This Story Might Save Your Life(71)

I try to rub his ducktail for good luck, but for some reason my limbs don’t work.

“Joy?” Benny says. “Are you all right?”

But my mouth doesn’t work either. My body feels odd. Different. And then I remember: I’m pregnant. But I can’t tell him this. I want to, but I’m afraid of what he’ll say, and it’s clear to me now that he’s afraid too. He’s squeezing my arms. “Joy? Wake up, Joy. Joy, wake up.”

“Ayyy,” I mumble.

I swim back to the surface and peek out through heavy lids. I’m alone. Disappointed, I close them again.



* * *



THE NEXT TIME I open my eyes, there’s a woman sitting on my bed. I recognize her from the computer lab. Mitali. I think her name is Mitali.

“I tried knocking first,” she says. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay. You never leave your room.”

Threads of light weave through the closed blinds in such a way that I can’t tell if it’s morning or afternoon. “What time is it?”

“Noon.”

I try counting days and fail. “Sunday?” I clutch the sheets to my chest, remembering afresh that my husband is dead. It hits me like the blast wind after an explosion. Dead.

Mitali eyes me with concern, and I realize she must have already heard about Xander. That’s what she was trying to tell me in the computer lab. I know I’m just a stranger to you, but … um …

“My husband is dead,” I say, testing the words aloud.

Mitali’s shoulders drop. “So you know. I wasn’t sure how to bring it up.”

“I just learned.”

She takes my hand. “You must be in shock. What are you going to do?”

What am I going to do? I’m not even sure how I feel. Or how Xander could have possibly ended up in Angeles National Forest, dead. Again, that word. By my count, I’ve been asleep for fourteen hours. Fourteen hours have passed since I learned that people are looking for me, and I’ve done nothing to let anyone know I’m okay. I try to sit up, but the room spins.



* * *



“THERE YOU ARE. You had me worried for a minute.”

Through cloudy eyes, I can just barely identify Mitali holding a washcloth in the dim light of my room.

“I have to tell Benny I’m all right.” I try again to get up, but my body is impossibly heavy. Like trying to lift a car.

“Don’t.” Mitali presses the washcloth to my forehead. “I think you just fainted.”

Blood pulses in my ears. People are looking for me. Benny must be beside himself. “Do you have a phone?”

She shakes her head. “Just the one in the kitchen. Do you want help getting there?”

I say yes, I do, but even with her help it’s no use. Slumping back onto my pillow, I start to cry.

“What can I do?” she asks.

I stare at my pill box on the nightstand. Whenever I flip open the plastic compartments, the yellow and orange and white circles all seem to be shouting, Not recommended during pregnancy, not recommended during pregnancy, not recommended during pregnancy! I’ve tried to be responsible, tried to avoid withdrawal as I taper off, but clearly I’ve done this wrong. If Xander were here he’d have spreadsheets, he’d be writing down symptoms. “I don’t know.”

“I can get someone to help.”

“No.” I don’t want more people in here, looking at me. I just want Benny to know I’m okay. I tell her this and beg her to make the call without me.

“Consider it done.” She looks inordinately relieved to have been given a task she can perform. “What’s his number?”

“Three-two-three … six…” I don’t remember the rest. Six-six-seven? No. There are two sixes, I know that, but the end eludes me. I shut my eyes, trying to visualize his number on an imaginary cell phone screen, but the digits keep moving around.

“It’s okay. I’ll figure it out.”

Tears of gratitude spill onto my cheeks as I watch her go.



* * *



I’M STILL HEAVY when I wake, but when I try to use my legs this time, they work. Unsteadily, they carry me to the bathroom, where I relieve myself and drink a glass of water. I don’t know how much time has passed since Mitali left.

Back in bed, I sink deep, deeper, until I am one with the old cotton sheets. The pillow beneath my weighty head is flat and lumpy. In another life this would bother me. When we toured, I squished my favorite feather pillow into my luggage. Xander made fun of me for it. “You’re like a toddler with her lovey.”

I think of all the times on tour he wedged himself between me and Benny. He’d tell me Benny had dinner plans so I wouldn’t invite him to eat with us while on the same night telling Benny I’d requested a romantic meal for two. He’d inform Benny that I was frustrated with him for running late, and casually mention to me that Benny thought my jokes were off the night before. “I probably shouldn’t tell you this,” Xander said once, “but Benny was making some negative comments about your recent weight gain.”

Once, before a show, Benny jutted his bushy beard out and said, “I changed shampoos.”

“Okay…?”

“Xander said you didn’t like the way the other one smelled.”