Ch 6 - Bad Day

And she swears there’s nothing wrong
I hear her playing that same old song
She puts me up and puts me on
I had a bad day again
She said I would not understand
She left a note and said I’m sorry I
I had a bad day again

“Bad Day” - Fuel

I waved goodbye to Margaret and headed out of the library after my shift. I muttered a curse word as I hit the front doors, realizing the storm had picked up and it was raining heavily.

Exactly what I needed to add to my day, I thought.

The day had started with me waking up in bed at 3am and hadn’t gotten much better since then. When I went to take a shower, the hot water wouldn’t work. I spent a good part of the early hours trying to get a hold of maintenance, as no one would answer. I was finally told they’d look at it whenever they got the chance but they made no promises on when that would be. So I forced myself to take a very quick freezing cold shower and in my haste got shampoo in my eyes.

The light bulb in my bedroom blew out and I didn’t have any to replace it. I stumped my toe while trying to get dressed and tripped on something in the dark, falling and twisting my ankle. I couldn’t find my keys, as I’d entered in such a hurry yesterday that I couldn’t recall what I did with them. I finally located them in the bedroom on my desk… I usually always tossed them on the bookshelf in the living room so I had no idea how they made it into the bedroom, but shrugged it off. I was late for work already at that point and bolted out the door, forgetting my umbrella.

Work was just as hectic and unorganized and now here I stood, exhausted, about to head out into the storm with no umbrella.

I glanced at the clock, realizing I didn’t have time to wait around for the rain to let up. I was going to be late for therapy if I didn’t hurry, and being late was unacceptable to Dr. Nelson.

I took a deep breath and bolted out the front door into the rain. It was coming down hard and was freezing cold, soaking me immediately. I sprinted in the direction of the hospital, going as fast as I could in heels with a sore ankle.

I slipped inside and made it to the office with mere seconds to spare. Dr. Nelson took a look at me and sighed. I was dripping water everywhere--drenched--and shivering from the cold. He walked down the hallway and went into a supply closet, emerging with some towels and a set of hospital issued scrubs. He also handed me a bag to put my wet clothes in. I thanked him and walked to the nearest bathroom, drying myself off and changing. The scrubs were entirely too large, the shirt coming down to my knees and I had to roll the pants up a bunch to get them to stay on me, but at least I was dry.

I walked into his office and thanked him quietly, placing my bag of wet clothes near the door and sitting in the chair. He smiled and nodded in response. He set his timer for one hour and pulled out his pen and pad.

“I considered the options for quite some time on how to address this situation and have come to the conclusion that it’s going to be better if we just dive right into it. I know you’re not looking forward to it, but we’re going to rip the band-aide off quickly so-to-speak.”

I nodded for him to continue.

“Let’s start at the party on Valentine’s Day. Whose house was it at? Did you go with anyone or did you go alone?”

“It was at Jessica Stanley’s house. Her parents were gone for the weekend. I went with my friend Angela but she met up with her boyfriend when we got there, so I didn’t see much of her.”

“And there was alcohol at the party?”

“Yes,” I said. I paused, thinking. “Someone had managed to get their hands on a keg and they raided Jessica’s parents liquor cabinet.”

“And you drank that night?”

I sighed. “Yes. I’d never had alcohol before, I actually hated the idea of it, but someone offered it to me and I was stupid and didn’t turn it down.”

“And how much did you drink?”

I scoffed. “Entirely too much. I obviously had a low tolerance, I was underweight and hadn’t really been eating, so it wouldn’t have taken much to intoxicate me.”

“And who gave you the alcohol?”

“I don’t know,” I said immediately. He narrowed his eyes at me and I looked away quickly. I was lying and he knew it but that was something I wasn’t willing to divulge and he knew why. I was hoping he’d drop it but of course, the way my day had been going, I knew the chances of that happening were slim.

“So you don’t know who was giving you the alcohol to drink, which means you’re saying you don’t know who drugged you?”

I nodded.

He shook his head, picking up my chart and scanning through it.

“When you were admitted to the hospital that night, your BAC was only .06. You were actually under the legal driving limit so you truly weren’t that intoxicated. You did have high levels of GHB in your system, which is what caused you to have the seizure that night.”

I nodded again, already knowing all of that. I knew he wanted information, but it was a secret I wasn’t spilling at the moment. I knew exactly who had mixed my drinks and who had slipped the GHB into it. They figured they could take advantage of me but they hadn’t taken my weakened body state into account. I overdosed quickly, collapsing on Jessica Stanley’s living room floor.

“Did you intentionally take the GHB that night?”

“Not at all, I didn’t know what had happened until Dr. Snow told me at the hospital.”

He nodded. He already knew I was drugged but I suppose wanted verbal confirmation. “Tell me about the hallucination.”

“It was when the GHB told hold, I guess. I collapsed and started seizing on the floor. I slipped in and out of consciousness; all of it was so surreal. I felt like I was dreaming. I opened my eyes at one point and he was just there. He sat down beside me and pulled me into his arms and held me while I convulsed. I could still see everyone else standing around panicking, but he was so calm. He stroked my hair and kissed my forehead, telling me to relax and hold on and everything would be okay. It seemed so real, I could literally feel him and smell him. His voice was so soothing. Every other time it had simply been his voice in my head, and a memory of the way he looked, but that time… that time it was like he was really there.”

He nodded, jotting down notes. “That’s called substance-induced psychotic disorder.”

I groaned, rolling my eyes. Of course he’d give it a title.

“Tell me what happened next,” he said, glancing up at me. I sighed.

“Well apparently someone finally called 911 because an ambulance and police came. Charlie of course was notified and went on a rampage. I was kept overnight at the hospital.”

“So you had your first true hallucination of Edward. You stayed overnight at the hospital and were released back to Charlie’s. What happened next?”

“Renee came to visit; Charlie called her because he was worried. I heard them discussing sending me away somewhere and debating whether or not I’d taken the GHB myself or if I were drugged. They asked me at the hospital but I hadn’t answered any of their questions. I knew if I didn’t do something they were going to have me institutionalized and that scared me.”

“So what did you do?”

“I put a smile on my face and pretended everything was perfectly fine, like nothing happened. I told them I didn’t recall what had happened at the party, I had no idea how the GHB got in my system. I admitted to taking a few sips of some of my friend’s drinks. I also threw it in Charlie’s face that the only reason I went to the party was because he insisted. They immediately stopped talking about sending me away.”

“And then what happened?”

“I went through the motions, went to school and came home. But I guess I had simply been on a high from my hallucination of Edward, because his face and the sound of his voice started slipping from my memory and I started going numb again. One morning I caught Charlie staring at me suspiciously and I realized I wasn’t doing a very good job at fooling him. It was then that I got the bright idea to force another hallucination.”

“And how’d you do that?”

“The same way it happened the first time.”

The alarm sounded on his desk, indicating our time was up. He smiled at me and stood up. “Speaking of which, Isabella, it’s been a month now since your release to outpatient treatment. That means we’re going to be reevaluating your situation based on your progress. Before we can do that, however, we’ll need a sample.”

I rolled my eyes and nodded. I exited his office and took a left, going down a long hallway to the lab. The lady behind the desk smiled.

“What can I do for you dear?”

“I’m Isabella Swan, I’m supposed to be drug tested today.” She nodded, understanding, and handed me a small plastic container, motioning towards the small bathroom.

And, with the day I had, of course I succeeding in getting more on my own hand than in the cup.