Private Dancer | Falice

Road to Recovery

That Friday the clock almost stroke 7pm and both of them were nervous for what was about to come. It couldn't take much more time before Hal would notice that she wouldn't show up.

While FP was putting their plates in the dish washer Alice phone began to rankle as if on cue. Her body froze while she kept staring at her phone, not knowing what to do. Her instinct told her that she should pick up, surrender and still go to work, but that would be a big mistake.

FP saw her finger going to the green button on her phone screen, so he walked over to her and carefully grabbed the phone out of her hands while he kept looking at her.

''You don't owe him an explanation.'' He tried to convince her. She couldn't help it, but Hal's name on her phone was a big trigger for her. Her eyes hadn't broken the gaze on the phone while her breathing became uncontrollably. She had been sober for almost two weeks, but seeing the name of the man that supplied her needs triggered her like crazy and suddenly she felt the need to use again so badly.

Mostly because she used before the show to get through the night. It was the first Friday she wasn't there and with that also the first Friday she didn't use for work. The last time she went to work she had avoided to use but the fact that she was sober only made the show a living nightmare for her.

She may not have slept with someone from the audience because she just couldn't get herself to doing that with FP in the back of her mind, but she needed it to survive the show as well. She needed those drugs.

FP had noticed that she started to panic so he grabbed her lower arms and directer her towards his chest. He softly shushed her and let her follow the same breathing pattern as he did to make sure she wouldn't hyperventilate.

Alice lost track of time every time she fell in one of those attacks. She could have stand in FP's arms for seconds, minutes, maybe even hours until she had calmed down. The tears that had escaped her eyes had formed a wet spot on his blouse, which she softly wiped with her index finger.

''I feel so stupid.'' She whispered more to herself than to FP, but he heard her nonetheless. His heart broke a little hearing those words from her, so he cupped her cheeks to make her look up to him.

''You are not stupid. Don't ever say that about yourself.'' Alice smiled slightly, but it wasn't genuine. It was hard to believe him if she all she had known her life was that she wasn't even good enough to finish her school. She was good enough to strip down her clothes and be a drug addict.

''I mean it. You are an amazing woman, Alice.'' Her heart started glowing once she heard those sweet words come out of his mouth. Nobody had ever said that to her. She felt like FP truly believed in her and right now that was all she needed at that very moment to get through this.

She wanted to tell him how crazy she is about him and how much she felt loved because of his actions, but Alice never had been good with words. Instead she did something she was familiar with. Her lips attached to his and slowly kissed him, thanking him for believing in her.

--

FP kept working on the case, but he couldn't fully commit to that anymore now knowing of Alice's addiction. Tom has been breathing down his neck the last week since he probably noticed a change in FP's behaviour. He was thinking about making some big life changes but he couldn't fully commit to that yet.

Hal had been blowing up Alice's phone with text messages but she hadn't respond to any of it. As a way to make it a lot easier for her FP had bought a new phone that she could use to text him and all the other people besides Hal she felt like talking to, so the phone that was being spammed by Hal would always stay at home. He didn't want her to take that with her to the treatment centre.