The Waiting One

Chapter 28 of 48- The Cousin of Death and Consequences

Chapter 28- The Cousin of Death and Consequences

The sun shined weakly though the blinds and cast multiple horizontal shadows on the bed. Serronie’s eyes flickered open. She went to roll over and groaned. Her body hurt from head to toe. Her expression mirrored her severe discomfort. Coming up on an elbow, she surveyed the room, noticing how late in the evening it looked. “How’d I get in my bed, I could have promised that I was on the couch”, she shook her head at herself, “Only weirdoes sleepwalk.” Slightly confused, she grabbed her cell phone to check the time. The cell phone was dead. Once she found the tip of her charger hiding under her pillow, she plugged it into her phone. Once the phone booted up, she gasped at the display on the home screen. “Sunday @ 6:47 p.m.” She wiped her eyes and looked again. Then she turned on the television and accessed the guide channel. The information was the same, Sunday evening at 6:47 p.m. “Oh my goodness! It’s no way I could have slept an entire day and a half!”

When she unlocked her phone, she had a total of twenty eight text messages, and six voice mails. Majority came from her mom, then Zachary, then a few random people. Her muscles ached, her stomach hurt, and she had a pounding headache. She picked her phone up and called Zachary. Halfway through the first ring, he answered with urgency, “HELLO, SERRONIE?! ARE YOU OKAY?!” Her voice was slightly hoarse and low. “Zack, I, I just woke up.” He could hear the concern in her voice. “Ronnie we’ve been so worried about you! How dare you turn your phone off, and not talk to anyone all weekend?!” “You do not understand me; I went to sleep Friday night and woke up just… now.” “Huh!?” “I’ve been sleep all this time Zachary, I don’t know how I slept so long, I know I was tired, but gosh.” He was silent for a few second, and then in a tone of revelation he spoke, “Oh Ronnie! You took those expired pain sleeping pills the other night! I remember you telling me they were expired, but I didn’t think they’d do anything bad to you; I mean, I take expired medicine all the time, and it’s never hurt me.” “Well that makes plenty sense Zachary, you’re six four and two-hundred and thirty pounds. I’m only five foot three, and one fifteen soak and wet.” “Well baby, please throw those pills away, any medicine that you have that’s expired, get rid of it. I was too worried about you. Sleeping that long isn’t healthy at all. How do you feel?” She relaxed backwards in the bed, wincing all the way down. “Something doesn’t feel right, I hurt all over. Every muscle in my body hurts, especially my legs, my head is in so much pain, my stomach is a mixture of sore and empty. Everything hurts, literally EVERYTHING.”

“You want to go to the doctor, because I’ll make the drive there to take you.” “Don’t be silly, you don’t have to drive three hours to take me to the doctor, I probably just need to stretch and eat and drink something, I mean, it has been like over twenty-four hours since I had anything.” She spoke with humor. “Okay, well you know I drive myself crazy when you’re sick, I can’t stand it. So eat, A LOT, and call me back in a few. And if I don’t hear from you, I’ll be making my way out there, you know I can’t have anything happening to you. You’re my world.” “Oh Zachary I just love you so very much, and I miss you.” He paused before he went on, “Would you consider moving out here with me? My place is huge, I know you have your thing going on out there, but I’m willing to do whatever to make you just as comfortable out here.” She talked deliberately, “Zack, you know how I am about change, it makes me really nervous.” He laughed, “Ronnie, I’ll be right here, I’m not going to let anything happen to you, haven’t I always been your protector, hmmm, your knight in shining armor?” Her voice lightened up,” Okay, I’ll come visit you for like a month and we’ll see how I adapt, and how we get along. I’ll need clearance in my schedule though, Francine said that the next six months is going to be really busy for me, you know, with my book and everything. Plus you know how I feel about shacking up in sin, that’s nothing but temptation.” Zachary scoffed loudly, “Oh Ronnie, everything is not about me trying to get in your pants okay! I figured that you’d know that by now. It’s all for you, that’s all I want.” “Zack, I never said those were your intentions, I’m just saying that things can happen, okay?” “Stop it, you’re about to give ME a headache you crazy woman, go eat, and we’ll talk about this more later.” “Love you Zacky-poo,” she said smiling widely. He replied with a chuckle, “Love you butter-nut”. They exchanged a laugh then ended the conversation.

She got up to get out of the bed, stood up and felt heavy pain in her legs, thighs and pelvis. She huffed and hunched over. “My goodness! Ooh, I need to just walk it off.” She began taking mini steps and wondered why sleeping that long could end so painfully. Upon walking to her utility room, she saw her apartment key on the floor near the door. “I dropped my key? Okay, Serronie, you need to really pay attention to what you do”, she scolded herself. Then she went to the kitchen and fixed French toast, scrambled eggs, and bacon. It was her and Zachary’s favorite, they always ate it together. She still walked very slowly around the apartment. After that, she went to the bathroom. “Maybe a hot shower will really do me some good right about now”, she said locking the door behind her.  She stood in the mirror and pulled her shirt over her head, and unsnapped her bra and took it off. Then she removed her shorts and underwear. Serronie glanced down and noticed blood in the seat of her underwear. “Just great! I get a period to top everything off! An early period! Ha! That probably explains all this soreness in my midsection.” She rocked around in a semicircle and sat down on the toilet, as she began to pee; she jerked up and screamed loudly. “AAAAhhhhhhh!!! Nooo!!! Please no urinary tract infection!” There was a stinging burning sensation accompanied by blood as she peed. “DAMN THOSE EXPIRED PILLS! DAMN ZACK FOR TELLING ME TO TAKE THEM! DAMN MY PERIOD! UUGGHH!” Once she finished taking her shower, she inched to the medicine cabinet and threw every expired bottle of medicine away that she saw. “Never ever again!” she grunted as she tossed the last bottle of pills into the litter basket.

For the rest of the day, she took it easy, ate again, and drunk plenty of water. She had a long conversation with Zachary about everything and he apologized excessively for giving her bad advice. Over the next few days, her discomfort subsided. They texted each other continuously and talked every chance that occurred. The first week was really easy for them to deal with. Over the consequent weeks, communication began to dwindle. Zachary was tied up working with his dad’s logistics business and Serronie was constantly on the go with her editor. They’d go days without speaking, and have very short conversations.