Spin

by Catherine McKenzie

I stand up stiffly. Less than five minute of running has left me feeling achy in places I didn’t know I had.

  He rises too, and we stand there inside an awkward silence.

  “Well,” he says eventually. “It was nice talking to you . . . um . . .”

  “Kate. Or Katie. Whichever.”

  He extends his hand. “OK, Kate, Katie, whichever. Nice to meet you.”

  I place my hand in his. A shiver crawls up my spine.

  “It’s nice to meet you too . . .”

  “E.,” Amber says, coming up behind me.

  He drops my hand. “Hello, Amber.” He gives me a nod. “See you later, Kate.”

  He strides past us and leaves the library without looking back.

  “What was that all about?” I ask Amber.

  “I can’t believe he brought him to rehab. That little fucker.”

  “Amber? Can you please tell me what’s going on?”

  She blinks slowly. “E. is Connor’s personal assistant.”

  “Does he have a drug problem too?”

  “E.? Hah! No way. Connor just can’t live without him, the big fucking baby.”

  “But I wasn’t even allowed to bring my cell with me, let alone a whole other person.”

  “Connor always gets what he wants,” she says in a resigned tone.

  “But isn’t dealing with your own shit kind of the whole point of rehab?”

  She makes a face. “Welcome to the lives of the rich and famous.”

  I notice the time on the clock on the wall. Group starts in five minutes.

  “Shit, it’s almost three. We’d better get to group.”

  Amber mutters her assent, and we walk to group together. We sit in our usual folding chairs next to Mary and just-returned-from-the-medical-wing Candice. Candice is babbling on about how hot it is to a bored-looking Mary. The tight, white bandages on her wrists give me the creeps.

  Amber slumps next to me and gazes out the window. A minute later, Saundra walks to the head of the circle and clears her throat to get our attention. “Today I want to talk about the moment you realized you needed help, when you hit your bottom.” She turns toward me. “Katie, I don’t believe we’ve heard from you yet. Would you like to share what it was that brought you here?”

  Jesus. Don’t I do enough sharing in therapy? Am I going to have to spin this bullshit in front of an audience too?

  “I don’t feel like sharing today, Saundra.”

  “Participating in group’s an important part of getting well, Katie.”

  “Ah, why don’t you leave her the fuck alone?” Amber says, shifting her focus away from the window.

  “Language, Amber, please.”

  Amber sits up straight and stares intently at Saundra. “You want someone to participate? Fine, I’ll fucking participate. All right? That make you happy?”

  “What would you like to tell us, Amber?”

  “I’ll tell you what everyone’s dying to know, how about that?” Amber looks around her. She has everyone’s full attention. “Don’t you all want to know how I got here?”

  Uh, yeah. I really, really do.

  “How did you get here, Amber?”

  “Young James Bond, that’s how,” she replies loudly. “That’s right. The big star who’s drying out somewhere in this building can take all the credit.” She half sings, half yells these last words, maybe hoping that Connor can hear her, wherever he is.

  “You can’t blame another person for your addictions, Amber.”

  “Oh yes, I can! ”

  “There’s no need to shout.”

  “You wanted someone to share, right! Well, I’m sharing. I’m putting it out there for everyone to see!” She waves her hands around in big sweeping gestures. “Can you see it? Am I sharing enough for you? Am. I. Sharing. Enough. For. You?” She flings her arms out wide.

  “That’s enough, Amber.”

  “But it isn’t. It’s never enough. I can never have enough.”

  “I think we’ve all had enough,” Mary says.

  The Director and The Judge twitter at Mary’s remark. Amber shoots her a dirty look and storms out of the room.

  Bloody Mary. What did she have to go and do that for? This was just getting interesting.

  I glower at her, but she doesn’t notice, high on the laugh she got out of the impossible-to-please boys.

  At least someone’s getting high in here.

  Chapter 10

  Sing Along If You Know the Words

  When I get back to my room after group, I find Amber sitting on Amy��s bed with her knees tucked under her chin, her arms wrapped tightly around her shins. Her cheeks are stained with mascara, and she’s rocking back and forth.

  My eyes dart nervously around the room. My iTouch is out of sight, but my journal is sitting on the nightstand next to Hamlet. I removed the offending pages from the book after my near miss the other day, but TGND’s proximity to everything I’ve gathered about her is not good.

  I sit down next to her, blocking her access to the nightstand. “What are you doing here?”

  “I just couldn’t stand being in my room anymore,” she sniffles. “Do you mind?”

  “No, it’s OK. Do you want to talk about it?”

  “I’m sick of talking.”

  “No problem.”

  I scoop up my journal and walk toward my dresser, grabbing a few loose pieces of clothing along the way. I tuck them into the top drawer and glance at Amber over my shoulder. She’s still rocking and staring off into space.

  I breathe a sigh of relief and pick Hamlet up off the nightstand. I lie down on my own bed and fight off the urge to try to get Amber to talk by reading.

  “Must be nice to have something else to focus on,” Amber says after I’ve read a couple of pages.

  I lower the book. Amber’s wiping away her tears with the back of her sleeve.

  “Yeah, but I feel kind of guilty reading it.”

  “Why?”

  “Well . . . I stole it from this lady at the airport.”

  Despite herself, she laughs. “You stole Shakespeare?”

  “Yeah . . .” I fill her in briefly on the details. “Pretty scuzzy, huh?”

  “Maybe she just forgot it?”

  I shake my head. “No, I don’t think so. She was annoying me, and I stole her book. End of story.”

  “You stole Shakespeare.”

  “I stole Shakespeare.”

  Amber hugs her knees harder. “Why is he here?”

  “I don’t know, Amber.”

  “He’s always doing this. He can’t let me have one thing to myself, not even rehab.”

  I sit up and swing my legs over the edge of the bed. “Maybe he’s trying to get help too.”

  “Why does he need to do that here, where I am?”

  “Maybe he needs your help to get better.”

  “He’s never needed me for anything.”

  “I’m sure that’s not true. I mean, haven’t you guys been together forever? He must care about you.”

  “It’s just this thing we do. Screw up each other’s lives. I wouldn’t call that caring.” She lies down on her side and scrunches up the pillow under her head. “Do you mind if I stay here for a while?”

  “Stay as long as you like.”

  The next day at lunch, I join Amber at one of the bistro tables. The sun streaming through the picture window lights her up like she’s on a film set. She’s wearing a pair of skin-tight black jeans and a loose black sweater, with her hair in a side ponytail, and she’s eating an omelette. Made of real eggs, yolks and all. There might even be a little cheese thrown in.

  I place my tray on the table and sit next to her, feeling slightly frumpy in my boy-cut blue jeans and a white striped button-down. She puts a small piece of egg in her mouth and chews it slowly.

  “Bad day?” I ask.

  “The baddest.”

  It doesn’t seem like she wants to talk, so I pick up my turkey sandwich and start eating.

 
; “Jesus Christ,” Amber says a few bites later.

  I look up. “What is it?”

  Amber nods toward the cafeteria entrance, unable to speak. Connor Parks is shuffling into the room with E. holding his elbow.

  He looks like, well . . . a young James Bond. Straight black hair, blue eyes, square jaw, and a build that’s meant to be swathed in an Armani tuxedo. His very handsome face is worn out, like he’s spent the last few days puking his guts out and spacing out on the same trippy pills Dr. Houston gave me. His three days of stubble makes him looks rugged and dangerous, like he could kill you with his bare hands.

  E. is wearing an expensive-looking pair of dark jeans and a light gray pullover. He looks cute and stressed.

  The room has gone silent, and everyone (and I mean everyone, from the lunch ladies to Carol and Saundra, who are eating a few tables away from us) is watching YJB. It’s like we’re all holding our breaths, waiting for something to happen.

  “This is fucking ridiculous!” Amber says, pushing her chair back, her face flushed. She stands angrily. “What’s everyone looking at, huh? He’s just a person, not a god. Stick a needle in his arm and he gets high just like the rest of us!”

  The twenty or so pairs of eyes that were watching YJB swivel as one toward Amber, including Saundra’s. Saundra says something to Carol, stands, and walks purposively toward us.

  I reach up and tug on her arm. “Amber, Saundra’s coming.”

  “Let her come.”

  Amber climbs onto her chair and from there onto the table. “What’s wrong with you? Are you so starstruck you can’t speak? Hey, I can’t blame you. Look at him. He’s so famous he’s allowed to bring his own little entourage to rehab. Say hi to E. everyone! Give him a big ol’ Oasis welcome!”

  Saundra has reached our table. “Please get down from there, Amber.”

  “OK, so you don’t want to say hello to nobodies. I get it. But I know you’ll say hello to the one, the only, Cooonnnnooorrr Paaarrrkkksss!”

  “Amber, I mean it. Get down right this minute.”

  Amber gazes down at Saundra with loathing. “Ooohhh, are you going to count to three like my daddy? Why don’t I just save you the trouble?”

  Amber stoops to pick up a napkin, wrapping it into a tube. Her hands are shaking.

  “One, and two, and three . . .” She starts singing Sara Bareilles’s “Love Song” right at YJB. He watches her, his face devoid of expression.

  When she gets to the chorus, Amber’s voice wavers and peters out, and my heart goes out to this damaged girl. I want to help her. Somehow. Some way.

  So, I do the only thing I can. I stand and sing. I climb onto the table and walk toward Amber. Still singing, I take her hand, squeezing it tightly. She gives me a grateful look and joins her voice to mine.

  We run right through the song, holding the last note. When we finish, there’s a momentary silence before the room erupts in cheers and clapping. We have one exhilarating moment in the spotlight, and then Evan and John haul us down from the table and out of the cafeteria.

  Evan leaves me in Dr. Houston’s office. As I wait for him to show up, I walk restlessly around the examining room, opening the cupboards that aren’t locked, looking for something, I’m not sure what. Inside one of them I find a six-month-old issue of In Touch magazine. Better than nothing.

  I sit down on the examining table. The sanitary paper crinkles under me. I leaf through the magazine. On page eight, there’s a picture of Amber dancing on a table with a drink in her hand at an Absolut Vodka event. She looks like she’s having the time of her life. I wish I could Alice-through-the-looking-glass myself into the party so I could be having the time of my life too.

  After a moment, I realize that both YJB and E. are also in the photo. (What’s E. short for, anyway? Eric? Ethan? Elliott? God, I hope not. Elliott is so not sexy.) They’re sitting behind her at a table littered with several empty cups and vodka bottles. E. seems to be watching Amber with a scowl on his face, but maybe it’s just a trick of the neon light behind him.

  “What have you got there?” Dr. Houston asks as he comes through the door buttoning up his white lab coat.

  I haven’t seen him since the night Candice almost died, and a flash of that gory scene leaps before my eyes.

  “Nothing. Just a magazine.”

  I toss it aside. It falls opens to the page I was looking at.

  Dr. Houston picks it up. “You know, we see this a lot.”

  “See what?”

  “Patients who aren’t used to being around celebrities getting caught up by their glamour.”

  I’m not caught up in her glamour. I’ve been hired to expose her. Big difference, pal.

  “That’s not what’s happening. We’re just friends, that’s all.”

  He gives me a concerned look. “Katie, I don’t think befriending Amber is the best way to promote your recovery. You should be finding new patterns of behavior so you don’t slip back into the ones that led you here.”

  “But can’t we help each other?”

  “I don’t think so.” He holds up his hand to stop me from asking why. “I can’t disclose confidences, Katie. Will you trust that I’m looking out for your best interests?”

  Right, just like I’m looking out for mine.

  “I guess.”

  “Good. How have you been feeling?” He sits on his stool and wheels himself over to me.

  “Pretty good.”

  “Have you been having any cravings?”

  My eyes wander to the magazine. “Some.”

  “How are you dealing with them?”

  “Pretending they don’t exist?”

  He frowns.

  I try again. “Saundra and I have been talking about it.”

  “Excellent. Have you been having trouble sleeping?”

  “Only for as long as I can remember.”

  “How have you dealt with it in the past?”

  I remember Joanne’s dwindling supply of investment wine. “I think it’s called self-medication.”

  “You use alcohol to sleep?”

  Nope. I used alcohol to sleep. Past tense for ten days now. Or eight, I guess, since I used those nice little pills you gave me the first two nights.

  “Yes . . . but now I count moonbeams.”

  He smiles. “I can give you some strategies to help you sleep if you’d like.” He flips through the papers on his clipboard. “I see from your weigh-ins that you’re losing weight.”

  Twelve pounds and counting.

  “A little.”

  “Have you had eating issues in the past?”

  I don’t have an eating issue, buddy. I have a lack-of-access-to-alcohol-and-crappy-food issue. Savvy?

  “Maybe it’s because I’ve taken up running.”

  His face clouds. “Yes, I wanted to talk to you about that. Saundra tells me you’ve been experiencing hallucinations?”

  Jesus Christ.

  “No.”

  “Perhaps I misunderstood. Did you tell Saundra that you’re seeing a monkey when you run?”

  Somehow it sounds even sillier when cute Dr. Houston says it.

  “Well, not exactly . . . it’s this feeling I get when I’m running. Like something’s sitting on my shoulders . . . I called it a monkey, but it could be anything . . .”

  His pen is poised over his clipboard. “I see. And this . . . monkey . . . does it talk to you?”

  “Of course it doesn’t talk to me. It’s not a real monkey . . . I’m not crazy.”

  “But you want to use this monkey as your higher power?”

  “Not the monkey, exactly, but what the monkey represents. It’s just . . . I can’t explain it . . . I mean, it could be a tree or a leaf, right . . . ?”

  Dr. Houston bends his head and writes something. From upside down it looks like: Repeat step.

  “No . . . I don’t need to repeat the step. I understand it, I swear.”

  He looks up. “I’ll discuss this with Saundra. In the meantime, I sug
gest you try to locate your higher power in the real world.”

  He kicks the ground with his feet and his chair slides across the room. He spins artfully, opens a drawer, and pulls out a pamphlet. Another kick and he’s handing it to me. “This contains some useful tips that should help you with your insomnia.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You’re doing better than you think, Katie. Keep it up.”

  I leave Dr. Houston’s office and walk back toward the cafeteria. What with the singing with Amber on the table and all, I never finished my lunch, and I’m pretty hungry.

  As I stroll through the hall, the song we were singing floats into my mind. I wonder why Amber chose to sing that song to YJB. Does it contain clues to their relationship, or was it simply the first song that popped into her head?

  “Haven’t we heard enough of that song today?” E. says, standing before me with an amused expression. He’s wearing his running clothes, but he must be pre-run because he still looks clean and fresh.

  Shit! Was I singing out loud? That’s embarrassing.

  I place my hands on my hips. “What? You didn’t enjoy our little show?”

  “I’m going to plead the fifth on that one.”

  “You would.”

  “Anyway, you guys were singing the wrong song. Their relationship’s much more Britney Spears than Sara Bareilles.”

  “How so?”

  He sings a snippet of “Toxic” in falsetto, doing a surprisingly good imitation of Britney Spears. Surprisingly good.

  “That’s quite the talent you’ve got there.”

  He colors. “Don’t go spreading that around, all right? It’s not good for my man-cred.”

  “Man-cred?”

  “Being able to sing like a girl is not really the way to get chicks.”

  “Not the way to get chicks. Right. Plus you have that no-talking-about-yourself thing working against you.”

  He raises his eyebrows. “You’ve got quite the memory.”

  “So I’ve been told.”

  We smile at each other, and I wonder if I’m the only one feeling nervous and awkward.

  “Can I ask you something?” I say, a moment too late for normalcy.

  “How many addicts does it take to screw in a lightbulb?”

  “Nope.”

  “Whether I prefer crack or old-fashioned cocaine?”