Lead Me Not

by A. Meredith Walters

  “I’ll be over there. I’m giving you fifteen minutes, Aubrey, and then I’m coming in after you,” Brooks threatened, shooting me a less-than-pleased look.

  I pulled the sleeves of my jacket down over my hands nervously and slowly made my way inside. I looked around for the guy who had gotten me inside, but my eyes were barely able to focus in the horrible lighting.

  Whoever it was who had saved me from being booted on my ass was nowhere in sight.

  I pulled off my hat and shoved it in my pocket, hesitant to move forward. And then, as though I was being pulled forward by an invisible cord, my feet started to move, one in front of the other, until I was standing in the middle of hell.

  At least that seemed to be the theme they were going for. Red lights shone through the room, casting everything in an eerie shadow. Barbed wire covered the windows and gave me the feeling of being trapped.

  But it was the energy that took hold and threatened to swallow me whole. The music pumped from gigantic speakers suspended from the ceiling, and the floor was a mass of writhing bodies swept away by the beat. The mood in the room was more than just frenetic; it was something I couldn’t describe.

  It was hot, and the air smelled of something sweet I couldn’t place. My heart started to thud in my chest, and my hands started to twitch. I had never seen such total abandon before. The music seemed to hold everyone and everything in its snare; the dancers were helpless against it.

  As much as I tried to resist it, I was entranced by the scene in front of me. Compulsion terrified me. It was overwhelming and borderline psychotic. But it also transfixed me in a way that had me questioning my own sanity.

  Because suddenly I wanted it.

  I craved it.

  I ached to lose myself in the oblivion.

  That is what this place promised. Sweet and total anarchy. And how easy it would be to hand over my careful control to the frightening and intoxicating world laid out before me.

  The thump, thump, thump of the music rattled around in my chest. I could feel the vibration from the speakers buzzing in my ears. The darkness was both smothering and strangely comforting.

  I closed my eyes and started to sway on my feet.

  And then the moment was over. I was jostled from behind as people pushed past me, pulling me out of my momentary loss of reality.

  What was wrong with me? I was here to get Renee, not play irresponsible club kid for the night.

  The large, open room was full of people, and it was proving impossible to get through the crowd. I looked around, straining on my tiptoes, trying to find Renee. I elbowed and shoved my way to the outer wall.

  I stumbled over something. My hands came out as I fell face-first onto the ground. My knees collided painfully with the concrete floor. And I lay there, sort of dumbfounded by everyone’s total disregard for the pathetic girl sprawled out at their feet.

  No one offered to help me up. They simply walked around or, in some cases, over me. I tried to get to my feet, but my ankle twisted in protest. I came back down on my knees and suddenly felt like I could cry.

  Someone spilled beer down my back at the same time I was knocked sideways. Shit, I was going to be trampled to death. I felt hysteria bubble up in my stomach and overshadow the anger I had felt toward my wayward roommate.

  Suddenly a pair of hands gripped me underneath my arms and hoisted me up. I groaned at the pain in my ankle as I steadied myself. A hand pressed into my back, right between my shoulder blades, and pushed me forward.

  “Are you okay?” a soft male voice whispered in my ear. I tried to turn to see who was navigating me through the throng, but it was so dark I couldn’t make him out.

  I nodded, even though it was a lie. I was so not okay.

  I could feel the heat of the guy’s hand through my shirt, imprinting my skin. He was pressed close to me as we moved forward, his front brushing against my back. It was uncomfortably intimate, and if I could have, I would have run far, far away.

  “Take a deep breath. You’ll be fine,” the voice soothed, somehow saying the words I needed to hear.

  I found myself complying automatically. The voice floating in my ears through the dark held some sort of strange sway that was hard to resist.

  The hand at my back began to move in comforting circles, and I found myself start to relax in spite of my trepidation. It was like the dude pumped Valium through his fingertips. He was Club Man, able to calm freaked-out girls with the power of his voice and hands alone! I tried to twist and squint at him again, but I still couldn’t make out more than a silhouette.

  “I see thee better—in the dark—I do not need a light,” the man murmured, his breath stirring the hair at my temple.

  Mystery dude was quoting Emily Dickinson? What in the hell? Had I unknowingly dropped down the rabbit hole and not realized it?

  And just like that, my calm popped like a soap bubble, and the reality of where I was set in like a hundred-ton weight on my chest.

  I was in an underground nightclub trying to find my friend. That was what I needed to focus on.

  I didn’t know this guy and shouldn’t be dropping my guard in a place like this—what the hell was wrong with me?

  I tried to push ahead—anything to get some distance from the potential serial killer behind me. But the wall of people made it difficult to move very fast. The hand at my back slipped up to the nape of my neck, fingers curling up into my hair.

  My heart was hammering in my chest, and I was scared. I could almost read the headlines now: Girl killed while trying to locate her selfish jerk of a roommate.

  But then the hand disappeared from my skin, and I was steered toward the bar. I could barely breathe. I was on the cusp of a full-blown panic attack.

  “Your friend is over there,” came the soft whisper again.

  Huh?

  I craned my neck and almost passed out with relief at the sight of Renee, perched on a stool, looking shaky and uncomfortable, her eyes darting around nervously.

  “Thank you,” I said loudly, finally finding enough light to take in the person who’d helped me. He was tall, with broad shoulders; a baseball cap was perched low over his brow, obscuring his face. In the red-tinged light of the club, I couldn’t make out a single detail, nothing to identify him. And that was more unsettling than anything else had been up until now.

  The inexplicable control this man exerted made itself known again. I was like a fish on a hook, flopping around in vain, hoping to be set free, but at the same time stupidly enjoying the trap.

  I wanted to see him. I needed to.

  The guy leaned in, his lips brushing against my cheek as he spoke. I caught the faint smell of peppermint and smoke.

  “You and your friend need to get out of here. This isn’t a place for you to be.” He brushed my ponytail off my shoulder.

  “What?” I asked dumbly. I was having a hard time wrapping my head around the strange turn my night had taken. Why was he helping me? Did I have easy mark stamped on my forehead? Or was he a rare breed of Good Samaritan?

  I patted the front of my jeans just to make sure I hadn’t been pickpocketed. Phone and cash seemed to still be there. That was a relief, I guess. But when I looked up, he was gone.

  He had disappeared like he had never been there, a figment of my overactive and overly stressed mind.

  I stood rooted to the spot, my ankle throbbing, my head dizzy, my ears ringing. I was shaken.

  That man had shaken me. And I wasn’t sure if it was fear or excitement that thrummed through my veins.

  He was right. I needed to get out of there. I pulled my phone out of my pocket and saw that ten minutes had already passed. If I didn’t get Renee outside soon, Brooks was going to go all suicide mission on the bouncer.

  “Renee!” I yelled over the music. My roommate and questionable best friend turned in my direction, and her face went slack with relief. She jumped down from the stool and threw her arms around my neck.

  “Aubrey, thank you so much f
or coming to get me,” she sobbed into my neck. I hugged the smaller girl and then pulled away.

  Renee’s eyes were bloodshot; her mascara ran in dark ribbons down her cheeks. Her hair hung in a tangled mess on her back. She wrung her hands together in agitation, and my protective instincts kicked in.

  She looked frightened and sad. I wanted to take Devon Keeton by the balls and give them a really painful squeeze. He didn’t deserve Renee. Why couldn’t she see that?

  “Let’s go home,” I said, wrapping an arm around her trembling shoulders.

  Keeping her close, and with a hand out in front of me, I started body-checking people as we made our way to the entrance.

  The music had picked up a notch, and the air buzzed with a frenetic energy. It pulled me in and didn’t want to let go. A part of me wanted to stay and get lost in it. My feet stopped moving, and I felt inexplicably torn. I needed to leave, but I wanted to stay.

  Renee tugged on my arm, and I gave myself a shake. My momentary loss of rational thinking gave way to the more pressing desire to ensure Brooks wasn’t making nice with bouncer Randy’s meaty fist.

  Just as we made it to the door, I felt a tingling along the back of my neck—a sensual awareness that made my hair stand on edge. My mystery man, with his face shadowed, stood just to the side of the exit. I felt his eyes follow my movements, and I couldn’t suppress a shiver of apprehension that was oddly enticing.

  I tried to meet his eyes, almost desperate to see them. But he turned away, denying me what I sought. I watched with a strange displeasure as he faded into the gloom.

  “Aubrey!” I heard a yell coming from outside. Brooks looked anxious, and I knew he was only seconds from bulldozing his way inside.

  Holding tight to Renee’s hand, I half dragged, half carried her out of the club. We passed Randy, whose scowl could have made a lesser person piss themselves. I was half tackled by a perilously-close-to-losing-it Brooks.

  “You gave me gray hair, Aubrey! Gray hair!” Brooks yelled, grabbing me by the shoulders and giving me a little shake.

  “Sorry. It took me a while to find Renee,” I explained, trying to communicate with my eyes for him to chill out.

  Brooks rounded on Renee and gave her his best stern-older-brother expression. “What were you thinking, spending your evening at Hepatitis Central? You need a swift kick in the ass, girl,” he lectured, though I knew his harshness had more to do with being worried than anything else.

  Renee hung her head sheepishly, and even though I wanted to give her my own lecture, I knew it wouldn’t do any good. She was obviously tired and in a state of emotional shutdown.

  She didn’t need judging. She needed a good night’s sleep, and then maybe I could give her the “I told you your boyfriend was a total dickhead” speech.

  “Sorry, Brooks,” Renee said quietly, and I glared at Brooks, who held his hands up in a placating gesture.

  “Okay, it’s cool. Let’s just get the hell out of here. I sure hope your car still has tires,” he muttered as we started to walk away from Compulsion.

  As we headed down the street, I couldn’t help looking one last time back over my shoulder.

  I couldn’t decide whether I felt disappointment or relief that the person I was searching for was nowhere in sight.

  chapter

  three

  aubrey

  i sucked on the red, angry skin of my thumb, silently cursing the metal chair that lay discarded at my feet. I gave it an annoyed kick before leaning down to pick it up.

  “Ouch, did it pinch you?” a kind voice asked. I opened up the chair and set it on its feet in the circle I had created. Kristie Hinkle, the support group facilitator, smiled at me as she pulled the plastic off a sleeve of Styrofoam cups.

  Two weeks had passed since Brooks and I had played Batman and Robin on a rescue mission to Compulsion. The disquiet that settled inside me after my experience left me feeling edgy. I couldn’t quite put my finger on why I was feeling that way. But there was no doubt as to who had put it there, even though I had never gotten a look at his face.

  Renee had gone straight to bed after we had gotten back to the apartment. When I got up the next morning, she had already left for work. My plans to find out exactly what had gone down at the club were sidelined by my friend’s blatant avoidance.

  I could tell she was embarrassed. Renee was easy to read. She wore her feelings on her sleeve. And when she became uncomfortable, her MO was to hide away until the dust settled.

  I had hoped that Devon abandoning her at the club would have been the wake-up call she needed to make the final break, that it had put the nail in the proverbial coffin of her shitty relationship.

  So it was with an almost homicidal frustration that I found Devon the Jackass sitting in our living room the next night acting like he belonged there.

  His feet were propped up on the coffee table as he ate a sandwich, crumbs going everywhere. For a moment, I saw red. I gripped my keys in my hand and thought about flinging them at his arrogant, overly large head. You know, right before I kneed him in the junk.

  Was this for real? Was Renee really going to allow this guy back into our home after he had left her, by herself, at Compulsion the night before?

  I wanted to tell him to get his fucking feet off the furniture. I wanted to scream at Renee to wake up and smell the sucky-boyfriend coffee.

  But I didn’t, because painful experience had taught me that saying anything would only accomplish the opposite.

  Nothing pushed two people together more than a case of Romeo and Juliet syndrome brought on by thinking the whole world was against them.

  It was at times like this that the similarities between Renee and my sister were so excruciating that it took my breath away.

  I had played the sneering judgmental card once upon a time, and it had cost me dearly. Self-righteous disappointment got me nowhere.

  So I had reined in my anger, and I had given my friend a smile, one that she hesitatingly returned, before going to my room to do my homework.

  The days passed, and my relationship with Renee came to an uneasy standstill. She was still with her jerk of a boyfriend, and there still wasn’t a whole lot I could do about it.

  But for the time being I had to focus my energies elsewhere.

  Tonight was the first meeting of the campus substance-abuse support group. I had been reading up on curriculums and methodologies, trying to figure out the best approach for facilitating the sessions. When I couldn’t deal with things on an emotional level, it was always easier for me to surround myself with hard facts.

  I knew that this would be hard for me, that it had the potential to trigger in me painful memories that perhaps were best left forgotten. But I was bound and determined to do it anyway. I was ultimately responsible for where my life was headed, and this was exactly what I wanted to do with it.

  I grimaced at Kristie’s question. “They’re sneaky little bastards,” I said, repositioning the chairs until I was happy with the layout. When I was finished, I joined Kristie at the table and got the muffins and cookies out of the grocery bag on the floor.

  Kristie held up her hand to show three fingers covered in Band-Aids. “They got me last week. Those chairs are merciless,” she joked. Kristie was in her late thirties and ran the outpatient program at the substance-abuse center in town. She had an unassuming air about her that was both relaxing and inviting. With frizzy black hair and green eyes behind dark-rimmed glasses, she was the epitome of the supportive counselor. I could easily see why people would be comfortable talking to her about their problems. Her demeanor lacked judgment, and her voice was soothing. I instantly liked her. Which was good, considering I would be co-facilitating this group with her for the next twelve weeks.

  “Let’s have a look at the curriculum materials for the group today. Like I said on the phone when we talked last week, I won’t expect you to do much today. Just observe, get to know the group members, get a feel for how these things work. Today ser
ves more as an introduction than anything else. It’s a ‘get to know you’ for everyone. Be prepared for some very resistant individuals, though. Not everyone is here voluntarily, and there’s always one or two who have to be an ass,” Kristie said, pulling her notebook out of her bag.

  I sat down beside her as she began to flip through the pages. “Really? I thought this was a group people came to because they wanted the help,” I said in confusion. Kristie chuckled good-naturedly.

  “I wish. That would make my job a heck of a lot easier. But no, some of these people have been court-ordered because of drug possession, usually a misdemeanor. Some are first-time offenders; others have been through the system a few times. You always hope they learn something from what you’re trying to teach them, but I can’t confess to being that naïve,” she said, handing me a stack of name tags.

  “Wow, that sounds pretty jaded, Kristie,” I teased. Kristie snickered.

  “I’ve been doing this group for almost five years. I will always have the hope that I’m making a difference, but I’m only human. And I’ve seen too many people end up at the bottom to think otherwise. But we keep on trucking. Because giving up isn’t an option,” she said sagely. I couldn’t say anything to that. I understood feeling jaded, but I was determined to feel the hope all the same.

  “Do they all go to LU?” I asked. Kristie nodded.

  “This group is for students. I facilitate several other groups in town as well. But we keep this one separate and just for the college community. These kids are dealing with issues that are very different from those of the addicts I see in the other meetings. The pressures, the expectations, and the failures of university life go hand in hand with their addiction.” I nodded.

  Kristie wrote her name on one of the tags and peeled it off. She stuck it to the front of her shirt. I followed suit and then put a name tag and pen on each seat. I had a vague idea of what to expect from the group. Having an addict in the family gave you a front-row seat for that particular brand of fucked-up.

  But still . . . I was apprehensive.