Challenges of Sobriety in a Weekend of Confines

Saturday

I had anticipated that she might have woken up in the middle of the night (dazed and sick) and run back upstairs, but there she was at my side still: passed right the heck out partly on the couch and partly on the ground, drooling into the cushions, all crumpled up in what looked to be a very undesirable position.

I bent down and wrapped my arms under hers, gripping her body and feeling the lithe outline of it as my still drowsy muscles lifted her up. Robin leaned her head against me in her slumber, lying there in my arms for a moment as I struggled to place her better onto the couch, adjusting her body until she seemed comfortable. I pulled the quilt over her and watched as she turned a bit, nestling into the warmth like she had yearned years for its embrace.

After a wild goose chase around her kitchen, I managed to clean enough scarce dishes and scrounge up enough ingredients for a home-cooked breakfast. I didn't bother starting it until around noon, surmising she would not crawl out of bed until then, knowing her. I kept it warm in the oven while I scrubbed her counter tops, cleaning what I could while she was still out of it. I had just washed my hands up and started new dishes soaking when I heard her move around.

Her groans were pained and sullen, her body limply rolling off the couch. She barely managed to catch her feet onto the ground and drag herself across it. Her eyes were narrow and still half-asleep as she rubbed them over and over while staggering into the kitchen. She furrowed her brows at the sight of me standing there, like she didn't remember, but then she just weakly waved and leaned against the refrigerator to keep herself upright.

"You look like a corpse," I said flatly.

"I feel like one," Robin replied in what sounded like a gurgle, wincing at the small volume of her own voice.

She touched her head and rubbed it a bit, seeming like she was something more than dizzy. She raised one wavering, trembling finger and held it out, like she was telling me to wait. She stepped an uneasy step backwards and groaned almost inaudibly, grasping at the wall to keep on her feet. I thought she was going to faint or something, from the look of her.

Turning suddenly, she darted up the stairs towards the bathroom, her toes stubbing on steps and her knees bending and wobbling all the way up to the second floor. I turned the oven down a bit to make sure the warm-kept food wouldn't burn, and followed after her. I could hear her from the bottom of the stairs, seeing as how she probably didn't have time to shut the door behind her. It made me hesitate. Looking at my feet, I slowly crept up towards the second floor; the erratic rhythm of her laboured breathing, scarce cries, and forced chokes were a stark contrast to the slow and easy steps of my own two feet.

I stopped at the top of the stairs, peering around the corner of the hall to see just a bit of her, leaning over the toilet in a heap on the bathroom floor. Another heave of her shoulders accompanied a cough that rang out pathetically, though by then I was sure she was finished. Her shaking hand stretched out and ripped some toilet paper off the roll and wiped her mouth, throwing the white fabric into the toilet after. Her hands clutched the porcelain bowl roughly as she stared into it, waiting for more. As nothing else seemed to rise from her stomach, she slapped at the flush handle, missing a couple of times before managing to pull it down.

I stepped up the last step to the second floor and approached her, leaning slightly to the side to see her body come into view as the door frame widened and moved out of obstructing her. She pushed off the toilet and landed clumsily on the ground, her legs bent up under her and her open palm smacking the cold tile. She ran her other fingers through her messy hair, brushing the black strands over the few blue ones, which had just about disappeared. I stood in the doorway and looked at her, my eyes worried and sincere. She must have heard me, because she looked over with a tired and miserable expression, her eyes watering and bloodshot.