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I don’t remember waking once during the night. Hearing him breathing beside me. Feeling his heat against my back.
I sit on the edge of the bed, gulping deep breaths and trying not to puke. Stakes pound into the base of my skull. My bones grind to dust inside me.
I need to find Trap. Find out what happened at Kynk. Make sure he’s okay.
My feet can’t find the floor. Somehow, I end up sitting beside the bed, my legs splayed in front of me. My body aches like one gigantic bruise.
I try to crawl to the bathroom, but I’m too weak. I call out, hoping Trap will hear me, but no one answers. I start to cry, but it takes too much energy to sob, so I just let the tears leak out of my eyes.
I can’t stay here. I need to move. I need to get to the freeport office tower, to find Trap.
A flurry of notes whispers from my nightstand drawer. The song is soft, like I’m hearing it from miles away. But I know that tune. It’s the music of my soul. It’s sweet, sweet salvation.
I remember shoving the bag to the back of the drawer. I can feel the plastic beneath my fingers, smooth and cool. I can picture the slips of paper inside, bright and cheerful, with their funny little cartoon drawing.
Just one square. I can let it dissolve on my tongue. It will drive away the weakness, push back the pain.
Once I can stand on both feet, I can make a plan. I can figure out how to taper off the Crash. I’ll take half a dose tomorrow, a quarter the next day, and then everything will be back to normal.
The song ratchets up in my head as I open the drawer. It fills my entire body as I work open the slider on the bag. It floods over me, around me,throughme as that tiny square of paper dissolves on my desperate tongue.
It only takes a few minutes for me to become human. I shower, wrapped in music. I dress, clothed in song. And I hide the plastic bag of Crash in the guest room so no one will worry about what I’ve done.
* * *
If I eat, I can manage the Crash. Food in my stomach buffers the drug. I still have the music, still have the song, but I can walk and talk and think like a normal human being.
And with cheese and an apple under my belt, I realize my bottom doesn’t hurt nearly as much. I can sit on one of the stools in the kitchen without squirming. I don’t need to finger the bruise on my neck either, the dark purple circle from Trap’s teeth.
I wear a turtleneck when I head over to the freeport. It’s November. No one will be suspicious.
Susan is coming out of Trap’s office just as I get there. “Careful,” she says in a low voice. “Someoneis in a mood.”
But the Crash whistles a few notes deep in my head. I know how to handle Trap, bad mood or not. “Thanks for the warning,” I say.
Trap’s on the phone when I close the door behind me. It’s a burner, and he’s talking too fast. Or maybe my ears are hearing too fast. “Your men did their job,” he says. “Not their fault if the cocksuckers hid under rocks.”
He listens for a moment, his face growing dark. Then he says, “If Iknewwhere they were, I wouldn’t have sat around the club half the night with my thumb up my ass.”
Another reply. Trap says, “Very funny. You should take that show on the fucking road.” A quick pause, and then, “Let me know if anyone goes in or out. We’re close. I can feel it.”
When the call ends, Traps looks at me and shrugs. “Best’s turned into some sort of comedian. Says there were a lot better things I could do at Kynk than sit on my own fucking thumb.”
The music distracts me, and I miss the chance to laugh. Instead I say, “Sorry I was out of it when you got home.”
He gestures with the burner. “You got the gist. Jonas and Ansel didn’t show. Best is keeping an eye on the Long Island house.”
More music. But I remember to shrug and say, “We’ve waited this long…”
“I don’t like the fact that no one knows where they are.”
My chest feels tight. Maybe I don’t like that either. Before I can say anything, though, the music swells. It washes away my anxiety, like Jonas and Ansel Herzog were just a bad dream.
“Hey,” Trap says. “Are you okay?”
“Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Your face looks flushed. And you were burning up when I got into bed last night.”
