What did he ingest?
The paramedics keep asking me that, and each time they repeat themselves my world fades out a little more, vision blurring. Tears were bleeding out of me. They had to rip Vince from my hold because I couldn't physically get my fingers to let go.
I had called 911 right when he collapsed. They asked what was wrong and I had said, "My boyfriend-my- my friend, he passed out, he had something in his system. Drugs, I think, yes. I don't know, I'm sorry. Please hurry please please hurry."
I held Vince's face between my palms, his breathing barely audible.
"Please," I said into his chest. Please don't leave me. Not now, not when you've made me need you.
"What did he take?" said a woman paramedic. "It would be helpful if you could tell us."
"I don't know," I said for the fifth time. They didn't believe that I didn't know. You could see that on their faces, the doubt. "He came in looking pale and sickly and high and then he collapsed. That's all I can -" I started to cry harder. "I can't give you anymore information," I said between breaths.
My fingers were clutching at the fabric of his shirt again, the only thing keeping me alive was his chest moving up and down, indicating breathing.
Indicting that he was still alive.
"Okay," she said, sympathy in her voice. "Alright." Finally, at least, it seemed she believed me.
They started to tell me that I needed to let him go again, because he needed to go to the hospital. I said I needed to go with him, he couldn't be alone, he has no one else, I need to. I held onto him tighter, in fear that they might try to pull me off again. I couldn't, couldn't let go.
They were talking about things like contacting family, asking about his drug use history, all these questions I couldn't answer - maybe I didn't really know Vince at all. I wanted to stop thinking about that.
They said I could come in the ambulance, that as long as I cooperated I could come. I promised as long as they let me touch him, to be sure he was breathing.
So we were inside the ambulance, and strangely the sirens were quite muted from the inside, and I had my head very close to Vince's. His skin was a grey whitish pale color and his eyelids looked thin and purplish. How could I not have seen this? how could I have missed this how how how -
"Please wake up," I whispered. "Please don't die please don't die please please I'm begging you don't die please I can't do it again please stay I'm sorry I didn't save you I'm sorry please please -" by this point, I could barely speak, choking back sobs of hysteria. I didn't know who I was talking to anymore, my dad, Vince, or myself.
The paramedics seemed to be monitoring him, and they kept looking at me, as if unsure whether they should be treating me as well.
"I promise I'll be better Vince I promise I'll be happy I promise I won't have panic attacks anymore I'll be happy I swear please live please," I said. He didn't move, didn't open his eyes, didn't make any signal to show he could hear me at all.
I still kept saying these things, scared to death of losing him of losing someone else please no I can't please
Please.
Finally, we were in the hospital. Then the paramedics were saying things like, "Drug overdose," and the doctors were all crowding around the stretcher and cutting with scissors down Vince's thin t-shirt, looking for signs of wounds or track marks, any injuries that could be hiding underneath clothing or clues to indicate what he took.
I closed my eyes. Caroline, is that you? I could hear Vince's voice in my mind, clear as day. Yes it's me, I answered back. It's me, I'm here.
"Excuse me," I asked a nurse, "I need to know what's happening." She looked very confused, then saw me staring at them wheeling Vince away, looked at my hands fisted so tightly my knuckles were going white, looked at my fast blinking eyes, tears still dripping - and she said: "Okay, hold on, honey." She hurried away, shoes squeaking.
I could hold on. I could. I sat down in the closest chair. I saw only the linoleum floor of the hospital, a stark pale blue floor, my converses dirty and scuffed. Shaking, tapping. My hands gripped the arm rests.
Hold on. I am. Yes. I am. I can do that. I've been doing that. For a while longer? Yes, yes I can do that.
Then, maybe a few minutes later or a few hours or a few seconds, the nurse came into my view, her scrubs were pink.
"Hi, miss. What's your name, miss?"
"Caroline," I said.
"That's a pretty name," she said in a voice you might use when addressing a hysterical child. "Your boyfriend?" she asked.
I shook my head. Then nodded. Then my face crumpled. "I don't know. He's my something. He's very special and dear to me."
"Okay," she says. Then she sits next to me, and she says a few things. Tells me that he ingested pills and rattles off names I've never heard of. She says that he probably didn't intend to overdose, just that maybe he had mixed some that shouldn't have been mixed. She said that it seemed he'd been on drugs for a while, that he was a user of some sort, that he, she suspected, had a problem. Did I know about that? Said that they were pumping his stomach now. That they were going to take care of him. I couldn't visit him today probably, she said. Maybe go home and rest? she said.
"No," I said. If I went home I would have to face my grandma and my mom and I couldn't see anyone or I think that I might spill over onto the floor and melt right through the floorboards and keep sinking lower and lower and lower until - "No, I'll wait," I say.
A user. He had a problem. Things were flashing through my mind, like how sometimes he was absent minded and his forehead was a little sweaty and his eyes sometimes got unfocused, or how he could go off on tangents or be random and spontaneous - what was the drugs and what was Vince? Were they synonymous?
I remembered the party he took me to, let's mingle Caroline come on let's mingle but wait I have to go somewhere I'll be back, and when he returned his hands shook and he was agitated but happy and amused and Vince. Was he high then? Was he ever not high?
I put my hands in my head, too overwhelmed to think anymore. The boy that I - who was he? He quit smoking cigarettes and I had felt so proud, as if I had done that, done something for him. All along there was an addiction hiding underneath.
Hours passed. I sat in the same position, and my neck hurt and my back hurt and my arms kept getting goosebumps because it was freezing inside the waiting room, but I didn't move.
The nurse checked on me every hour or so until her shift was up. She told me before she left that he was now in a room. Stable. That's all that mattered to me, really, despite all the things I had learned tonight.
Finally, when dawn broke and my grandma had called to see where on earth I was, I lied and said I was at Vince's. Said I had fallen asleep there. Sorry, grandma. She couldn't hear the sad, tiredness in my voice. The utter weariness.
I could go see him now. Since he was stable and it was visiting hours. I found what room number he was in and I felt my palms sweating as I boarded the elevator.
When I saw him lying there, he looked a lot less pale than the last time I had seen him. He still looked vulnerable and very young in that bed. I felt a strange urge to cover him from anyone seeing him like this, as if to see him weak was some kind of intrusion.
I sat down in the chair. I put my hand on his. It was cold and didn't move. I took my hand off.
"This is a mess," I said and my voice cracked because I hadn't spoken more than a word or two in a while. I swallowed.
"I don't understand," I said. I knew I was talking to a sleeping Vince. It was better that way. "I don't understand. Why? Why?" I rested my head on the side of his bed, my face right next to his shoulder. I could see his collarbones from this angle and they were so sharp, fragile. I knew I should call Josh about this. Maybe he knew about this... this addiction. That Vince was a - a user. But, selfishly, I wanted this time to myself. I wanted Vince to myself right now.
"You could've died," I told him. You could've, I kept saying. How could you? I knew it wasn't really fair to say that. It still hurt to know that people were human and made mistakes and did things to survive and get through the day even if those things were sometimes damaging.
I placed my hand on his cheek.
"Mom?"
I jumped at the sudden sound of his voice. His eyes were open a little but it didn't really look like he was seeing anything. The doctors did say that he would have a fever as they detoxed him from the drugs in his system and it might make him have nightmares and even see things or hear things that weren't real - but, they said, that probably wouldn't happen.
It seemed to be happening now.
"Mom?" he says again, reaching. I clutched his hand, didn't dare say a word. When he felt me hold him back, he sighed in relief. "My head is killing me," he says. "Really. It's crazy hurting. Maybe a Tylenol would help? Mom? Mom, are you there?"
I held still. Couldn't breathe or make a sound. Then he quieted down, half asleep.
Then, "Caroline? Is that you?"
"Yes," I said. My voice broke. "It's me. I'm here."
"Miss Caroline, you beautiful thing. My beauty, Caroline," he sighs. He seems to still be in a feverish daydream. It didn't seem like he could really hear me or even himself. Sweat drips down his forehead.
Then he says, "Please don't tell Caroline about this." His eyes are closed, breathing slowing down as he falls asleep. "She deserves more. I'm a bastard, aren't I? God. Jeez. Please don't tell. Her sadness is too deep. Too deep. And I think she would hate me, mom. Do you think so? Don't tell her."
"I won't," I say. I hold his hand and wipe at the sweat that's on his hairline. "I won't tell."
My heart trembles inside my chest. What am I going to do?