“I think I just did.”
“No, you didn’t.” His tone was sharp. “I understand why you feel sorry for yourself right now. But I think you’re the toughest person I’ve met. A hopeless case lets the hospital medicate him. Because the doctor ordered it, right?”
“It was a doctor who gave me my first pills. ”
Denny shrugged. “Still. There are more opiates in this building than you can shake a bedpan at. And you turned them down. You’re a B.A.”
“A what?”
“A—” He dropped his voice. “—a badass.”
I snorted, but when I did, it tugged on my surgical wound. And I felt cold all of a sudden. A chill usually preceded a new bout of nausea. I eyed the plastic tub on the table, measuring its distance from me. “I’m glad we had this chat. But what do you want?”
He shifted his weight. “Two things. Sophie has been calling around, trying to figure out your next move.”
I grunted in surprise. I hated the idea of Sophie having to bail me out. And I couldn’t imagine what my “next move” was. Moving made me ache or it made me puke.
“Ruth Shipley wants you to stay at her place when you’re released from here.”
Closing my eyes, I tried to picture it. When I’d landed on their farm last July, I was fresh from a thirty-day inpatient drug treatment program. I was finished detoxing, and I’d buried my cravings under ten or twelve hours of hard physical labor a day.
This time I’d be sweating on a bed in the bunkhouse, trying not to claw through the walls. And the hole in my gut meant I’d be nearly helpless. “I can’t go there,” I said.
“You don’t have a lot of options,” he said quietly. “You don’t carry health insurance, which is illegal by the way.”
“Thanks for the update.”
“You could go to a nursing home that charges on a sliding scale. But some of them aren’t so nice.”
“I don’t want to puke on Ruthie Shipley,” I said honestly. And just saying the word made me feel green. My feet were hot and my hands were cold. I was disgusting even to myself. So I’d rather be alone.
“Well, that’s why I need you to listen to my second idea,” Denny said. “I came up here to suggest that you try some Suboxone,” he said, surprising me. “Sophie said you didn’t love the idea, but she’s been calling around. She found a doctor who will prescribe for you after you leave the hospital. And that doctor will consult for you right now. You could have your first dose today.”
“Nobody here said anything to me about Suboxone.” And they’d all had their prescription pads handy. I’d assumed that I couldn’t have it because of the surgery, or something.
Denny shook his head. “The hospitalist is young, and it’s a controversial drug. But Sophie and the doctor she reached think you could really be helped.”
“Okay,” I said.
Denny blinked at me. “Okay? You mean you’ll try it?”
“I wanted to do this without another drug. But I can’t take it anymore.” Even now I was fighting off another wave of nausea. I needed to stop puking and start healing.
“You have done it, fool. This setback is not your fault. Sophie warned me that you were a stubborn a-hole.”
“I am.”
“Let the doctor help the stubborn asshole, okay? I’m going to make a call,” Denny said, edging for the door. “Don’t go anywhere.”
As if.
*
A while later, Teen Doctor and Nurse Angela brought me this strange little strip which I was supposed to dissolve in my mouth. It made my throat feel disgusting, and I nearly yarfed up the medicine.
Nothing happened. I was still cursing life.
So after fifteen minutes they gave me another one. “It’s not working,” I mumbled. And didn’t it just figure?
“Just wait,” Nurse Angela said while I made grumpy faces at her.
And then, at around the thirty-minute mark, all my symptoms suddenly just…leveled off. It was as if the roar of a jet engine had been powered down, leaving me in a peaceful silence. My stomach still felt empty, but the waves of nausea subsided. My hands weren’t shaking anymore, and the crawling skin was gone.
I was not high, though. Not at all.
The Suboxone was some serious juju.
And it was totally fucking odd to be suddenly transported to a state of sobriety even though I knew all too well the sensation of quickly getting high.
I took several deep breaths in a row, because breathing had just gotten easier.
“It’s working, isn’t it?” Angela had snuck up on me. “You look calmer.” She fastened the blood pressure cuff around my arm and shifted the stethoscope to her ears. After a minute of silence, she ripped the velcro off. “That’s impressive.”
I thought so, too. “You know what’s weird? I’m kind of hungry.”