Page 5 of Forgiving Paris
No tubes in her mouth or esophagus.
I’m alive. How could I be alive?
Then she remembered the baby, and her hand moved to her abdomen. Surely the tiny life inside her had died in this ordeal. All because Alice wouldn’t listen to Benji. Her eyes scanned the monitors and machines around her until she saw the nurses’ button. She pressed it and called out at the same time. “Help me! Someone, please!”
An older uniformed woman rushed into the room. “You’re awake!”
Panic welled up in Alice’s heart and limbs. “I… I don’t feel well.” Of course she didn’t feel well. How long had it been since she’d had a fix? “I need… I need more.”
“Shhh.” The woman stood at her bedside. “I’m taking care of you.” She put her hand on Alice’s shoulder. “You nearly died. Do you know that?”
“Y-y-yes. What… happened?”
The nurse hesitated. “I believe it was a miracle.” She sat in the chair next to Alice’s bed. “What’s your name?”
Why should she tell the woman? She needed to get back to her tent, back to Benji. She had survived the heavy stuff, lived through the pepper. She wouldn’t push it so hard next time. She started to sit up, but a wave of pain hit her head and slammed her back to the pillow. “I need more…”
“You need to rest.” The nurse looked straight at her.“My name is Fran. And you’re at a rehab facility just outside Paris.” She was kind and soft-spoken. “We can’t get far without your name.”
Alice squeezed her eyes shut. The pain in her head was getting worse. Her arms and legs throbbed. She didn’t ask for this, didn’t ask to be rescued. “Take me back.” She had no memory of life before heroin. There was no returning to who she used to be.
“You’re not going back.” The woman stayed in the chair. “Just your first name. Then I’ll tell you how you got here.”
Her head was spinning now. What would it hurt to tell the woman? “Alice.” She pressed her thumb and fingers into her temples. “My name is Alice.”
“One more question.” The nurse took a chart from the bedside table. “How old are you, Alice?”
She didn’t want to say, didn’t want the horrified, pitiful look from Fran. But what did it matter? “I’m… eighteen.”
“That’s what I thought.” Fran made a note in the chart.
For the first time since Alice started using, she didn’t feel judged. She relaxed into the bed. This nurse probably saw people like Alice all the time. Her feet and hands started shaking. Or maybe they’d been shaking. “Please… can… can you give me a… a hit? Just… just one.”
Nurse Fran stood and touched the side of Alice’s head. “You know I can’t do that.” She smiled, and there was something different about the woman. A light and certainty. “We’re going to get you better.”
Alice wanted to throw up. No more heroin? Shewould have to find a way out of here, slip through a window maybe. She wouldn’t feel okay until she got the next needle. The nurse couldn’t possibly understand.
“Is there anything you’d like to tell me, Alice?” Fran held Alice’s chart to her chest. She waited.
Then Alice remembered and her shaking hand returned to her belly. “I…” If the baby had lived, it would’ve been Benji’s. He was the only one. She closed her eyes again. “I was pregnant. Before… before I overdosed.”
Fran nodded. “You’re still pregnant, Alice.”
A wave of nausea rushed through her gut and her head pounded. “I’m… I’m still…?”
“Yes.” Fran put her hand on Alice’s shoulder. “You’ve been here five days, Alice.” The woman paused. “Would you like to hear what happened that night?”
Not really,Alice thought. But maybe she should. “Yes. Please.”
“Your friend must’ve known you were overdosing, because he was experiencing the same thing.”
Benji had overdosed, too? Alice’s heartbeat picked up speed. And how had he gotten a cell phone? Must’ve been one of those cheap throwaways. “I… I remember taking my last breath.”
“An officer was fifty feet away, about to check out the homeless camp. He heard your friend yelling and he rushed up in time to give you Narcan. Your friend wasn’t doing well, but he pointed at you. He wanted you to have it.”
Alice sat up straighter. “What happened to him? To Benji?”
For a few seconds the nurse didn’t say anything. She looked down at Alice’s chart and then back at Alice. “He didn’t make it. I’m… I’m so sorry. The officer had just one dose of Narcan on him and by the time backup came… It was too late.”
