better?
“I’m going to go,” she continued. “I don’t want to be here when Emma wakes up. She’ll realize something is amiss.”
Though my legs were still shaking, I walked Valerie to the door. “Thank you,” I said, quiet so that my voice wouldn’t travel up the echo-prone center stairwell. “For everything, Valerie.”
She nodded, her gaze drifting to the staircase. “Thank you, for protecting Emma from this.” She paused, and her next words were pained; they came at a great cost, I knew. With her hand on the door, she said, “And for taking care of him.”
She left, and I stood staring at the door for a long moment. Once again, the woman had left me speechless.
* * * *
Dr. Hearn’s prescription of coffee and constant wake-up pokes was exactly what Neil needed, though he refused to recognize it.
“I don’t know what all the fuss was about,” he told me, pinching the bridge of his nose. He sat swaying on the edge of the bed, and though his speech was still a bit slurred, he was mostly with it. “I wouldn’t do anything irresponsible, I just wanted—”
“Don’t you ever do this to me again.” I went from tired and defeated to furious and trembling in three-point-five. Which, I assumed, was fast. It had to do with cars, and I’d heard Neil use the phrase before. Which just went to show how pissed off I was. I couldn’t even think of my own idioms.
Neil squinted at me in annoyance. He was annoyed? He hadn’t just had the “by the way, your fiancé is an addict” conversation with one of my exes.
The worst thing Neil can do in an argument with me is try to act like he’s being totally reasonable and I’m the one out of my mind. It only enrages me further, making him seem even more collected in comparison. He tried that now. “Don’t you think you’re overreacting, just a bit? It isn’t as though I swallowed a bottle of sleeping pills.”
“No, just Valium and scotch and enough marijuana hard candy to make me want to call the hospital!” My anger was like a jackhammer inside my body, shaking my bones. “Can you imagine how upsetting that would be to Emma? If you were in the hospital, again? And during her grandmother’s funeral?”
He glanced sideways at me but didn’t maintain eye contact. When he spoke, it was in the maddening, controlled voice that always s
ounded as if he were scolding me. “I’m in pain, Sophie. My mother has just died.”
“Don’t use that angry dad voice on me. It’s not intimidating.” I paced the room, from the door to the fireplace to the window. “I understand that you’re hurting, but that doesn’t mean you can be reckless. You need to be present this week. Your brothers and sister are going to need you. Your daughter needs you.”
“And who do I need, Sophie?” he demanded. “Who will be there for me, in all of this, this obligation you’re heaping on me?”
“I will, you big dumbass!”
Neil’s expression of outrage was somewhat spoiled by the twitches at the corners of his mouth. I couldn’t stay at my level of upset, either. I was too exhausted, and as far as angry retorts went, that one hadn’t been my best. It would be foolish to keep fighting.
Bleary eyed, Neil patted the bed beside him. “I’m sorry I worried you.”
I sat, still reluctant to make it seem like all was forgiven. “I called Valerie.”
“Why did you do that?” He squinted slightly, a deep vertical line of confusion appearing between his brows.
“I needed help. I wanted to keep this from Emma.” With a shaky breath, I added, “And I had to know what was up with all this. She said you’ve done this before.”
There was a catch to the beginning of his exhale, and that soft noise dashed any hope I had about this being an easy conversation. He’d already lapsed back into Sophie-is-overreacting mode. “Valerie has known me for a long time. I’m sure she had a lengthy list of my faults catalogued.”
“Don’t blame this on Valerie. You’re the one who fucked up,” I said softly. I took his hand in mine. “I need you to go back to therapy. When we get back home, I want you to make some calls.”
“I don’t need any more therapy.” It had been a touchy subject between us, since he’d stopped seeing the counselor he’d consulted in New York. I’d thought he could use more time. He’d wanted to be better so badly, he’d gone to this whole new level of denial and declared himself just fine.
“Then, you need AA. But I’m not sure how ‘A’ it’s going to be.” I didn’t need to remind him of that. We’d been under some increased scrutiny since my book had come out, and since Emma’s lavish wedding had been gushed over by “society.” Whoever those people were.
The Ex Page 3
