King of Her Desire

53

Even when I woke up, I wasn't really awake.

I didn't know where the hell I was, who the hell I was, what day it was, what planet I was on—I was a lump. Dead weight. Laying there in intensive care staring into this hazy void.

Before that, I'd been semi-comatose for over 6 hours. Intubated for most of that time. I could feel the pain in my throat when I woke up.

And it was at least another day before I fully understood what had happened to me. It was GHB. Juice. Cherry meth—homemade, apparently. And badly, too.

Shut down my respiratory system and almost killed me because at the hospital they were afraid to use the usual antidotes without knowing what they were actually dealing with. Or what it'd been mixed with in that flask. Plus, I'd been drinking, too.

All I remember from those first few hours after I came to is watching these... "shapes" moving around in front of me. It was almost like there was some sort of film over my eyeballs that I couldn't blink off.

And the voices sounded like they were coming from far away. I felt people touch me, but it was sort of like when the dentist deadens your mouth and you finally start feeling a little something a few hours later.

Took me the better part of the next day to actually recognize Sochi. Or to even know she was there next to me, sleeping.

Nice way to wake up, man. With that sweet face right there, turned my way. I just took in the beauty of it: the long, long black lashes, the cute little nose, the full lips. All that satiny black hair spread out over the pillow. Over her.

And then I smiled a little bit because she had this t-shirt and some sweats from the gift shop on. The tee had this grinning saguaro on it. Wearing a sombrero and standing in front of a "sunset" made out of a big orange circle with a littler yellow circle on top.

The sweats were just camo. Didn't go with that shirt, but you could tell she just snatched stuff off the racks trying to get back to me as fast as she could, probably.

Some woman's voice interrupted the peace with, "Welcome back," from somewhere nearby. And then leaned over and peered into my eyes—startled me.

"Do you know where you are?" she asked. Very friendly, not like for an "exam."

I gurgled something but it hurt and my chords didn't work. And Sochi's eyes opened. Those incredible eyes--the smile was incredible, too. Warm and deeply relieved.

"You can see me?" she asked.

I wanted to say something about how happy I was to see her, but I just croaked again. Didn't matter. She touched my face and said, "Don't worry..."

And I have no idea why, but it made me cry. I think it was the aftereffects of that stupid drug. Made right, it can make you combative or just kind of out of control, period, emotionally. So it must've been at least somewhat like the real thing. Only 'way worse. And 'way too strong.

I really started to get weird my short-term memory kicked back in. It takes that, too, G.

The sibs came first. I could feel something about them but I couldn't bring up any details. My body just got all tense and I stared at Sochi, trying to figure out what that was about.

And then the doctor said, "I'm going to let you wake up a little bit more and then we'll talk about what's going on, okay?"

And I finally said, "Kids..." Sort of.