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HAVOC

W hen I was little, I used to get stomach bugs all the time. I’d be sick for an entire week, head in a trashcan and my ass on the toilet. My mom would call me her little norovirus affectionately. By the sixth or seventh day, my brain would wipe all memory of previous life from my mind, as if sickness was all I knew.

I’m not quite there yet.

Still in the trenches, stuck between it feels like I’ll never feel good again and I don’t even know what healthy feels like anymore. But I’m not giving in this time. I don’t just need Madeline—I want her, and I want to be someone deserving of her. I want her to be proud of me and look at me the way she does when she’s admiring me.

I want everything with her.

What I don’t get, though, is sleep. She’s passed out on the couch. I’m only still in her lap because I don’t want to wake her. The nausea has lessened now, and hopefully soon, I’ll be able to get more than an hour of sleep at a time.

I feel like a leather saddle on a clothesline that had its time in the mud and rain.

Rode hard, put up wet.

Not quite the same.

Forever altered.

Still here for a good ride. I make myself laugh, a reminder that there’s a piece of me that wants to be okay again.

The need comes in a violent wave. It’s a rush I can’t explain, a pulling of my own internal compass compelling me to move. I unwind Madeline’s arms from my waist, placing a soft kiss on her forehead before getting off the couch. Picking my phone up from the coffee table, I find the voicemail notification still begging to be relieved.

“Vera?” Madeline asks, like she’s on watchdog mode and her body won’t afford her the pleasure of relaxing if I’m not beside her.

“I just need a second.” I look back at her, my hand on the doorknob. “I just gotta do something.”

I don’t think she trusts me, not when it comes to making good decisions for myself, but somehow, I think she sees that right now is more than that. She nods and closes her eyes again. I’m not fooled; she isn’t asleep, but that doesn’t matter.

Going outside is pointless; there are plenty of rooms to do this in, but it helps me feel better, less trapped, less boxed in.

Instead, I hit the play button, and it’s only when I hear her voice that I’m able to slide my back down along the outside wall until I’m seated on the ground. “Vera.”

She sings, the sound of her voice already bringing tears to my eyes. I pause the voicemail, unsure if I can keep going. I’m already regretting it, heart rate elevating, sweating like I just finished my speed test, and the nausea I thought I’d conquered comes rolling back in. I press the button again.

“Hey loser, it’s me—I’m gonna try to make this quick so it doesn’t cut me off. I know we promised we wouldn’t call unless the other was supposed to come running. I-I didn’t want to do this, Vera. I heard about your mom, and well, after everything, I can’t even imagine how you’re feeling out there. I hope you’re not alone and that your team was there for you.”

It’s silent for too long, and just as I wonder if it ended, she speaks again. “Anyways, I hate doing this. I didn’t want to tell you over the phone because there you were dealing with all your mom’s shit, and here I am…with my shit. I didn’t want to worry you, and I knew you needed to prioritize her, so I figured in ten years, we’d laugh about it, and you’d kick my ass for keeping it from you, but—” She laughs, and it’s so genuine that the tears start falling, and they don’t stop. “It’s not looking like it’s gonna be that way babe. I’m losing this bout. Getting hip-checked to the afterlife. So, yeah, bitch, I am calling, and you and the riders of Rohan better come galloping. I don’t have a lot of time left, and I hope to God you do the classic Havoc thing and hold onto this voicemail for months before you get over here so I’m good and dead. Last thing I need is for you to have to see me suffering too. Come home, bitch. I’m calling from the afterlife.” She lets out a weak cackle that turns into a coughing fit. “My skaters need you, Vera. Skatium needs you. They can’t—” The voicemail ends.

It feels like my heart has stopped.

I sit outside for far too long, waiting for the pain to stop, waiting for the cutting breeze to numb me so I can stop feeling it. I pray for a line, for a pill, for something to take it away. But I can’t keep relying on the things that hurt me to fix me.

Then, it’s her face I see when I blink my eyes closed. Madeline. The craving doesn’t temper, doesn’t subside or dull down. It sits there, at the surface, begging to be tended to. I fill my lungs with air, the inhale stuttering like every oxygen molecule is rubbing the wrong parts of me. My hiccuping is loud, I’m not surprised when I open the door and see her sitting on the couch, elbows on her knees with her hands clasped behind her head.

Her gaze jerks up to me when she hears the door open. “You okay?” She starts to stand, but I’m in her arms in just a few quick strides, knocking her back down and falling apart in her embrace. She squeezes me tight, and the pressure is everything.

Security.

Safety.

Home.

“I will be.”

I’m not okay now, but I will be.

Maybe that’s enough.

* * *

I wake up in bed, not covered in sweat for the first time in what feels like days.

Madeline’s already showered and tripping over her own feet as she scrambles to put her socks on.

“What are you doing?” I’m sleepy, groggy, and without the energy to even lift my head to talk to her.

“D is fixing everything.” She laughs in disbelief. “I gotta go to the rink for a bit…” She doubles back as she’s about to leave the room, and I’m sure she’s wondering if she can leave me on my own. We listened to Asha’s voicemail three more times together last night, crying like little bitches at the last trace of our friend. “Do you want to come?”

I think about it, and I nod. “Can you wait for me?”

“Wait for you?” She chuckles, coming toward me and scooping my face into her hands. “I’d make the whole world wait for you if I was in charge of the sun.”

I push her away with a grin, but she doesn’t back down, kissing me hard and setting the butterflies loose in my stomach. It seems like so long since I’ve felt anything at all, and now, all I want is to feel.

Feel whatever she wants to make me feel.

She wipes the tear from the corner of my eye, ignoring it as she focuses on the smile on my lips. “I love you. And I’m proud of you.”

It’s a heavy burden to bear, but I want it too.

She helps the shirt over my head and assists with the pants, even though she knows I can do that on my own.

I shake my head. “Don’t say that yet. I can still fuck everything up.”

She’s brushing my hair now, gathering up the pieces for the braid she’s become so skilled at fashioning.

“Yeah? So can I. So can anyone else. Anyone can become an addict, Vera. I just need you to focus on yourself right now for me. Can you do that?” she says with so much confidence that I can’t help but feel it in myself too.

“Yeah,” I whisper in agreement, entwining our fingers together as we make our way to Skatium.