Fear of Heights

by Mara White

  I’m worried that all our time in the bathroom is beginning to look suspicious. We hurry and change into Emily’s dresses in the toilet stalls. We also switch sunglasses. I take my hair down because I had it up, and Janinie does the opposite because she had it down. They’re rudimentary disguises at best. We make a plan to exit separately, and meet up again in two hours at the hair salon. We’ll attempt to change our appearance more dramatically there, and leave separately to go to the hotel. I feel like a fool but I have to believe that we can do this. I told Jaylee that I’d take care of Janinie, and I can’t let him down more than I already have.

  When I leave the restaurant, no one seems to care or notice that I’ve changed clothes. I sit at a random gate for what seems like hours and pretend to read a book. My eyes search the same paragraph a thousand times without registering a word. All I can do is play out paranoid fantasies about how powerful the men from the beach house might be. Maybe they’re on to us already, or worse yet, have Janinie back in their custody while I sit here like an idiot. A text comes through from Janinie that she’s found a hair salon and is making us appointments. She’s left the airport and gone back to the neighborhood by the hotel. I’m relieved that she’s okay, and am hoping whoever was on watch has left, assuming we boarded the plane. I’m also furious with her for changing the plan and leaving so rashly. Teenagers and their false sense of indestructibility, I think. Then again, Janinie and I both could qualify as experts in the art of bad decision-making.

  I wonder if her cell phone is bugged, and if we’re heading toward a catastrophic mistake. Just in case, I find a mobile store and buy two new SIM cards for our phones. The woman at the register stares at me, and I’m afraid she can see right through to the truth. I’m so anxious, you’d think I was the one with a gut full of cocaine.

  I blindly hail the first taxi I see upon exiting the airport. My nerves have almost made me sweat through Emily’s dress, even in the airport’s frigid air-conditioning. The humidity outside is ten times worse. I’ll be drenched by the time I arrive at the salon. As if I didn’t already look crazy enough in a tight dress and Janinie’s reflective, red, horn-rimmed shades.

  I calm down a bit when I realize the driver couldn’t be more uninterested in my ensemble, my sweatiness, or my destination. I’m a run-of-the-mill fare to him, though I feel like a ticking bomb.

  The salon is nondescript, low-end for such a touristy spot. It’s Pepto-Bismol pink on stucco, with a window sign hand-painted in cursive that reads “Salon de Belleza.” The door jingles as I enter, and gives way to the smells of perfume and half-burnt hair. My eyes scan everyone in the store and then suddenly snap back to one person, my breath catching in my throat. There stands sweet Neenay with a huge smile across her face. Only she’s now unrecognizable as a platinum blonde, with a sides-shaved, long, slicked-back, ladies’ mohawk.

  “I got the Miley Cyrus,” she says, beaming.

  “No, you got the ‘Your mother will kill me,’” I reply.

  “She won’t care. Besides, you said ‘change’ our looks—whad’ya think I was gonna do, get highlights?”

  “Well, maybe we can just leave mine, since I think you’ve done enough for us both. I didn’t even recognize you.”

  I take Emily’s credit card over to the receptionist and pay for Neenay’s radical makeover. She bounds over and hugs me, handing some nail polish and a bottle of hairspray over the counter for purchase. She’s so overjoyed with her new look, her nervousness and nausea seem to have gone away. But she still feels way too warm to the touch.

  “Thanks, Emily!” Janinie says, rubbing my back as I sign the receipt.

  “Yes, thanks, Emily, indeed,” I say shaking my head at her playfulness.

  The receptionist looks back and forth between the two of us like we’re crazy, trying to figure out our connection.

  The heat outside swallows us as we exit the salon and I put my sunglasses on, feeling suspicious of a sedan parked across the street with a driver sitting at the wheel. I grab Janinie’s hand and jerk her in the other direction away from the car.

  “Kate, that’s our car! The driver I got at the airport.”

  “I don’t like how he’s looking at us. Let’s find a cab.”

  “Well, I didn’t pay him yet and I told him to wait. Maybe he’s staring because my hair looks so different. Or maybe because we’re walking the wrong way. Ever think of that?”

  Janinie’s makeover has gone to her head.

  “How are you feeling?”

  “Okay.”

  “Did you get the number for the contact?” I ask.

  “Yeah, I just have to text him our room number, and he’ll call us on the room phone.”

  “Are you sure that no one saw you leave or followed you out of the airport?”

  “Fuck, I don’t know, Kate. I don’t think so. What are they gonna do anyway? Kill us? Julio is supposed to be like my uncle.”

  “Your uncle wouldn’t make you smuggle drugs,” I say, as I look both ways and pull her across the street.

  “Well, that’s where you’re wrong, Kate. Your uncle wouldn’t make you smuggle drugs,” she retorts, jerking her arm away from my grasp. “I’m in the family business,” she says with a touch of reproach, and walks around the back of the car to the passenger’s side, signaling for me to leave her alone.

  “Janinie, come on, is every single member of your family an active Trinitario? You’re not a drug dealer. You’re a high school student.”

  She shoots me a “fuck off” look. I sigh, and slide into the back seat of the sedan. Janine gives the driver the address of the hotel, and he pulls out onto the street without saying a word.

  We check in with no trouble; Robert has booked us a deluxe suite, but I switch to something less conspicuous. I reserve two nights just in case, with Emily’s credit card. I want to make sure that Janinie is completely clean before we attempt to enter the States. I’ll be damned if I let every single one of Janet’s family members end up behind bars. But I do plan on giving her an earful about just how helpful her “hermano” was, and how much he has their best interests at heart, including endangering her teenage daughter.

  Janinie is coming down from her brief haircut high; she’s gone silent and her shoulders are drooping. I asked for a small room on a low floor, hoping it would be quiet and afford us some privacy.

  Janine flops onto one of the queen-size beds and kicks her sandals off. She then sits up and peels off Emily’s tight dress, pulls on some jean shorts and a tank top and sticks her earbuds in. She drops back down again with an exaggerated sigh. I change clothes as well and pull back the drapes to stare out at the economy-room view of the parking lot. I can hear Janinie flipping through the channels behind me, no doubt with her earbuds still in place.

  “He’s going to call now. I just got the text,” Janinie says.

  “Do you talk to him or do I?” I ask.

  Janinie stares at me, her eyes wide and lips pursed. “You,” she says, blinking twice in quick succession and lying back down.

  “Are you okay?” I ask, but the ring of the hotel phone cuts me off. I keep expecting her to be tripping out on drugs, or seconds away from cardiac arrest and overdose caused by a broken bag—but for now she’s just moody Janinie. She’s probably wishing she were anywhere but here.

  I grab the phone and hesitate, not knowing whether to speak in English or Spanish. Are they calling from here or from home?

  “Hello?” I ask timidly, praying that this isn’t a mistake.

  “Qué lo qué?,” says a raspy voice, deep with an echo of distance.

  “Who is this?” I ask.

  “Ideal.”

  Hm. Okay. Ee-day-al. “Are you calling to tell us how to fix our current—problem?” I ask.

  I sound stupid. I don’t know how to speak in code and relay messages about drugs over the phone. What’s with the name, anyway? Ideal?

  “No te preocupe’. Relax. They ain’t got the time or the money to bug your phone.�
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  He sounds relaxed, that’s for sure. Probably high as a motherfucker. Just what I need. A stoner to carefully guide me step by step through saving Janinie’s life.

  “How much she swallow?” he asks. His voice sounds as if he’s smiling over the phone.

  “Janinie,” I whisper-shout, covering the mouthpiece. “How much did you swallow?”

  “Seventeen. That was all I could do before I started gagging. They wanted me to do like twenty-five. I don’t get how people do that many. I guess some people can swallow fifty. It’s funny, right? Cause I’m seventeen years old.”

  She says it so matter-of-factly. As if everyone has tried swallowing illegal drugs wrapped in condoms.

  “Seventeen,” I say with some confidence to the man on the phone.

  “Janinie? Like Inoa?” he asks, his voice picking up, and becoming alert.

  “No,” I say carefully. “Seventeen bags or pellets or whatever you call them. Can you tell me how to get them out of her, please?”

  “Best thing to do is let them come out on their own. But you ain’t got time for that, I suppose.”

  “No. We leave tomorrow.” What can I tell him that he doesn’t already know? Those men will be after us the second they realize we didn’t arrive with their drugs.

  “Got a pen? You gonna to go to the store. Rubber gloves, two ten-ounce bottles of oral magnesium citrate saline laxative. Get her grape or lemon—those taste the best. Get a mineral oil enema and a Bisacodyl enema. Do the Bisacodyl then the mineral oil. Don’t let her swallow any mineral oil, though, that can fuck the latex up and make it burst. It’s okay as an enema, just to cut the pain on the way out. Then just stand back,” he says, with a slight laugh at the last part.

  “Can you tell me what the danger of rupture is? How can I tell if something has gone wrong? She doesn’t look so great, and I’m afraid she might be running a fever.”

  “They make ‘em tight these days, maybe ten years ago you’d’ve had to worry, but naw, should be fine.”

  I shift on the bed and then lay down all the way, kicking my shoes off. I’m still not fully recovered myself, and I’m already exhausted from this. I hope we’ll both eventually make it home in one piece.

  “What about her fever? Could that be from the pellets?”

  “Yeah, sometimes you see like a small infection if they ain’t clean about packing them, tu sabe’? Get her Tylenol. Not Ibuprofen. Like I said, she’s gonna be fine. You okay?”

  “I’m trying to be,” I say without much conviction, surprised by the stranger’s concern.

  “What you gotta worry about ain’t so much the drugs in her body but the smugglers who had her do it. You know what you dealing with?”

  “Yes,” I say and inhale deeply. I have no fucking idea what I’m dealing with.

  “Have her go in the tub. Get a ruler or a paint stirrer or some kind of long spoon. At least get their shit back to them and maybe they’ll get off your tail. You can usually pay ‘em off too,” he says.

  “Thank you for your expertise. Is there a number I can call you back at if we run into trouble?”

  He gives me a New York cell phone number, which I scratch out on the pad by the phone. I hang up and lie back on the pillow.

  Here goes nothing.

  I won’t be giving any drugs back to anyone. I’ll be flushing that horrible crap down the toilet where it belongs. I’m dizzy and feel feverish myself. It’s impossible to tell what are nerves and what’s illness. I look over at Janinie, and she appears to be sleeping.

  I hate this so much! I want Jaylee and Janinie freed from this life. It’s never-ending and it’s lethal. No one should have to live like this. I long for the normalcy and safety that actually felt boring to me just one short year ago.

  In the brightly lit pharmacy a few blocks away from the hotel, I realize that my basket is a little too obvious after I’ve gathered everything on the list Ideal gave me. I haphazardly throw in a tin of roasted almonds, bags of chips, some Dominican Republic souvenir mugs, mascara and a cheap bottle of fragrance from the beauty section. There. Perfectly normal purchase for a constipated, hungry, disheveled tourist lady. Hopefully. Not everyone can see right through you, Kate, I tell myself. You made it out of the airport.

  It was comforting to speak with Ideal. He made me feel less guilty, as if these things happen to good people all the time. Here’s the solution. No judgment. Maybe I’ll call him again when I get back to the hotel. Or I could call him when we’re back home, to thank him for the help.

  The young man at the checkout scans my items, uninterested in my purchases. Either he doesn’t care or he’s seen this many times before. He wears a blue vest with the pharmacy’s insignia—a US chain. He looks to be Jaylee’s age, but I’m as interesting to him as the old lady behind me, or the balding, chubby man who went before. What is it about chemistry that makes Jaylee the most desirable person in the world to me, and this guy, just another kid?

  I’m drenched in sweat on the short trip back from the pharmacy to the hotel. I check my watch and realize I’ve missed my antibiotic schedule by hours. I can’t help Janinie if I’m not okay myself. I stop at the hotel lobby bar, which is nearly empty in the late afternoon. I order a mineral water with extra ice and shake the tablet into my palm.

  Janinie is still sleeping when I get back to the room. I’m relieved to find her here—she’s impetuous and I don’t trust her not to run. I shake her awake and make her swallow two Tylenol and drink both of the saline laxatives. I don’t know how to broach the subject of the enemas so I just leave it be. Maybe these alone will work and I don’t have to humiliate her teenage sensibilities. Lord knows she’s seen more of me than she wanted to on this trip. But Janinie is tough and hates to be vulnerable, so I’ll grant her all the privacy I can for now. I roll into bed fully clothed, and succumb to deep sleep.

  I’m awakened by retching that sounds so violent, I spring from the bed. It’s night now and only a pale sliver of light escapes from the bathroom door into the dark room. It takes me a minute to remember where I am.

  “Janinie?” I call, my heartbeat picking up speed. I’ll never forgive myself if anything happens to her, I won’t let her down while she’s in my care. As I approach the bathroom, the smell of sickness abounds, both vomit and diarrhea, painting a gruesome picture of what lies beyond the door.

  “Janinie!” I shout and knock tentatively.

  “Don’t come in! Go away!” Janinie pleads, her voice weakened by her own bodies assault.

  “For Christ’s sake, Neenay! I’m a mom. I’m not scared of poop or puke. Just think about what I was like this time last week,” I say pushing the door open slowly.

  But I’m not prepared for the mess I see of Janinie laying in her own filth, a trail of vomit and watery feces leading from the toilet to the tub, where she’s curled into a ball, her body in spasms from involuntary muscle contractions.

  “Get out,” she says weakly, her face green and gray with sickness.

  There is no way for me to get to her sidestepping the mess because it’s spread across the floor. I peel off my stockings and throw them back over my shoulder and tiptoe to the bathtub. I scan the ejected contents of Janinie’s stomach for pellets but all I see is shit and bile and nothing solid that could be the drugs. I gag once and begin breathing from my mouth while Janinie rolls her head in objection - too weak to put up any fight.

  I turn on the water in the tub and stick my hand under the stream to gauge the temperature. Janinie is naked from the waist down but still wears a white tank top with a fluorescent-pink bra underneath. I peel those off of her and toss them into the pile where her soiled jeans and underwear lie. Either she’s really sick, I gave her too much, or maybe both. I’m terrified that nothing has passed, and the words ‘impacted’ and ‘ruptured’ are clawing at the back of my mind.

  I turn the shower on, rinse her in warm water, and wash her gently with the hotel shower gel. She heaves, spitting bile on the floor of the tub. I rinse
her again, we wait to see if she’s done, then I wrap her in the one remaining clean towel, and try to lift her to her feet. She wavers and steps out, clutching me, then sobs into my shoulder. I push her now-platinum hair off her face and shush her, walking her back to the bed.

  “I messed the bed,” she whispers and I direct her towards mine. She hobbles onto it and collapses naked, rolling into the sheets.

  Once she’s sleeping I don the rubber gloves and use the ruler to comb through what’s in the toilet and then clean the floor. I find nothing but bits of food and waste, and begin to doubt the plan to do this on our own. I dial Ideal desperate for both answers and support. It sounds as if I’ve woken him. He’s groggy and mumbling, and then I hear him light a cigarette before he speaks.

  “Did you use the mineral oil?” he asks, then coughs away from the phone.

  “I didn’t want to humiliate her,” I whisper, feeling suddenly intimately connected to this lone voice, reaching out to me across distance and space. His voice is comforting, bringing hope, while I’m surrounded by darkness and anxiety. Ideal makes it all seem a little more okay.

  “Listen, Janinie’s whole family been in the business—I’m sure she’ll be fine—and you don’t got to worry ‘bout being polite.”

  I didn’t slip her name, did I? He must have known all along. Does that mean he knows who I am too?

  “So just the Bisacodyl and then the mineral oil—and if it doesn’t work I take her to the hospital?”

  My heart is racing, my head throbbing, I’m still so sick and now sick with worry too.

  “Relax. Can’t you relax? Think of it as an adventure.”

  Maybe it’s an adventure to this dipshit, but I’m in emergency overdrive, and none of this is anywhere near fun.

  “I wish you were here with me,” I tell the voice. Where the fuck did that come from? Oh God, I’m losing it.