Though my hands were shaking, my fists were closed too tightly to drop the weights again, and my arms—though in protest—did as he demanded.
As I lay in my bed twenty minutes later, my heart was still pounding in my ears. My hands were still shaking, and my mind was flying.
I wanted Nicole.
I wanted my Dad to walk into the room so I could haul back and punch him.
I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to slow down my breathing, but the gasping was impossible to control. I was dizzy, and when I closed my eyes, I felt like I was going to throw up. I turned my head a little so my nose was up against Nicole’s pillow, stared out the small window, and begged the stuff to make its way out of my system.
My old buddy The Bard once said, “In time we hate that which we often fear.” Somehow, I couldn’t agree with him more.
Now please, please make it stop…
“Stop your whining,” Steven said. He used his head to gesture over to his little bag full of needles and shit. “Or do you need a little help?”
I shook my head and did another set of lifts as my arms burned, and my side felt like it was going to split right back open.
Could that happen?
I felt a shudder run through me but wasn’t sure if it was due to the weights in my hands or the thought of ripping open the gash down my side. I pushed on because there wasn’t a choice. Dad was watching from the kitchen, and as I was finishing up, he took his buzzing phone out of his pocket and walked out of earshot.
“Where are your charts from yesterday?” Steven asked as I sat like a limp noodle in my wheelchair.
“I think Dad put them in his study,” I replied.
“Well, go get them! I need to do some comparisons.”
I took a big breath and wondered if my workout-fatigued arms would even be able to wheel me over the hardwood floors at this point. Somehow, I managed to get myself down the hallway, slowly, and to the door of Dad’s study. I reached out and turned the handle and then pushed it open so I could wheel myself inside.
I could hear Dad’s voice from the kitchen rise and intensify though I couldn’t quite make out his words. Something about how no one’s going to try to pull that shit, and he was the goddamned mayor or something. I heard Steven responding but couldn’t make out his words, either.
I went through the doorway, trying to ignore whatever the hell was going on in the other room. I just didn’t have the energy.
It was rare for me to go into this room. It’s not like it was ever specifically off limits or anything, it just…didn’t invite company, I guess. The walls were painted to look like red leather, and one whole wall was lined with bookshelves containing medical books and journals. There was even an authentic human skeleton in the corner, enclosed in a large, glass case.
It gave me the willies.
The place was also full of all kinds of shit. There were books stacked everywhere, a couple of trees’ worth of papers, and tons of dust. There were staplers and hole-punches and letters on a table next to a wing-backed chair and one small corner dedicated to Real Messini merchandise, including a little Real Messini garden gnome.
Okay, the gnome was actually creepier than the skeleton, if you asked me. The skeleton didn’t have any eyes, but that gnome always seemed to be watching me.
Ignoring the peering black eyes of the plastic figure, I maneuvered the chair around the side of Dad’s desk and grabbed the file sitting on top. I flipped it open to make sure it was the right one and then closed it and started trying to back up around Dad’s desk chair and the desk itself.
Dad and Steven were definitely yelling at each other now. I still couldn’t make out the words. I hoped maybe Dad was going to be pissed off enough to fire him.
I should be so lucky.
I held tight to the file folder so nothing would fall out as I tried to get out of the small space. It wasn’t easy—the space was too tight for the chair to fit, and I wanted to make sure I didn’t come close to bumping into the skeleton. That would just freak me out. I backed up and pulled forward and eventually turned myself part way around so I could get out.
Well, almost.
I knocked right into the side of the desk, and three books fell off from where they were stacked. They knocked into a bunch of papers, which fell on the floor. I tried to back up to reach them and banged right into the desk again. More books fell, taking more papers with them.
“Dammit!” At this rate, I was going to wear myself out picking up all this shit before Steven even got round two started on me. I heard the front door open and slam shut and half prayed he was getting fired right now.
I reached down and grabbed at the stack of papers. It put a bit of strain on my side to reach down like that, but I managed. I stacked them up along with the books and reached over to fully close the desk drawer that had been jarred open in the process. Something very familiar caught my eye as I reached for the drawer’s handle, and instead of closing it, I opened it a little more.
It was my sketchbook.