Söbriety • Mötley Crüe •

2. Group Therapy

Warnings: Mentions of Previous Drug Use

Ryan's POV

I groan and open my eyes to the sound of my door opening, and see Sara's bright red hair walking through my door.

"Good morning, Ryan! I have your morning medicine."

I scoff, remembering the Benadryl Dr. Mouse gave me last night.

"Thanks, Sara." I take the small medicine cup from her and quickly shoot the pills in my mouth with a gulp of water.

"Hey- do you think you could get Dr. Mo- I mean Dr. Levinsky to give me something for my stomach? I'm really nauseous." I bat my eyelashes at her.

"I didn't hear you throwing up any last night."

"I didn't eat dinner last night, I was too nauseous." I lie as my stomach growls remembering the spaghetti I refused.

"Okay, I'll talk to her and see if she can give you some Phenergan or something."

Score.

"Thanks, Sara. I appreciate your help. I know it's probably not the easiest thing working with addicts, but it makes a difference." I smile a bullshit smile at her, and when the corners of her lips turn up into a smile I know my bullshit worked.

"You're welcome, Ryan. You have group therapy in an hour. You need to be in room 242 at 10 AM."

Group therapy? Gross.

"Group therapy?" I can hear the disgust in my voice, and I know Sara hears it too.

She nods her head and walks out of the room, probably trying to avoid me yelling at her like I did last night. I shouldn't yell at her, it's not her fault Dr. Mouse is a shit doctor.

I sigh and pull the covers back off me, and race to the bathroom before I piss myself. Normally I wake up several times to pee, but I didn't last night and my bladder is totally full.

Huh, maybe that Benadryl did help.

A disappointed sigh escapes me when I look at myself in the mirror. I look like death. I at least need to try to make myself look like I'm doing better when I get out of here. If I look like this when I get out, the judge will immediately know I'm still using and throw me in jail.

Note to self: gain a few pounds, lose the eye bags, wash my hair regularly, and look like an actual human being.

But for the time being nobody expects me to look great in rehab, so I throw on a pair of sweat pants and a t-shirt and pile my hair on the top of my head. I never got into the whole 80s "make your hair reach the sky" trend. My hair is always in a pile on my head or flat down my back. I clean my big square-rimmed glasses and push them onto my nose. Good enough, I don't have anybody to impress here.

I leave my room in search of something to secretly eat before group therapy. Sara will know I'm lying about being nauseous if she sees me eat. As I walk down the hall I avoid eye contact with everyone in sight. All the employees either look at us like we're lepers, or with pity like we're about to die.

They're not necessarily wrong.

My nose perks up when I smell sweet dough and chocolate. I know whatever it is isn't meant for patients because they believe sugar is a drug, even though the employees can have it whenever they want.

I follow the smell in hopes of finding donuts like leprechauns follow the rainbow to their pot of gold. I finally reach the heavenly smell at the receptionist's desk, a small but pretty woman they call Victoria taking one out of the box for herself.