“Yeah. Bullshit.” I drag myself to the edge of the bed, the pain returning, slicing through my back and leg like a knife. “Fuck.”
“I’m coming to pick you up. I’m taking you to the hospital.”
“No way. I need to get to work—”
“See you in five.”
I huff, closing my eyes, and throw the phone on the bed. “Love you, girl,” I say into the silence.
So fucking much.
I just wish… I wish I could figure Ryan out. Figure out myself, why I still want him, and how to erase him from my mind.
***
“It looks like a pinched nerve,” the doctor says, a gray sixty-something guy with a goatee and a soothing voice. “What we call sciatica.”
“Awesome.” I lick my dry lips. “Am I getting surgery?”
“We don’t operate unless there’s no other way,” he says, and I relax marginally. “Take the anti-inflammatories, lie down and rest. If it’s not better in a few days, we’ll have to see what other options we have.”
Fuck. More days off work. At this rate, I’ll be on the street in no time. Cardboard box house, here I come.
“You may want to think about finding a different job,” the doctor goes on, helping me to sit up on the examination table. “Lifting weights with your back problems will only aggravate them, and may cause permanent damage. As it is, I believe the anti-inflammatories will be enough, but next time…”
I’m shaking as I sit there, gripping the edge of the table and hanging my head. Another job? What other job can I do? I’ve been a warehouse loader ever since I finished school.
I just can’t catch a break, can I?
“Thank you,” Brylee tells the doctor, her face serious. “I’ll make sure he takes the pills. And to use the compresses.”
I wanna joke with her about rubbing my back and my ass, but the memory of the weekend hits me square in the chest, and I say nothing.
I get a shot of strong painkillers, and we’re done.
She helps me up and into a wheel chair, then rolls me out of the doctor’s office, through the hospital, down elevators and through hallways.
I let her, lost, clutching the prescription and patient care instructions in my hands, unable to see a way out—out of here, out of the financial problems, out of the mess inside my head.
“Your friend not with you today?” the reception nurse asks as we head out, and Brylee stops.
“My friend?”
“Mr. Dawson. He was looking for you the other day.”
Brylee’s mouth tightens. “Right. No, he’s not with us today. How do you even know his name?”
“Oh, I know Ryan. I know all of you.” She smiles.
I recognize her, too. She’s been around the last couple of times Mom ODed. But why would she know Ryan?
Before I get a chance to ask, Brylee pushes me past the desk and outside, into the cold morning. We’re silent as we reach her car and she helps me out of the wheelchair and into the passenger seat.
She’s surprisingly strong.
She helps me buckle on the safety belt and strokes my face.
“Bry…” I whisper, not sure why my lungs feel crushed, not sure what I need.