Jessica Sorensen - Saving Quinton

“How?” I nearly growl, wiping my chin with my hand. I don’t understand anything other than the fact that it feels like my veins are on fire and I’m melting into something else. “What’s going on?”

He doesn’t answer me, stepping back and motioning at me to get out. “Just get out of the car.”

I figure he’s dumping me, so I climb out, stumbling a little as the cold air hits me. I’ve been so used to the sweltering heat, but now I just feel cold all the time.

“Where are we?” I ask, wrapping my arms around myself. I have a jacket on, but it’s still so cold.

He looks at me with pity as he shuts the door. “I already told you, we’re getting you help.”

I don’t know why he keeps saying this but then I look over at the sign on the building and I understand. “I’m not going to rehab,” I say, reaching back for the door handle. “Now take me out of here.”

He shakes his head and puts his hand on the door. “No, I won’t.”

“Why the fuck not?” I ask, jerking the door open, my body starting to uncontrollably shiver.

He pushes on it and slams it shut. “Because I’m not going to let you ruin your life anymore.”

I almost laugh at him. “Anymore? Why the change of heart? After all these years?”

“Because it’s what your mother would have wanted,” he says in an unsteady voice, but it looks like he’s holding back, not telling me the entire reason. “And I should have realized that a long time ago.”

He’s barely spoken about my mom in the twenty-one years I’ve known him and now all of a sudden he is. More emotion piles over me and I’m not high so I feel it. It’s been a very long time since I’ve been this sober and I feel so lost and disoriented. Sick to my stomach. Overwhelmed. Maybe it’s because of this that I go inside. Or maybe it’s the simple fact that when I look down the road that will take me out of here, it looks so far and I feel so goddamned tired and beaten down. But I walk into that building with zero expectations, because I can’t even think that far ahead yet. I’m moving forward by a half step at a time and sometimes it feels like I’m moving backward. But I manage to get checked in. They take everything of mine away, which is pretty much nothing. Then they give me something that will supposedly help me deal with the withdrawal, but I know it won’t help because it’s not a shot of heroin and that’s the only thing that would make this whole process less painful.

I go into a small room with a bed and a dresser, and then sink down on the bed, feeling too much of this moment. It’s excruciating, the fire in my veins burning hotter and hotter. I feel like ripping my skin off, banging my head on the wall, anything to get the fire—the emotion out of me. I start desperately begging, to the door, to the ceiling, hoping someone will hear me and help me, but all I have are the four walls surrounding me. No one is going to help me out of this. No one is going to hurt me like I want to hurt myself.

So all I can do is take the next breath and then another.

Jessica Sorensen lives in Wyoming with her husband and three children. She is the author of numerous romance novels and her first new adult novels, The Secret of Ella and Micha and The Coincidence of Callie and Kayden, were both New York Times and kindle bestsellers.

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@jessFallenStar