16

Sixteen
February 13 Imbolgen 19
Adrienne sat cross legged in the center of the living room on the beige carpet surrounded by piles of numbered index cards and scattered books: biographies, commentaries, and annotated criticisms. Her blue laptop sat in front of her, open to a word document that was now thirty pages long. Various drafts lay strewn across the floor, creating a pathway from the living room to the bedroom. Empty Pepsi One cans haphazardly graced the floor. A package of chocolate chip rice cakes sat next to the newest addition. Several instant messages flashed on the screen. Adrienne ignored them, as she had ignored everything for--she wasn’t quite sure how long she had been sitting there. Perhaps it was only a few hours; perhaps it was a few days. She had been stuck on page thirty for the past three Pepsies. That was how she told time--by how many cases of Pepsi One she consumed. “Going Under” filled the air; Adrienne stared blankly at her lavender cell phone. She stared until the ringing ceased and then put it on vibrate. She stopped paying attention to who was calling hours ago. Her mind was numb; her head throbbed violently. In fact it had been throbbing for several hours--but Adrienne was totally unaware of time at this point. It felt as though her head was under water. Thought ran too fast for comprehension.
Abruptly she rose from the floor and ran into the bedroom. She began emptying the contents of dresser drawers onto the floor. Frantically she scrambled around, rifling through clothes, makeup, lotion, random postcards. Still she couldn’t find it--them. She needed all of them. She needed all of them right now. Right now right now right now right now right now. The words raced through her mind, the only words that would connect. How was it that four little orange bottles could always escape her? True, she did hide them from herself when she started feeling better. But there aren’t that many places that little pill bottles could hide, are there? The problem was when she really needed them she wasn’t coherent enough to find them. She wasn’t coherent for much of anything, except pacing across the floor. But pacing isn’t very constructive when your brain is going a thousand miles an hour and you start bumping into the wall.
Someone was knocking on the door--banging--they were banging. Adrienne kept dumping drawers onto the floor. She threw clothes everywhere. She threw books at the wall in frustration. She hadn’t heard him unlock the door. She wouldn’t have known that he was there if she hadn’t smelled him--the cinnamon and laundry detergent floated peripherally in her consciousness. He wasn’t important right now. Right now right now right now right now right now right now.
Jamar had been standing there leaning against the door frame of the bedroom for ten minutes. He watched her scurry around on the floor through the same pile of junk over and over. At first he was not sure whether she cognizant of the fact that it was the same pile each time; that was why he had watched her for so long without interfering. Now he was sure that she had no idea.
He had been with her long enough to know that she was aware of his presence. To what degree he wasn’t sure. It varied based on how long she had been unmediated. The hiding places were never the same. He had tried to look for patterns each time; there was no immediate pattern between her hiding places. Adrienne was either way too intelligent for him or the places were too random. He wasn’t sure which one it was. You could never be too sure of anything with Adrienne.
Jamar squatted next to her and touched her shaking hands. She didn’t look up; she simply kept sorting through the same pile. “Adrienne,” he said sharply. No response. “Baby, you need to go lay down,” he said softly, running his fingers though her scarlet curls. He stood slowly, grasping her right hand and supporting her waist with the other. In one swift motion he led her to the bed. Gandalf sat in the middle of the purple flowered pillows. Instinctively she lay down, cuddling next to the cat.
Jamar put his back to her and began searching the room for her prescriptions. Obviously they weren’t in the dresser; she’d torn it apart already. He went to the closet and began looking in shoe boxes. Some of them actually contained shoes. Adrienne never ceased to amaze him.
He conducted a rapid inventory of the living room: Pepsi One cans, rice cakes, paper, laptop, cell phone. They weren’t in there he knew. There was no place to hide them. Quickly he moved to the kitchen. With a trained eye he searched it content s the way the memory traces a familiar road. He looked for things that were out of place. There were no dishes in the sink. That did not surprise him much, from the looks of the living room she had been subsisting solely on rice cakes and Pepsi. Dishes, he thought suddenly. Abruptly he opened up the cupboard and searched behind the glasses on the second shelf. Nothing.
He moved to the third shelf: random pieces of china Adrienne had received from her grandmother: salt and pepper shakers, gravy boat, demitasse cups. He began removing the demitasse cups. At the back of .the cupboard he saw a little orange bottle. Jamar grasped it and read the label. Depakote. Great. There were three more left to find. Suddenly he smiled. Demitasse. Depakote. Alliteration.
The problem now was remembering all the meds she was on. He went back to Adrienne’s room. Adrienne lay curled up next to Gandalf, still shaking. “Baby, where’s your necklace?” he asked, stoking her hair. She could only reply in indistinguishable whimpers. Just then he noticed a reflection of light on the wall. Hanging on the bathroom doorknob was the necklace. He grabbed it and walked back to the kitchen. Jamar opened his palm and stared at the medical pendant. Depakote, Celexa, Seroquel, and Welbutrin. At least she had enough sense to own a pendant that listed her meds. The drawback was they changed so often that it was only moments like this that made them useful. It seemed that her life was made up of a never-ending series of such moments.
Jamar randomly chose the next medicine to find: Celexa. What started with a C in Adrienne’s kitchen? Cup was too simple. Cake. Corn. Cheetos. It had to be in the Cheetos; she loved them. He opened the already broken into bag; he smiled. Two down, two to go. He found the last two faster. There wasn’t much to choose from that began with S or W. The Seroquel was behind the soap; the Welbutrin was harder because it wasn’t on Adrienne’s side of the kitchen. He never understood why Marie insisted on splitting up the kitchen. She was never there. Now was a prime example. Adrienne was always by herself when she didn’t need to be.
He took a purple glass from the second shelf of the cupboard. Cutting a slice of lemon, he filled it up with water. Adrienne refused to drink water by itself. Actually, she refused to drink water. Sometimes she would make an exception if there was lemon in it. Jamar smirked and dropped half a lemon in.
“Adrienne,” he said firmly for the fourth time since he’d been standing over her. Adrienne turned her head and stared at him blankly. Jamar sat on the bed. “I need you to sit up real quick; it will just be for a minute. I promise.” She didn’t move. He placed the purple glass on the floor and the assortment of pills on the bed. Gently he sat her up. He closed her fingers over three Depakote, one Seroquel, two Celexa, and one and a half Welbutrin. She moved as if in a trance; her body moving only with the absence of her mind. She shoved all seven pills into her mouth and attempted to swallow them dry. Abruptly she coughed them up. Again she shoved them down her throat, and Jamar raised the glass of water to her mouth. She lay back down upon swallowing, curling up in the fetal position and placing her back to him. He lay down on the bed next to her, encircling her with his arms.
He whispered softly into her ear, positive that at least about a tenth of what he said was being picked up by her subconscious. “You’ve got to stop hiding your meds, baby girl. You really shouldn’t live by yourself; you practically do. Maria’s never here. I would take care of you better if I were with you. I don’t understand why you won’t let me help you.” She made no acknowledgment that she heard him. Perhaps she hadn’t.